Detroit Man Charged With Murdering Four Women Found in Vacant East Side Houses
Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy charged Deangelo Martin, 34, with first-degree and felony murder in the deaths of four women and said prosecutors believed he was a serial killer.
Published
Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy announced murder charges on Wednesday, September 18, 2019, against Deangelo Martin, 34, in the deaths of four women whose bodies had been found in abandoned houses on Detroit's east side. He was charged with four counts of first-degree murder and four counts of felony murder, and was arraigned that afternoon.
"I think it's pretty clear that we believe he is a serial killer," Worthy told reporters.
She named the women. Annetta Nelson, 57, was found on February 26, 2018. Nancy Harrison, 52, was discovered on March 19, 2019, and Trevesene Ellis, 55, five days later, on March 24. Tamara Jones, 55, was found on June 5. According to the prosecutor, each woman lay face down with a used condom beside her. A coroner found that Nelson and Harrison had died of blunt force trauma; the bodies of Ellis and Jones were too badly decomposed for a cause of death to be determined.
Martin had been in custody since June, first arrested in the rape and attempted murder of a woman who managed to escape him. By the time the murder charges came, he already faced charges in the stabbing and sexual assault of a 26-year-old woman in May and the kidnapping and assault of a 51-year-old woman in June. Police Chief James Craig had said he saw similarities between three of the killings and the attacks on at least two women who survived. When Martin was first arrested, police had already found three of the dead women, and teams of officers and city workers were searching hundreds of vacant buildings for more.
Police said they believed all four women were sex workers. Worthy answered that directly. Predators, she said, look for people who seem vulnerable and left behind, people they think nobody cares about and nobody will miss. "But they're wrong," she said. Her office, she added, had worked to bring the women a measure of justice, respect and dignity, whatever their lives had involved before they were reported missing.
Investigators were looking at two more possible homicides that might be connected, Worthy said. A probable cause conference was set for October 2 and a preliminary examination for October 9. None of the murder charges had yet been tested in court.
Sources
- Man who prosecutors call serial killer is charged in deaths of 4 women in Detroit, NBC News (Associated Press)