she had become a kidnap victim rather than a runaway. However, there was little trace of exactly when or how she had disappeared. Kondro had been friends with Rima's parents and was apparently drinking beer with Traxler's stepfather on the day she vanished. He was questioned by police, but not named as a person of interest in the case. Abduction and murder of Kara Rudd, arrest and prosecution On November 21, 1996, 12-year-old Kara Rudd vanished after entering a car on the grounds of her middle school in to Monticello. As with the Traxler case, Rudd had been a popular girl with no behavioral issues and was not suspected as a runaway. Again there was a connection to Joseph Kondro, but this time the suspicions were more concrete. Kondro had been a childhood friend of Kara's mother, was known to the victim herself, and had frequently stayed in the family's garage before being evicted due to his chronic drinking issues. Kondro was seen with lacerations on his skin that he could not explain shortly after Rudd's disappearance, suggestive of scratches from a girl's long nails acquired in a struggle. Most strikingly, Rudd had told a classmate of her plan to skip school on the day of her disappearance and was seen entering Kondro's vehicle, a Pontiac Firebird, making him the last person to be seen with her prior to her disappearance. Authorities still lacked sufficient evidence to make an arrest, but after a fruitless six week search, local detective Scott McDaniel decided to inspect the Mount Solo area near the Columbia River, which Kondro was known to frequent. There, police found Rudd's body inside an abandoned Volkswagen; she had been raped and strangled. The car allowed the preservation of critical forensic evidence, and DNA samples from the crime scene matched Kondro, who was arrested for Rudd's murder. Under interrogation, Kondro admitted that he had taken Rudd to a swimming hole in Germany Creek, and then to an abandoned house near the Columbia River, where he raped and strangled her. To avoid the death penalty, Kondro and his attorneys struck a deal with prosecutors, in which he confessed to the murder of Traxler more than a decade before. Kondro explained that he was already known and liked by the Traxler family, and he was able to trick the girl into entering his vehicle by mentioning the word "unicorn", a safety password