SAN DIEGO -- A convicted rapist was found guilty today of the 1993 strangulation murders of two young South Bay boys, setting the stage for a penalty phase of trial that could end with a jury's death recommendation.

The verdict in the Scott Erskine case came on the second day of deliberations.

In her closing argument Tuesday, prosecutor Valerie Summers said Scott Erskine, (pictured, right), could have taken up to five minutes to kill each victim.

The prosecutor said the evidence was "uncontested" that Erskine bound, gagged, molested and strangled 13-year-old Charlie Keever and 9-year-old Jonathan Sellers on March 27, 1993.

Erskine, 40, molested and killed the boys to satisfy his sexual desires, Summers said. He is charged with two counts of murder, with allegations that he used a rope to strangle the two boys.

The two boys were on a bicycle ride in South San Diego, near the Otay River, when Erskine attacked them and took them into an igloo-style fort covered with brush.

Summers said it may never be known which of the boys died first, and which one had to watch the other one die. It was "a horrible way to die," the prosecutor said.

DNA samples were collected from the victims, but it wasn't until 2001 that advanced DNA technology allowed scientists to learn that someone else's DNA was left in Keever's mouth, the prosecutor said.

A "cold DNA hit" on prison inmates revealed a match between the DNA left in Keever's mouth and Erskine, Summers said.

Erskine's DNA was also found on two cigarette butts found outside the fort, the prosecutor said.

Deputy Public Defender Juliana Humphrey told jurors that it was human nature to be curious and "want to know what happened" to the victims.

The defendant was serving a 70-year sentence for raping a woman in October 1993 when he was charged with killing the two boys.

Investigators in Palm Beach, Fla., are looking at Erskine as a suspect in the 1989 rape and murder of a 26-year-old woman, Summers said.