SANTA MARIA, Calif. — Nearly 38 years after the killing of Ofelia Sandoval, a California woman, a Georgia man has been found guilty of first-degree murder.
Aloysius James, 58, was convicted of strangling 30-year-old Sandoval in 1988 at the Town Center Motel, where she lived. Sandoval’s body was discovered by her boyfriend on September 18, 1988. At the time, her roommates reported seeing her walk toward the room with an unknown man.
Despite early investigations, the case went cold in 1989. In the 2000s, DNA collected from Sandoval’s room was used to develop a profile of an unknown male suspect, but no matches were found in local or national databases.
In 2018, the Federal Bureau of Investigation partnered with Santa Maria police to obtain a covert DNA sample from James, which matched the evidence from Sandoval’s autopsy. Authorities obtained an arrest warrant, and James was taken into custody in Georgia on April 16, 2024.
James was charged with first-degree murder, with a special allegation that the killing occurred during an attempted rape. Trial hearings began in January 2026, and on February 27, a jury found him guilty of first-degree murder with the special circumstance of murder in the commission of a rape.
A sentencing hearing is scheduled for April 14, where James could face life in prison without the possibility of parole. Investigators believe James may be connected to additional unreported crimes, including threats, sexual assaults, and domestic abuse.
The investigation involved multiple agencies, including the Santa Maria Police Department, Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Office, Hall County SWAT, the FBI, and the Department of Justice DNA Laboratory.
