By Chuck Hustmyre
(Continued)
THE NORTH STREET STRANGLER
Between 1996 and 2004, at least 11 women—most in their 30s, most of them prostitutes, all of them black—have been found murdered in a tightly confined area surrounding North Street Park in Baton Rouge. Seven of the women were strangled, three were beaten to death, one was stabbed.
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North Street Park, Baton Rouge |
Nearly all them were found nude or only partially clothed.
The bodies of 10 of the murdered women were discovered in a four-square-mile area. Four of them were found inside the small park, which takes up only one city block.
Six of the killings took place during a nine-month period between September 1999 and June 2000.
All 11 murders remain unsolved.
By January 2003, more than 60 women had been killed in the Baton Rouge area during the previous 10 years. None of the cases had been solved.
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East Baton Rouuge Sheriff patch |
Col. Mike Barnett, chief criminal deputy for the East Baton Rouge Parish Sheriff's Office, said at the time that Baton Rouge had become a prime hunting ground for serial killers.
"There are more whodunits here than there should be," Barnett told The Advocate newspaper.
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Derrick Todd Lee |
Derrick Todd Lee was in jail on unrelated charges when some of the early North Street slayings took place. Sean Vincent Gillis, who eagerly confessed to killing eight women, said he didn't have anything to do with the murders around North Street. When the last known North Street killing took place, in July 2004, Gillis had already been in jail for three months.
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