Former NFL Cheerleader, Linda Sobek (Alex Paris/Pinterest).
Linda Sobek is defined by a few things: her killer, her death, her beauty, and her career. Those are key aspects of her life story. However, Linda was someone’s daughter, someone’s prom date, a little girl with hopes and dreams. Let’s get to know Sobek as a person first.
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Little Linda Sobek
Linda Elaine Sobek was born in 1968 in Los Angeles to her parents, Bob and Elaine. She also grew up with her brother, Steve.
Ever since she was a little girl, Linda wanted to be a model. She would even drop out of high school to pursue modeling full-time.
Linda’s pursuit of modeling is impressive considering she doesn’t fit the typical “look” for a model. Her beautiful blonde hair and tiny frame (she was less than 100 pounds) fit the American beauty standard well, but it was her 5″3″ height that was limiting.
Most models were and are still much closer to the six-foot mark. But Linda Sobek wasn’t going to let a little thing like height block her from her dream.
Employers would describe Linda as reliable, professional, and hard-working. Friends described her as not being a respecter of persons and being engaging and sweet.
Family Dynamics
Sobek was always very close to her family, talking to her parents and her brother regularly and maintaining a close connection with all three. Friends would say that, besides modeling, all Linda wanted in this world was to be a wife and mother some day.
Unfortunately, after her passing, things were difficult for the family. Interestingly, Elaine Sobek would pursue roles in crime dramas in the 2000s like Forensic Files and American Justice.
In 2017, Elaine took Steve Sobek to court for elder abuse and domestic violence. It’s unclear what the results of the cases were, but a restraining order was filed. The impacts of a crime on a family can be long-lasting and insidious.
Linda Sobek Heads to the NFL
Sobek got her career started by applying and winning a slot on the NFL cheerleading squad with the Los Angeles Raiders. Competition was high, but Linda’s work ethic and skill level were higher.
Linda was the perfect Raiderette. She was beautiful, she could dance, and she was very engaging. Being a friendly woman who could present herself well was crucial since the cheerleaders in Los Angeles attended a lot of community events on behalf of the team.
It’s not completely clear when Linda Sobek became a Raiderette, but it does appear that she was likely very young, so 18 isn’t unlikely. This would place her on the squad in the mid- to late 1980s.
The Los Angeles Raiderettes
The Raiderettes formed in 1961 and have a vivid history. In its infancy, the cheerleading squad was originally a team of one. Quickly, the team grew and was an entire group of high school girls—this was fairly common for the time, which doesn’t make it any less creepy.
In the 1970s, the squad upgraded to women (it seems) and expanded from 18 to 36 throughout the decade. Actual auditions were held in Oakland as well. Things were getting more sophisticated quickly.
The decade that Linda joined the squad was also a big time of growth for the Raiderettes. The group expanded twice, from 42 to 45 ladies, and they had multiple choreographers. By the 1980s, the squad grew in popularity rapidly. The applications were through the roof.
Linda Sobek was part of the NFL cheerleading squad at a very exciting time, staying on the team for five seasons. She leveraged being in the public eye well, as the NFL was the catalyst for her career.
Linda Sobek the Model
The former NFL cheerleader stuck with calendar and commercial-type roles as a model. She was featured in magazines like Grapevine and also did a lot of pin-up and nude modeling shoots.
Sobek’s IMDb profile shows that she was on the hour-long documentary “Wheels, Heels, and Hot Licks.” Linda was also supposed to be auditioning for a role in “Married with Children,” but actually ended up meeting with her killer for an impromptu photo shoot just prior to the audition. One that she would never end up attending.
A Model is Missing
On November 16th, 1995, Linda called her mother, Elaine, to check in, as she was apt to do. The model was in a hurry because she had scheduled a last-minute photo shoot and told her mother she would call later.
Elaine would report her daughter missing the next day after not hearing from her. Former Raiderette and friend of Linda’s, Denise Villanueva, a public relations expert, got Linda’s information in the media ASAP.
Sobek fits the blonde, blue-eyed, beautiful woman who is well-known in the public eye. The media snapped it up, with the help of Denise, who highlighted the things about Linda that would attract them with a compelling press release.
This wasn’t a controversial topic at the time, although in recent times we have had more open conversations about the unfair amount of attention that some women (white women) receive versus others (women of color).
Villanueva’s press release worked. There were over 100 calls an hour as soon as Sobek’s missing person case hit the media.
The Hot Tip
A man who was working to maintain Angeles National Park found some photos of Linda in a trash can. He kept the modeling shots because he found Sobek to be very beautiful.
Upon hearing about the case in the news and noticing the woman in the photos was a missing person, the man immediately reached out to the police.
The police investigated the area and found a leasing agreement for Mr. Charles Rathbun in the same trashcan. That vehicle was returned on November 20th by Charles and was subsequently investigated by the police. Linda’s planner was also in the trashcan that kept on giving. The page with appointments for the day she died was conveniently ripped out. You’re not sneaky, Rathbun.
Rathbun was arrested on November 24th, 1995.
Rathbun’s Lies
Rathbun had told a friend who was a reserve member of a police force that he was guilty of the crime and was going to end it all in the days after he killed Linda. The friend thought his confession was hogwash but did try to help save his life.
He accidentally injured one of his friends when he shot the ground with one of the 100 firearms police would later find in his home, and the bullet ricocheted off the ground and hit her. He was arrested for that incident and then started talking to the cops once he was in custody.
Initially, the big fat liar said he met her at Denny’s (why is it always Denny’s?), said she wasn’t a good fit for the modeling job, and he drove away.
The Denny’s part is at least true. Linda’s car was parked at the diner on the 16th and was still there when police investigated days later.
When that jig was up, Rathbun tried another story a little closer to the truth.
The 2nd Rendition
Charles told the police that he had bet Linda $60 to finish a bottle of tequila, so she was quite inebriated.
Somehow Linda was outside the vehicle he had a lease for that she was supposed to be modeling. Red pill Rathbun was doing doughnuts in a dry lake bed at the national park, trying to show Linda how to do them right for the shoot. Things went south when he accidentally clipped her with the car, and she died.
Why is Charlie a red piller, you might ask? He had the nerve to say that Linda was a stuck-up b*tch. In other words, she wouldn’t give him what he wanted.
The Third Time is Not the Charm
Prince charming Charlie realized forensics wasn’t matching up to his little story. In his third retelling, he didn’t actually hit her; he just almost did. She jumped back and cut her head instead.
In anger, 99-pound, 5-foot Linda started kicking at the car, and Rathbun was afraid of damage to the car. So, he pinned her in the backseat to get her to stop and accidentally strangled her. He then tried to revive her in the creek bed.
When she didn’t wake up, he tried to get her back in the car. The 6″3″ man was unable to for some reason, so he tried to help balance her by tying her legs together with an ace bandage. Give this man a writing contract because he could write an entire Brothers Grimm novel in a day with that kind of imagination.
Rathbun knew things weren’t going to go well, so he ended up taking a razor to his wrists in prison, writing on the wall in his own blood that he never meant to hurt anyone. The police felt it was a manipulative tactic.
Charles in Court
We’ll keep this short and not at all sweet. Creepy Charles had another version of his story. He alleged that things were consensual and the whole strangling thing was fun times going too far.
He even procured photos that would make your grandmother clutch her pearls and her rosary of a woman in a different car, posed and without her face showing. Charlie implied that that was Linda when they were doing front hugs.
The jury didn’t buy it and suspected the photos were either fake or of someone else entirely. Photoshop was in its infancy at that point. More than likely, the rotten Rathbun likely lied for the millionth time and defiled another woman by destroying her privacy by showing off her photos in court.
There’s reason to believe that Charlie might have been a serial offender, but we don’t know that to be true, although it is thought-provoking. More information on that can be found here. Either way, he’s rotting behind bars, where he belongs.
The Truth Behind Linda Sobek’s Death
After leading the boys in blue on a series of dead ends, the murderer finally led them to Linda Sobek’s shallow grave, where she had been for nearly nine days and, thanks to the cold weather, had been fully preserved.
There was no sign that Linda had been hit by a car. She had defensive marks where she had tried to fight her attacker off. She died of asphyxiation, likely from strangulation, and she had been violated in the most intimate way with a firearm.
Justice was fought for in her case, and the defendant was charged with 1st degree murder and assault of a certain nature with a penalty of life in prison with no chance of parole.
Linda’s Legacy
Linda’s family and friends still remember the young woman regularly. Sobek was an amazing daughter and friend who had love and respect for everyone.
The world lost out when Linda Sobek’s life was taken from it. We aren’t lucky enough to see the great things this wonderful young woman would have continued to do in her life.
RIP, Linda Sobek. You are gone, but never forgotten.
