9. ERIC PIERSON
Eric Pierson was first convicted of murder in 1993. He beat and strangled 17-year-old Kristina
Whitaker in Davie, Florida. He was only 28 years old at the time he committed this heinous offense.
He had been in and out of prison since he was a teenager. By the time he killed Kristina, Pierson
had already done time for attempted first-degree murder and armed burglary. In 1985, he broke into
a woman’s home and cut her throat. She survived, and he served just 4 years of an 18-year sentence.
Pierson received a 40-year sentence for Kristina’s murder. He was released in 2020, after serving
27 years. Barely a year later, he was arrested again for allegedly killing 33-year-old
Erika Verdecia and throwing her body into a canal behind his house. She was a single mom.
The repeat offender reportedly confessed to murdering Verdecia with a screwdriver,
which he used to stab her twice in the neck and once in each eye. Pierson claimed that he
committed the act in self-defense, but it’s hard to believe that the 6-foot, 8-inch (2m) giant
would need to defend himself against a woman who was 5 foot 7 and weighed 160 pounds (73kg)
A witness saw Erika with what they described as a “grimy” man at a sandwich shop shortly before
her murder. They were also together during a traffic stop on the day she was killed.
Pierson initially told police that they had parted ways at a gas station,
and that he had no idea where she went after that. But surveillance footage proved that
the pair were at the gas station before police pulled them over, and that Pierson was lying.
Officers found blood inside his pick-up truck, and Pierson’s girlfriend
told them that he had made disturbing comments while staring at the canal
where he dumped Erika’s remains, including that the police had no case without a body.
Erika’s mother, Carmen, believes that Pierson had too many second chances,
and that he shouldn’t have been free in the first place when he murdered her daughter.
It’s an understandable sentiment – one that many people probably agree with.
8. ARTHUR BOMAR
In 1978, Arthur Bomar got into an argument over a parking space in Las Vegas and ended up killing
someone. He served 11 years for it, and then moved to Pennsylvania in 1990 to be near his family.
Bomar was arrested later that year for allegedly pulling a woman out of her car and assaulting
her. In 1993, he was convicted for assault after getting in a bar fight. These arrests should have
gotten his parole revoked, but Bomar’s crimes flew under the radar. And that’s unfortunate
because if he had been sent back to prison, it would have stopped him from killing again.
He murdered 22-year-old Aimee Willard in 1996 while she was on her way home from a night out
with friends. The victim’s car was found on a highway exit in Pennsylvania. There was a pool
of blood nearby, along with Aimee’s panties and shoes. Her body was found 17 miles (27 km) away
in a garbage-strewn parking lot in North Philadelphia. She had been beaten and raped.
Detectives investigated numerous leads, but the case went cold for two years. A break
finally came when Bomar hit a woman while driving. They both pulled over, and he tried
persuading her to get out of the car, but she refused and instead memorized the plate number.
It was registered to Bomar, but the car belonged to Maria Cabuenos, who had gone missing that year.
Bomar was convicted of Aimee’s murder based on DNA evidence and was sentenced to death.
He denies having any role in the crime and is in the process of appealing his sentence.
7. STEVEN PRATT
One day in 1984, 15-year-old Steven Pratt shot and killed his neighbor.
He was given a 30-year prison sentence and was released in 2016. The 45-year-old
returned to his old neighborhood, where his 64-year-old mother Gwendolyn Pratt lived.
Steven’s family accepted him back with open arms and even threw him a welcome home party.
And he showed his appreciation – or lack of it – by killing his mother just
two days after his release. She died from blunt force trauma to the head.
A neighbor told CBS News that before the murder,
Steven had gotten into an argument with his aunt and asked his cousin if he could
stay at their home. He had just gotten out of prison, and things were already going badly.
The repeat offender immediately expressed remorse at his initial court appearance.
He admitted to killing his mom and said “I have failed. I don’t want a
trial. I’m guilty.” Steven pleaded guilty to manslaughter and received a 25-year sentence,
which he must serve 85 percent of before he’ll be considered for parole.
6. DAVID EDWARD MAUST
Life got off to a rough start for David Edward Maust.
His mother dropped him off at a mental institution when he was nine years old.
He then went to a children’s home, where he was abused by a teenager. His history
of violence goes back to childhood, when he choked two other kids and tortured a squirrel.
Maust joined the U.S. Army as a young adult and was stationed in Germany during the early 1970s.
In 1974, he killed a 13-year-old boy.
He was convicted of manslaughter and served three years of a four-year prison sentence.
In 1979, after moving back to the States, Maust stabbed a friend while he slept and
was accused of attempted murder. But he somehow maintained his freedom, and two years later,
he drowned 15-year-old Donald Jones. He then stabbed, but didn’t kill a 14-year-old boy.
While in prison for the stabbing, Maust was extradited to Illinois for the Jones murder.
He was found unfit to stand trial and spent the next 12 years in mental health facilities
and jail while awaiting trial, and received credit for it as time served.
It knocked his 35-year sentence down to 17 years, and he was released in 1999.
The prosecutor fought to keep Maust incarcerated, and Maust himself even wrote to the Illinois
Department of Corrections telling them that they shouldn’t release him. But the
agency cut him loose, and in 2001 he once again proved that he can’t control his urge to kill.
That year, Maust repeatedly hit someone in the back of the head with a metal pipe,
but the person survived and declined to press charges.
In 2003, the body of 16-year-old James Raganyi was found encased in cement on the serial killer’s
property. He was charged with killing Ragyani and for two other murders. It was finally clear that
Maust was right in saying that he belongs in prison, and he was sentenced to three life terms.
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5. ANDREW DAWSON
At just 19 years old, Andrew Dawson stabbed an elderly man to death
in Ormskirk, England. He plunged a knife into 91-year-old shopkeeper Henry Walsh in 1981
after entering the store to rob it. By then, the young man already had a reputation around town
for stealing money. When Walsh said to Dawson “I know who you are,” it propelled him into a rage.
Dawson expressed remorse in court. It didn’t spare him from prison, but he saw freedom again
in 2001, when he was paroled. He ended up back in custody three times over the following years,
but managed to avoid returning to prison.
The killer’s time on the outside would eventually come to an end.
In 2011, Dawson went to the homes of two neighbors – 66-year-old John David Matthews
and 58-year-old Paul Hancock – and asked the men if he could use their washing machines.
He stabbed them both to death and left their bodies in their bathtubs.
While searching Dawson’s home, police found a handwritten confession to one of the murders,
which was signed the “Angel of Mercy.” When asked why he killed the two victims,
he reportedly told officers that he had experienced the urge to kill.
Dawson admitted to the killings in court but reportedly expressed no remorse.
He received a life sentence with no possibility of parole.
4. DARRYL KEMP
Serial killer and rapist Darryl Kemp was sentenced to death for raping and murdering Marjorie
Hipperson in her Los Angeles apartment in 1957. His sentence was commuted to life in 1972 when the
Supreme Court of California ruled that the death penalty was unconstitutional. Kemp was paroled
in 1978, getting a second chance at freedom that very few people on death row ever see.
Almost immediately after his release, he attacked and murdered Armida Wiltsey. Police investigated
Kemp, but couldn’t find any evidence that definitively tied him to the crime,
and the case went cold.
He went on to rape several women in Texas, and he was sentenced to life in prison.
When the Wiltsey case was reopened in 2000,
detectives realized that they could test blood found beneath Kemp’s fingernails for DNA,
as well as hair and other evidence from the crime scene. Three years later, the results came in:
it was a match. Even though Kemp was already in prison for life, he was tried for the murder. In
2009, a jury decided that the 72-year-old deserved to be executed, and he was sentenced to death.
3. KENNETH MCDUFF
Kenneth Allen McDuff began his life of crime in the early 1960s at age 18, when he was
convicted of multiple counts of burglary in Texas. He was released from prison in 1965.
Less than a year later, he and an accomplice named Roy Dale Green took three teenagers captive.
McDuff shot 17-year-old Robert Brand and 15-year-old Mark Dunman. Then,
he and Green proceeded to rape 16-year-old Edna Louise Sullivan repeatedly. Using a
3-foot-long (1 meter) broomstick, McDuff strangled her to death, then dumped her body in some bushes.
McDuff was originally sentenced to death, but his sentence was commuted to life when Texas
outlawed executions. He hired a lawyer, who collected evidence pointing the finger at
Green as the murderer rather than the accomplice. The parole board
thought McDuff could contribute to society and granted parole in 1989.
Kenneth allegedly began killing again three days after his release, but he was never charged with
murdering the victim. After returning to prison for a parole violation and being re-released,
he went on a killing spree, torturing as many as six prostitutes to death over a five-month span.
Police eventually identified McDuff as a suspect in the murders, which were happening in different
parts of Texas. He slipped away to Kansas City, Missouri where he began working at a garbage
collection company under the alias Richard Fowler. A coworker recognized McDuff after he was featured
on America’s Most Wanted and he was sent back to Texas to face justice. He was executed in 1998.
2. ARTHUR SHAWCROSS
In 1972, Arthur Shawcross raped and killed two children aged 8 and 10 in his hometown of
Watertown, New York. He took a plea bargain that allowed him to plead guilty to manslaughter in
exchange for a 25-year sentence. After serving 14 years, he was paroled early. Prison staff
had determined that he was no longer a threat to society, despite the heinous nature of his crimes.
Shawcross moved to Rochester in response to a public outcry about his release and went on
to commit at least 12 more murders throughout 1988 and 1989. He drove through the streets,
targeting prostitutes and earning himself the nickname of the Genessee River Killer.
His first victim of this second spate of crimes was a 27-year-old sex worker
named Dorothy Blackburn, whom he strangled and tossed into the river.
The murders continued from there and went unsolved for a long time. Investigators
looked into possible suspects, but authorities had sealed Shawcross’s record after his prison release
to prevent people in Rochester from finding out about his history and panicking. He was finally
caught after his van was connected to the crimes and someone managed to get the plate number.
Shawcross confessed to 11 murders and received a 250-year sentence.
He died in prison in 2008 at 63 years old.
1. DESMOND LEE
Desmond Lee was a teen when his boyfriend broke up with him
and left their shared home in Bradford, England in 1989. The ex went back to his former lover,
and Lee’s landlady, Shirley Carr, supposedly taunted him about the split.
Lee, who had been drinking heavily, became full of rage and pinned Ms. Carr to the floor.
He suffocated her to death and was sentenced to life, but only spent 14 years in prison for it.
Less than five years after being released in 2004, Lee murdered his lover,
51-year-old Christopher Pratt. The two had met at a gay sauna months earlier.
Lee killed Pratt at the victim’s home by breaking his neck and voice box. He then took
his lover’s credit cards and used them to pay bills and buy food, alcohol, and other items.
The next day, Lee returned to the flat for Pratt’s naked body and dumped it
on a roadside. A jogger discovered the victim’s remains 11 days later.
Lee was captured on surveillance footage, which showed him arriving at Pratt’s home on the day
of the murder. At his trial, he claimed that he accidentally killed Pratt when he leaned
over in the middle of having sex and unknowingly crushed the man’s neck.
The jury found Lee guilty, and he was sentenced to life.
This time, the judge said he will truly spend his remaining years behind bars.
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