#8 - Mikilo Morgan Rawls
20-year-old Emma Roark was reported missing on January the 27th of 2022,
having last been seen by her family at about 11:30 that morning when she left to take a
walk along the American River Parkway. The young woman, a resident of Rancho Cordova,
California described as being on the autism spectrum, remained missing until February the 1st,
when police found her partially nude body in a secluded area at the American River access point
in Sacramento. According to the resulting police report, Roark had been kidnapped,
assaulted, and fatally strangled. Her remains were bound with rope and hung from a tree under
a series of tarps near the riverbank, in what the authorities described as a homeless encampment.
DNA recovered from the crime scene was linked to 37-year-old Mikilo Morgan Rawls, a transient from
the Sacramento area with a criminal record dating back to 2005 for burglary, resisting arrest,
and being a felon in possession of ammunition. Two days after abducting and brutally murdering Roark,
Rawls reportedly sold her cell phone to another homeless man, later identified as Cedric
Sandiford, and told him not to reveal where he’d gotten it. In defiance of Rawls’ instructions,
Sandiford used the device to contact Roark’s father, who, in turn, contacted the authorities.
Sandiford ultimately led investigators to the encampment where he’d purchased the phone,
the same encampment where the victim’s body was located. Rawls was held in custody without
bond on charges that included murder with special circumstances. During a preliminary court hearing
held a few days after his arrest, he showed little emotion, and spoke only to correct
the Sacramento County Court Commissioner on the correct pronunciation of his name.
#7 - Levi Isaac Davis
The police in Middleton, Idaho were called to the 100 block of East Murtaugh Lake Street after
receiving an emergency call at about 3:30 pm on October the 10th of 2022. Upon their arrival,
law enforcement discovered the body of Karly Cantrell lying in a pool of blood on the floor
of her residence, with chunks of hair and skin missing. Emergency crews were called to the scene,
but the victim, who’d suffered apparent knife wounds to the neck and abdomen,
was ultimately pronounced dead. The Canyon County Sheriff's Office interviewed Cantrell’s neighbors,
who reported seeing a blue vehicle leave the scene of the murder earlier that day.
The car reportedly matched the description of a vehicle belonging to the victim’s son,
26-year-old Levi Isaac Davis, who was tracked down and arrested in Nampa shortly before midnight.
Investigators found blood-stained clothes in the backseat of Davis’ car and in his bedroom.
Officers also observed a deep laceration on his upper thigh, a scratch on his hand,
as well as a burn mark on his bicep. It subsequently emerged that the young man
had been kicked out of the family home due to his “poor behavior”, which police theorized had served
as a motivating factor behind the “truly horrific” killing. While speaking about his mother, Davis
allegedly showed no emotion or remorse for his actions. Before her death, Cantrell had served as
the Executive Director of the West Valley Humane Society animal shelter in Caldwell, which said,
in a commemorative statement, that she was “a kind, compassionate and empathetic friend, mother,
wife, grandmother, and daughter”. #6 - Frank Bredt, Jr.
Police and fire officials in Buffalo, New York responded to the scene of a house
fire on Manhattan Avenue in the early morning hours of January the 11th of 2018. The charred,
lifeless body of 28-year-old Elisabeth Bell was found on the second floor of the residence. Five
other people had reportedly escaped from the blaze, including Bell’s 7-year-old daughter,
who sustained burns to her feet but was otherwise in stable condition. A
short time later, authorities came upon the victim’s boyfriend, Frank Bredt Jr.,
hiding in another nearby house. He was suffering from severe burns to his entire body, for which
he was taken to the Erie County Medical Center. Bredt remained in the hospital’s burn treatment
center for over a year while recovering from the extensive injuries he’d sustained in the fire,
which investigators subsequently determined had been started by him. On the day of the incident,
the man had allegedly tried to kill Bell by burning her alive in her bedroom following
an argument in which they’d broken up. By dousing her in an accelerant and setting her body alight,
Bredt also inadvertently set fire to both himself and the house. The Erie County
District Attorney said in an official statement that it was “one of the most horrific domestic
violence homicide cases” that his office had ever prosecuted. In March of 2022,
a jury found Bredt guilty of second-degree murder, for which he was given a sentence of 25 to life.
#5 - Deundrea Holloway
On June the 9th of 2022, the decapitated corpse of 22-year-old Liese Dodd was found by her mother
at her apartment in Alton, Illinois. Her severed head had reportedly been discarded
in a nearby dumpster. The victim was pregnant with her first child at the time of her death
and had a due date in late July. Upon launching an investigation into the “abominable” homicide,
local police identified Dodd’s on-again off-again boyfriend, Deundrea Holloway, as their prime
suspect. The 22-year-old man was arrested and charged with two counts of first-degree murder,
two counts of intentional homicide to an unborn child, dismembering a human body, concealment of
a homicide death, as well as motor vehicle-related offenses. He was held in custody on a $2 million
bond as the case’s legal proceedings got underway. Alton Police Chief Marcos Pulido said that Dodd
had been “savagely killed”, and called Holloway’s actions “beyond reprehensible”. When asked to
recount the moment she discovered her daughter’s beheaded body, the victim’s mother stated,
“It’s not something I wish on anybody. So, yeah, I rather not speak on that”. In September of 2022,
Holloway was found unfit to stand trial after undergoing a mental health evaluation.
#4 - Justin Fields
At around 5:30 pm on October the 22nd of 2022, deputies with the Blount County Sheriff’s Office
in Alabama were called to 102 Bailey Drive in Springville after a neighbor requested a welfare
check for resident Tammy Bailey. When officers entered the home, they came upon the 52-year-old
woman’s mutilated corpse. It was subsequently determined that she’d been stabbed over 100
times with an 8-inch long, survival-type knife. The autopsy suggested that the very first stab,
which went straight through Bailey’s chest and pierced her heart, had been the fatal blow. After
she was already dead, her killer decapitated her and severed one of her lower limbs. The victim’s
live-in boyfriend, Justin Fields, allegedly confessed to committing the crime himself,
and he was taken into custody at the scene. According to the Blount County Sheriff, the
38-year-old man indicated that the grisly crime had been precipitated by an argument centered
around Bailey’s unwillingness to have intercourse with him. After initially stabbing the woman in
frustration, Fields, who admitted to having been drinking to celebrate his birthday, claimed to
have blacked out as he continually plunged the knife into her lifeless body, then dismembered it.
As of the latest developments, the case was slated to appear before a grand jury in January of 2023.
#3 - Robert Wayne Gore
The lifeless body of University of Miami student Yasser Talal Ibrahim Abualfaraj
was found at his Coral Gables apartment by his roommate on October the 7th of 2018. The
Miami-Dade Medical Examiner's Office determined that the 23-year-old architecture student had
died from more than 60 stab wounds inflicted with “multiple sharp-force instruments”. The
homicide investigation ultimately led to the identification of local homeless man Robert Wayne
Gore as a suspect. Later in the month of October, 28-year-old Gore was tracked down and taken into
custody at a Mobil gas station in Cutler Bay, in the area of Southwest 200 Street and South
Dixie Highway. After being read his rights, the suspect reportedly provided authorities with
a video confession to Abualfaraj’s slaying. On the day of the deadly incident, Gore entered the
victim’s apartment through an unlocked door. After brutally murdering the young man, he allegedly
fled on foot with several stolen items. Charged with first-degree murder and armed burglary,
Gore was denied bond while being held at the Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center. As
of recent updates, it was unclear how the case’s legal proceedings had played out.
#2 - Hend Bustami
Early on the morning of October the 26th of 2022, emergency dispatch in Las Vegas
received a startling phone call in which a woman said, “I think I killed my mommy”.
The caller gave her address, 10190 June Flower Drive, before hanging up the phone. Metropolitan
Police officers were sent to the home, where they found a woman suffering from multiple stab wounds.
Emergency medical crews attempted to revive the victim, identified as 62-year-old Afaf Hussanen,
but she was ultimately pronounced dead at the scene. During the subsequent investigation,
the police learned that a mother and daughter had lived at the residence in question,
with the daughter being identified as the original 911 caller, Hend Bustami, aged
28. Less than an hour after the latter fled the scene of her mother’s murder,
a license plate reader caught her driving south on Interstate 15 towards California. Highway
Patrol troopers tailed Bustami before pulling her over near Barstow. While speaking with police,
the young woman again admitted to killing her mother, indicating that they’d gotten
into an argument, which escalated into a physical altercation. Bustami revealed that she’d broken a
glass table over the victim’s head, before using a glass shard to stab her multiple times and slit
her throat. The young woman was held in custody in Rancho Cucamonga, California, while awaiting
extradition back to Las Vegas, where she faced a charge of open murder with a deadly weapon.
#1 - Jose Rafael Solano Landaeta
Shortly before noon on September the 8th of 2022, a young mother was brutally attacked
by her ex-boyfriend outside her apartment on Magnolia Avenue and Laurel Street in San Carlos,
California. According to the San Mateo County Sheriff’s Office, 27-year-old Karina Castro
was butchered with a sword by Jose Rafael Solano Landaeta, who then beheaded the woman in front of
horrified witnesses. The 33-year-old man briefly fled the scene on foot before returning unarmed
a short time later, at which point he was arrested by responding police officers. Landaeta was booked
into the San Mateo County Jail without bond. The deadly incident reportedly stemmed from a domestic
dispute between the former couple, who shared a 1-year-old daughter. When asked about Landaeta’s
potential fate, the victim’s father stated, “I don’t feel he should continue breathing. I think
the death penalty would be perfect for him”. During the man’s arraignment in Redwood City,
he kept his head down and refrained from speaking. His defense team requested that the case’s legal
proceedings be suspended until he undergoes a psychiatric evaluation, to which the judge agreed.
Thanks for watching! Would you rather be forced to house a recently released felon
convicted of murder or take your bicycle on the highway to get to
work every morning? Let us know in the comments section below!