Phillip Carl Jablonski was an American serial killer convicted of killing five women in California and Utah between 1978 and 1991.
Crimes and Convictions
In 1972 Jablonski raped a female acquaintance at knifepoint in her home, while her infant child was in the room with them. Luckily the woman escaped with her life, grabbed her child and ran to a neighbor's house, who promptly called the police. Jablonski was arrested and convicted for the rape.
In February 1977, Jablonski met a woman by the name of Linda Kimball. They started living together that August in Palm Springs. Kimball became pregnant and gave birth to their daughter in December 1977. On the night of July 6th, 1978, Kimball's mother Isobel Pahls, who lived nearby, was awakened by Jablonski. He told her he had come to rape her but didn’t go through with it because when he looked at her face "all he could see was Linda's face." Pahls escaped to a neighbor's house but did not report the incident to police. A few days later, Kimball left Jablonski and she and their daughter moved in with her mother.
On July 16, 1978, Kimball returned to pick up some belongings for their baby. She was found dead inside the apartment that afternoon. She had been beaten, stabbed, and strangled. Jablonski was arrested for the murder 11 days later and served 12 years in prison. He was released on parole for good behavior in 1990, even though, in 1985 he attempted to strangle his mother using a shoelace.
In 1982, Jablonski met and married Carol Spadoni. After Spadoni responded to a newspaper ad placed while Jablonski was serving time in prison. On April 23, 1991, Spadoni 46, and her 72 year old mother, Eva Petersen were murdered at their home in Burlingame. Spadoni was shot, suffocated with duct tape, then stabbed, while Petersen was sexually assaulted and shot.
On April 1991 Jablonski was charged with the death of death of Fathyma Vann, 38, in Indio, California. Vann was a fellow student at the local community college that Jablonski attended as the conditions of his parole. Vann, a recently widowed mother of two teenage girls. She was found shot in the head and sexually assaulted, lying naked in a shallow ditch in the Indio desert with the words "I Love Jesus" carved in her back. Her body had been subjected to other mutilations including removal of her eyes and ears.
On April 25, 1991, Jablonski stopped at a rest stop in Uinta County, Wyoming and pointed a gun at Yvette Shelby. She managed to escape when he dropped the gun. She drove to the next truck stop and called police. Police questioned him about the incident but claimed that the gun had accidentally fallen out of his car as he was getting out. The officer who questioned him accepted his explanation and let him go.
Jablonski was also charged with the robbery and subsequent murder of Margie Rogers, 58, in Grand County, Utah, on April 27, 1991; Her body was found on Interstate 70 where she and her husband owned a store. Rogers had been sexually assaulted and shot twice in the head.
He was apprehended on April 28, 1991, in Kansas. He was found guilty of the murders and sentenced to the death penalty In January 2006, the California Supreme Court upheld Jablonski's death sentence on appeal.
Jablonski died on December 27, 2019, of "unknown causes" at the age of 73 in San Quentin State Prison in his cell.
Before His death Jablonski used to write to multiple pen pales from his cell and he would occasionally send them his artwork. The letters and drawings are frequently sold and bought online by True Crime enthusiasts. A few of his letters are available to read free online if curiosity gets the better of you,
