BRUCE MENDENHALL - THE TRUCK STOP KILLER

Article BY Chris Bartholomew

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Many people in Albion, Illinois thought Bruce Mendenhall was loud, hot-tempered and a little peculiar, but they were still stunned to hear police say he has confessed to killing six people. Married with two grown children he was 'a little different' from other people in town. He had a loud voice.

He didn't mix well with those around him and he generally kept to himself. He appeared to be pretty easily upset if provoked.

He liked to bowl, and when he was at the alley, he would laugh and cut up with the rest of the gang, he was sociable.  At the bowling alley they say he never did anything violent.

Bruce Mendenhall has been indicted and will go to trial for the murder of Sara Hulbert in January of 2009.  The state will seek the death penalty.

Bruce Mendenhall, 56, of Albion, Ill., an independent long-distance truck driver was also charged with murder in the July 2007 disappearance of Carma Purpura, 31, of Indianapolis. He was charged last year with two killings in Tennessee and one in Alabama, and investigators have said he's a suspect in up to six other deaths in the U.S.

Mendenhall's victims were primarily young prostitutes, usually found shot, though detectives have determined that his method of killing may have changed over the years.  He has implicated himself in several killings.

Authorities have connected Mendenhall to the killing of Deborah Ann Glover in Suwanee, Ga.; Sherry Drinkard in Lake Station, Ind.; and Carma Purpura in Indianapolis. Birmingham police have charged Mendenhall with the murder of Lucille Carter. In Lebanon, Tennessee, and he is charged with killing Symantha Winters.

On June 26, 2007, the body of 25-year-old Sara Hulbert was found shot to death at the Truck Stops of America in downtown Nashville. 

Witnesses gave a description of a truck that was seen near Sara the day before her body was found.  A detective found a truck matching the description traveling back to where Hulbert's body was found and asked him to get out of the cab and talk to him.  As Mendenhall got out, the detective saw blood on his thumb and some blood on the inside of the door.  The detective asked for permission to search the cab, and Mendenhall granted that permission.  Mendenhall was taken into custody where blood was found under his fingernails. 

Mendenhall may be responsible for killing at least 10 women across the country.  The blood of at least this many different victims was found inside the cab and sleeper of this long-haul driver's truck. Investigators found a garbage bag that had blood inside and a pair of shoes that had similar prints to shoes found at one of the murder scenes.

There was so much blood of one victim, a Carmen Purpura, that she couldn't possibly be alive. Purpura's identification was found in Mendenhall's truck upon his arrest and police are awaiting a blood match on clothing also found. DNA tests link some of the blood from Mendenhall's truck cab to the woman's parents. Investigators also found her cell phone, ATM card and clothing she wore on the day she disappeared. Witnesses said they saw Purpura standing near Mendenhall's truck at the Flying J truck stop on the day she disappeared - July 11, 2007.

Police catalogued 300 items from the truck including a rifle, knives, handcuffs, latex gloves, several weapons cartridges, black tape, a nightstick, and sex toys. Among the list was the .22-caliber handgun that Mendenhall used in the killings, the victims were shot after their heads were wrapped in plastic wrap and duct tape, which were also found in the search.  Trash bags and condoms were also listed among the items.  Some items were blacked out before the list was released, possibly being some body parts as he is suspected of collecting flesh trophies.

Here is a look at the killings he has implicated himself in:

Jan. 29, 2007: Suwanee, Ga., The body of Deborah Ann Glover was found behind a motel, near a truck stop.

Feb. 26, 2007: Authorities found the body of 43-year-old Sherry Drinkard, of Gary, Ind at a truck stop in Lake Station, Indiana.  She was found stripped naked, shot once in the head and dumped in a snow bank. She may have been killed a week and a half earlier, when a snowstorm blanketed the area.

On the afternoon of July 1, a semi with a mustard-yellow cab and white trailer was parked at a small local truck stop in Birmingham, Ala. when several local prostitutes climbed onto the truck, trying to coax the driver out. But the cab's curtains remained tightly shut. Eventually, the truck stop owner came out, shooed the women away and banged on the truck door and ordered the driver to leave.

The truck pulled out. Ten minutes later, a passer-by spotted the body of Lucille Carter, 43, of Birmingham, splayed on the pavement next to the spot where the truck had been parked.

She'd been shot, and thrown to the side of the road with a bag over her head.

June 6, 2007: The body of Symantha Winters was shot and dumped in a trash can at a Pilot Travel Center in Lebanon, Tennessee.

June 26, 2007: Sara Hulbert’s body was found at a TravelCenters of America truck stop in Nashville.

Jennifer Annette Smith - April 2005 - Bucksnort, TN age 24, Her dead body was found nude on April 19, 2005 at an abandoned truck stop in Hickman County. A surveillance camera mounted atop a nearby adult bookstore captured a picture of a white semi-truck in the parking area where Smith was located.

Tammy Zywicki was a student who was found stabbed to death on September 2, 1992. She vanished from Interstate 80 near LaSalle, Illinois nine days before, after dropping off her brother at Northwestern University.  Zywicki was reportedly last seen with her car at mile marker 83 in Central Illinois, between 3:10 p.m. and 4:00 p.m. on August 23, 1992.

A tractor/trailer was seen near Zywicki's vehicle during this time period. The driver of the tractor/trailer is described as a white male between 35 and 40 years of age, over six feet tall, with dark, bushy hair. Some of the victim's personal property is missing, including a Cannon 35mm camera and a musical wrist watch with an umbrella on the face.

Andrea Hendrix Steinert - October 29, 1997 - Evansville, IN
This 28-year old was found dead near Francisco, Indiana off Highway 351. A highway worker spotted her nude body in a ditch. An autopsy revealed she had been strangled and had been dead anywhere from 24 to 48 hours. Police say the victim wasn't killed where she had been found.

Dusty Shuck - May 2006 - Mount Airy, MD

Dusty's body was found near a truck stop off Interstate 70 in Maryland.

Tanya Estep Robbins Millersville, TN

October 2006 - Millersville, TN Tanya Estep, also known as Tanya Robbins, has been missing since last August. Estep worked the truck stop and Dickerson Road.

Latisha Milliken - Millersville, TN

February 2007 – Ms. Milliken lived on the street and routinely picked up truck drivers at the TravelCenters of America truck stop to support a crack cocaine habit. It is the same truck stop where police arrested Mendenhall and found the body of his alleged victims in June. Milliken is also a missing person. Robin Bishop - July 01, 2007 - Fairview, TN

Robin Bishop, Fairview, TN

a prostitute who was run over at a truck stop on Interstate 40 in Fairview, Tennessee on July 1, 2007.

Belinda Cartwright Valdosta, GA

Belinda was a hitchhiker who was run over at a truck stop in Georgia in 2001. A composite police sketch made of the suspect based on information from witnesses bears a striking resemblance to Mendenhall.

Mendenhall could be involved in the 2005 death of 24-year-old Jennifer Smith. Her body was discovered along Interstate 40 in Hickman County. Investigators will compare DNA and other evidence, trying to determine if there's a link in that case.

This killer had other nicknames: The Prostishooter, The rest stop killer, The Truck Stop Killer, The Prostitrucker.

Law enforcement agencies across the country have contacted Nashville investigators to learn if Mendenhall could be involved in unsolved murders in their areas. The FBI has been creating a timeline of Mendenhall's travels during his 20 years as a trucker to determine other cases in which he could be a suspect.

Law enforcement officials have been going over Mendenhall's records — and finding troubling gaps and trips that took far longer than they should have. In one, Mendenhall was supposed to make an eight-hour run to Fayette, Ohio. He wound up in Fayetteville, on the wrong side of the state, and took another day to reach his destination. Nashville police released a list of places where they said Mendenhall either confessed to having been or placed himself in the vicinity of a homicide this year. Local law enforcement officials filled in the details.