Death Row Inmate Who Killed Bay Area Police Officer Dies

CORCORAN, CA— Condemned California state prison inmate James Odle, 71, died Friday of natural causes, officials with the state's Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation said.

Odle received the death penalty at his sentencing Aug. 12, 1983, in Contra Costa County for the first-degree murders of Pinole teen Rena Aguilar and Pinole Police Officer Floyd "Bernie" Swartz.

Odle was also convicted of vehicle theft, assault with a deadly weapon on a peace officer, and manufacture/sale/possession of a weapon. He also received enhancements for use of a deadly weapon, being armed with a firearm, and use of a firearm.

Officer Swartz's end of watch came on May 3, 1980. According to a news report at the time, he and other Pinole police officers were involved in a manhunt for Odle in connection with the stabbing death two days earlier of 19-year-old Rena Aguilar.

Swartz was shot in the throat with a sawed-off rifle while he and a partner tried to coax Odle out of a hiding spot in dense brush behind a residential area.

Odle surrendered later that day when police officers from across the East Bay responded to assist the grieving members of the Pinole Police Department.

Swartz, a 10-year veteran of the department, was a married father of two whose wife was pregnant with another child.

Three years later, on Aug. 15, 1983, Olde was admitted onto California's death row.

Thirty-seven years later, Olde was pronounced deceased at 12:14 p.m. Friday at an outside hospital, prison officials said.

There are now 709 inmates on California’s death row.

According to state prison officials, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed an executive order in March 2019 instituting a moratorium on the death penalty in California in the form of a reprieve for all people sentenced to death. The executive order also calls for repealing California’s lethal injection protocol and the immediate closing of the execution chamber at San Quentin State Prison. The order does not provide for the release of any individual from prison or otherwise alter any current conviction or sentence.