Suspect in Fernley abduction case has violent criminal history in California
Submitted by Kelsey Penrose on Sat, 03/26/2022 - 11:45am
The small town of Willits, Calif. was rocked in April of 1997 when several teenagers were implicated in the murder of a 19-year-old methamphetamine dealer.
According to the Ukiah Daily Journal, Paul Steven Rodriguez was killed after his 17-year-old girlfriend waited for him on a darkened road and shot him in the head with a shotgun.
According to reports, Alissa Marie Moore and two teenage boys staged a a vehicle breakdown on the road and waited for Rodriguez to appear. When he was looking under the hood of the vehicle, Moore came up behind him and shot him.
Carl Herbert Dulinksy, 19, and Troy Driver, 17, both of Willits, helped to dispose of the body in a nearby woods along with Rodriguez’s burned out vehicle. His remains were located two weeks later, and the three defendants were shortly taken into custody.
The murder of Rodriguez was one of several killings by youths that occurred in the area during the 90s, according to a Los Angeles Times article. Between 1993 and the murder of Rodriguez, six young people had been involved in slayings. Then, while the three teenagers were in custody awaiting trial, another two teenagers were arrested for killing a homeless man after throwing him off of a bridge.
In Aug. 1997, Driver pleaded guilty to being an accessory to murder after the fact, as well as three charges of second-degree robbery of a Ukiah Circle K convenience store and Chevron Service stations in Willits and Rohnert Park, Calif. He also pleaded guilty to second-degree burglary in connection with a break-in of a hardware store.
Driver was sentenced to 15 years in state prison for all of the crimes, and would have to serve 85 percent of his sentence, approximately 12 years.
Now, almost 25 years later, Troy Driver, 41 has been arrested again as a suspect in the abduction case of 18-year-old Naomi Irion in Fernley, Nevada.
Vine Link reported Driver’s full name as Troy Edward Driver, stating he was booked on Friday, March 25, 2022 at 8:28 p.m.
In a press release sent Friday, Lyon County Sheriff’s Office deputies stated that Troy Driver had been taken into custody and held on charges of kidnapping. The suspect truck had been impounded and taken into evidence, and law enforcement is still seeking Irion and information about her whereabouts.
Vinelink listed Troy Edward Driver as being 41, and a search of property records showed that he had addresses listed in Ukiah, Calif., Elko, NV and Fallon, NV. His first residence in Ukiah, Calif. was recorded in 2013, 15 years after he was sentenced to prison.
This is a developing story.
