Biography

Ricky Rodriguez was born on January 25, 1975 in Tenerife, Canary Islands, Spain. He was married to Elixcia Munumel. He died on January 9, 2005 in Blythe, California, USA.

Biological son of Karen Zerby. Brother of Faith Zerby and Deborah Davis.

Rick's birth name was David Moses Zerby. His mother was Karen Zerby and his biological father was an anonymous hotel staffer in Tenerife, Canary Islands, whom his mother had "flirty fished," a tradition of the Children of God cult she belonged to with her husband, cult founder, David Berg. On July 13th, 1994, Rick changed his name for the last time to Richard Peter Rodriguez.

Born into the religious cult, The Children of God, Rick was raised by his mother, Karen Zerby and cult founder, David Berg as Berg's heir-apparent. Rick was a poster child for the cult's perverse practices, which included the mandatory practices for followers to engage in incest and sexual abuse of children on daily schedules. A 726 page book about Rick, "The Story of Davidito," was published (in Spain) showing photos of Rick growing up to the age of three. The book, now banned for sale, has many photos of Rick being proudly sexually abused as a child by his nannies and others in the cult (that now goes by The Family International.) Rick left the cult with a chip on his shoulder at the age of 20, very angry at his role in the organization he came to despise.

On January 4th, 2005, depressed and angry, Rick made a home video wherein he detailed his plans to hunt down and kill certain members of the cult group that abused him as a child. In particular he was hoping to find his mother, Karen Zerby for he was particularly mad at her for the abuse he suffered that she seemed to happily participate in doing. Not finding his mother, the next day, Rick called one of his former nannies, Angela Smith and called on her under the pretense of having dinner with him at his Tucson apartment. Rick fatally stabbed Smith five times, before eventually turning the gun on himself, January 5th, 2005, and fatally shooting himself in the head in Blythe, California. His story can be found in the movie 'Cult Killer: The Story of Rick Rodriguez (2006) (TV)' and 'Children of God: Lost and Found (2007)'.