Today, I somberly bring to you the horrific case of Linda Lee Daniels. Like Carly Martinez and Arietta Chandler, Linda Lee Daniels was just living her life, doing nothing wrong, when she was murdered by a group of men.
Daniels was a gifted anthropology student at the University of New Mexico. She was pretty and smart. Her fiancé was very lucky to have her.
Then she was targeted by Johnny Zinn, Signey Sliger, Wallace Pierce, and James Scartaccini simply because she was an attractive young woman. She died a horrific death that no one deserves. This is her story.
Daniels was grocery shopping on January 12, 1986. Four men were cruising the area, searching for a woman to star in a pornographic flick they wanted to make. They zeroed in on the pretty UNM student with long blonde hair and they followed her to her boyfriend’s house near Manzano High School. They abducted her when she pulled into her boyfriend’s driveway. Her boyfriend came outside to find her Mustang parked in his driveway, the driver door ajar, groceries trailing toward his door, and a can of Mace rolled under the car.
In the Canyon Motel on Central, the four men held Daniels at knifepoint and took turns raping her for hours. The next day, they determined to take her to Farmington to meet the film maker for the porn. But they realized that Daniels’ disappearance was on the news and too many people were looking for her. So instead they took her out to the Jemez Mountains, shot her, and left her dead in a culvert. Her clothed body escaped detection for ten days.
The hunt for Daniels caused lots of panic in the community of Albuquerque. It also caused police to look more closely at other local disappearances and unsolved murders of other women, which seemed to be occurring with particular evil frequency in the 80s. Fortunately, Daniels’ case did not go on to become one of the many cold cases from the 80s that I write about. That’s because her killers decided to use her credit cards. The police tracked them down by purchases made around the city. Then James Scartaccini squealed like a pig and turned all of his accomplices in for an immunity deal. He even led the cops to the body, which they claimed they never would have located otherwise.
Daniels lay under the snow. She had been violated and shot in the brain and dumped like trash. Albuquerque resident James Curry wrote a letter to the Albuquerque Journal about how he used to play in the area where she was dumped in the Jemez; it was a getaway and a special place to him. Now, the beautiful bridge near a campground is a dark reminder of evil.
Johnny Zinn was 44 at the time of the crime. He liked to brag that he was a drug dealer for the Mafia. When he promised the other 3 men $1500 each for procuring a woman for a porn, he became the mastermind of one of the most horrific crimes in Albuquerque history. His three friends failed to procure a woman, so Zinn began to threaten them. That’s when they went scouting for a woman and found Daniels.
Zinn got life plus 96 years and died in prison at the age of 74 in 2015. James Scartaccini was only 17 when he took part in the crime. He was a high school dropout and a creep, enticed by the money Zinn promised. He did no time due to his immunity deal, which caused a lot of public controversy. He hanged himself in 1990; he apparently couldn’t live with the guilt. Wallace Pierce was 24 and he got 66 years for firing the fatal shot that ended this young girl’s life. Signey Sliger was 20 and he did only 3 years for rape, which is just disgusting. He is now living in Tucumcari.
Sources:
https://www.abqjournal.com/161355/a-crime-that-shocked-us-all.html
https://apnews.com/article/914cf7e5eec56841b32cee8a6e824f94
https://www.koat.com/article/mastermind-of-brutal-nm-murder-dies-in-prison/5061778
https://www.abqjournal.com/534433/farewell-to-the-criminal-of-albuquerques-nightmares.html