Georgia man arrested in 30-year cold case murder of 17-year-old girl

SOUTH FULTON COUNTY, Ga. — A teen’s murder from 1991 may soon finally be solved after the arrest of a Georgia man.

A district attorney in Middlesex County, Massachusetts announced the murder indictment of 48-year-old Rodney Daniels on Wednesday. He was arrested in South Fulton County on Monday.

On July 20, 1991, just after 3 a.m., police responded to the third floor apartment at 21-23 Henry Street, Malden, Massachusetts where the 17-year-old victim, Patricia Moreno, was found with a single gunshot wound to the head. Patricia had been living at the home after being placed with a foster family. 

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The investigation revealed that the victim’s foster mother, her two teenage daughters and her daughter’s boyfriend, Rodney Daniels, were also in the apartment.

When police and emergency medical personnel arrived, Patricia was alone, face down, on the third floor fire escape landing, still breathing but seriously injured. The victim was rushed to Massachusetts General Hospital, where it was determined that she had suffered an irreversible brain injury. She died that afternoon as a direct result of the gunshot wound. No weapon or cartridge casing was recovered from the scene.

The surviving occupants of the apartment claimed that they had heard a pair of gunshots, but had no information on the shooter. There was no evidence of forced entry into the home. During the investigation police interviewed Daniels, who claimed that he had been sleeping in an armchair in the living room when he was awakened by the sound of two gunshots, and that he walked out onto the fire escape where he found Moreno.  Moreno’s foster mother then called for police and an ambulance.

Over the course of the investigation police learned that Daniels had been in possession of multiple handguns close in time to the murder.  Further investigation also revealed that Daniels had engaged in threatening behavior toward Moreno in the weeks before her death. Numerous parties were interviewed over the course of many years but no arrest was made in the case.

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In 2020, after the case had been assigned to the Middlesex District Attorney’s Office unit dedicated to these types of uncharged cases, crime scene investigators returned to 21-23 Henry St. and reconstructed the position of the victim on the third-floor fire escape. Based on the position of the entry wound and the downward trajectory of the bullet, the path of the bullet was consistent with having been fired by an individual standing in the area of the doorway to the apartment, where Moreno had been staying with her foster family, and where Daniels had been staying that evening.

As investigators continued to search for new information, they began re-interviewing witnesses and were also able to locate a witness who had been out of the country for an extended period. That witness, who lived in the second-floor apartment at the time of Moreno’s murder, revealed that on the night of the murder the witness had been awakened by a loud noise and immediately looked to the fire escape. The witness was able to provide a physical description of the party, which was consistent with the appearance of Daniels, and described the man immediately retreating into the apartment and closing the door behind him.

As a result of the new information investigators applied for and obtained a warrant from the Malden District Court for the arrest of Daniels on the charge of murder. He was arraigned in Georgia as a fugitive from justice and is being transported back to Massachusetts to be arraigned.

“After three decades we have taken the first steps today to hold accountable the person who we allege took Tricia’s life. It is always with mixed emotions that we make these announcements as we know this will not fill the void caused by the loss of a daughter, a sister and a friend to many,” said District Attorney Ryan. “I do hope, however, that it brings hope to some of the families who are still awaiting answers. This is a case that was solved not by a new development in forensic science, but as a result of relentless investigative work and a change in circumstances for some parties involved. When we created a dedicated unit to look at our uncharged cases, we hoped for outcomes like this one. We know that time can change many things and in this case we were able to uncover new information that led us to this arrest.”

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