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Couple found shot in school parking lot

She worked in the school cafeteria. He usually drove her to work. But Monday morning, something went wrong.

By ABBIE VANSICKLE
Published July 31, 2006

TAMPA — Luis Rodriguez  spoke of his parents Monday in both the past and present, as if the grim reality hadn’t fully set in.

“They were happy, real happy,” said Rodriguez, 19, standing behind the chain link fence of his family’s home. “They’ve got two young kids. It doesn’t make sense.”

Earlier that morning, Rodriguez learned that his mother, Ada Campos Rodriguez, 38, and his father, Alfredo Rodriguez, 54, had been found shot to death on the pavement outside Young Middle Magnet, an east Tampa middle school.

As police tried to solve the crime, the Rodriguez’s six children — ages 5 to 19 — struggled to understand what had happened.
“Everybody loved my mom,” Luis Rodriguez said.

He last spoke with her Monday morning. She called out to him before she left for her first day of work as the head of the middle school’s cafeteria. She reminded him to check on his new job.

That’s all he remembers. Nothing out of the ordinary, he said.

His father, who was on disability because of a bus accident, typically dropped her off at work about 6 a.m., Luis Rodriguez said.

It’s unclear what happened next. By 6:20 a.m., someone making a delivery to the school had found the bodies  .

Luis Rodriguez and his brother, Ivan, learned of the deaths when a detective came to their door that morning.

By evening, the younger children still didn’t know what happened. The older brothers hadn’t figured out how to tell them.

Police told the older boys that they were looking into the possibility of a murder-suicide. To the boys, it seemed unimaginable.

“I don’t even know, I just know it  isn’t suicide,” said Luis Rodriguez.

Ivan agreed.

“I think it was a murder,” he said.

Both remembered their parents as a loving and happy pair. They wanted their children to get an education above all else. Ada Rodriguez envisioned her eldest son in a business suit, not the dirty clothes of a cafeteria worker.

Ada and Alfredo married 21 years ago. He grew up in Cuba; she, in Puerto Rico. Both eventually moved to New York.They met at an arcade, when Ada noticed him struggling to understand the Pac Man video game. She helped him and they hit it off.

The two started a family and moved to Minnesota, then Florida. They’ve been in Tampa for seven years, Luis Rodriguez said.

Ada Rodriguez was hired as a cafeteria worker for Hillsborough County schools in August 2003, according to school spokeswoman Linda Cobbe. Rodriguez’s job evaluations were stellar, each praising her for going beyond what was expected, Cobbe said.

Recently, she was picked to head the lunchroom. Monday would have been her first day in the new job.

In the days before her death, she told her co-workers how happy she was, Cobbe said. None of them noticed anything unusual.

After the bodies were discovered, school staff gathered, Cobbe said. The lunchroom crew went home early. Crisis counselors will be available for them.

As for the Rodriguez children, school officials will do whatever they can to help, Cobbe said.

The children — Luis, 19, Ivan, 18; Carmen, 17; Maria, 14; Sampson, 7; and Isaiah, 5 — all live at the family’s home on 24th Avenue, not far from Young Middle Magnet.

Several officials went over to the family’s home on Monday.

“They are making sure (the children) are getting all the help they need,” Cobbe said.

Since Luis and Ivan are adults, the others will likely stay with them or be placed with other family, said police spokesman Larry McKinnon.

Researcher Cathy Wos contributed to this report. Abbie VanSickle can be reached at 226-3373 or vansickle@sptimes.com.

[Last modified July 31, 2006, 22:44:34]