Post by SoulTrainOz on Jul 30, 2006 3:44:17 GMT -5
A child killer serving a life sentence in a Colorado prison pleaded guilty Thursday to a second murder as authorities investigate his claims that he killed as many as 48 people across the USA.
Robert Charles Browne, 53, was convicted in 1995 of kidnapping and murdering Heather Dawn Church, 13, in Black Forest, Colo., in 1991. Since 2002, Browne has been giving a cold-case investigator details of killings in nine states and South Korea, according to El Paso County, Colo., Sheriff Terry Maketa.
"It's possible he's exaggerating, but I don't think you can conduct
business assuming he's exaggerating," Maketa said at a Colorado Springs news conference. "We'll continue to pursue leads."
After following up on Browne's accounts, Colorado Springs prosecutors charged him with 1st-degree murder in the 1987 death of Rocio Sperry, 15, the married mother of a 3-month-old daughter. "We were in my apartment, and I strangled her," Browne told a judge Thursday in pleading guilty.
The tall, bearded defendant was sentenced to a 2nd life term.
Browne told investigator Charlie Hess in prison interviews that he killed 49 people 48 in the USA and one in Korea and he provided details about 20 of the killings, Maketa said. In the rest of the cases, Browne says he can't remember details, the sheriff said.
Authorities so far have found evidence corroborating Brown's claims in 7 slayings 3 in Louisiana, 2 in Texas, 1 in Arkansas and the Colorado Springs case, Maketa said.
Maketa told USA TODAY that "I wouldn't be surprised at all" if enough of Brown's stories check out to put him on the list of the USA's most notorious serial killers.
That list includes Ted Bundy, a law student who was executed in 1989 after confessing to killing 30 women and girls in several states; Gary Leon Ridgway, a former truck painter who killed 48 prostitutes, runaways and drug addicts in the Seattle area; John Wayne Gacy, who was executed in 1994 for killing 33 young men and boys in Chicago from 1972 to 1978; and Jeffrey Dahmer, who killed and dismembered 17 people in Milwaukee from 1978 to 1991.
Browne told investigators that his killings began in 1970, when he broke the neck of a fellow soldier in Korea in a fight over a prostitute, Maketa said. Between then and 1993, he killed in Colorado, Louisiana, Texas, Washington state, California, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Arkansas and Mississippi, Maketa said.
The convict told Hess that in 1983 he killed two women in his hometown, Coushatta, La., according to The Gazette newspaper of Colorado Springs, which interviewed Hess. Browne said he killed mostly women, strangled most of his victims and stabbed or shot others, the newspaper reported.
Browne grew up as one of nine children in a hardscrabble family, said Johnny Norman, the sheriff in Red River Parish, which includes Coushatta.
Norman, a schoolteacher in the 1960s, said Browne was in his physical education class in eighth and ninth grades. He recalled Browne as smart but aloof and with a short fuse.
"He was a loner, but not somebody you'd expect to do this," Norman said.
(source: Associated Press)
Robert Charles Browne, 53, was convicted in 1995 of kidnapping and murdering Heather Dawn Church, 13, in Black Forest, Colo., in 1991. Since 2002, Browne has been giving a cold-case investigator details of killings in nine states and South Korea, according to El Paso County, Colo., Sheriff Terry Maketa.
"It's possible he's exaggerating, but I don't think you can conduct
business assuming he's exaggerating," Maketa said at a Colorado Springs news conference. "We'll continue to pursue leads."
After following up on Browne's accounts, Colorado Springs prosecutors charged him with 1st-degree murder in the 1987 death of Rocio Sperry, 15, the married mother of a 3-month-old daughter. "We were in my apartment, and I strangled her," Browne told a judge Thursday in pleading guilty.
The tall, bearded defendant was sentenced to a 2nd life term.
Browne told investigator Charlie Hess in prison interviews that he killed 49 people 48 in the USA and one in Korea and he provided details about 20 of the killings, Maketa said. In the rest of the cases, Browne says he can't remember details, the sheriff said.
Authorities so far have found evidence corroborating Brown's claims in 7 slayings 3 in Louisiana, 2 in Texas, 1 in Arkansas and the Colorado Springs case, Maketa said.
Maketa told USA TODAY that "I wouldn't be surprised at all" if enough of Brown's stories check out to put him on the list of the USA's most notorious serial killers.
That list includes Ted Bundy, a law student who was executed in 1989 after confessing to killing 30 women and girls in several states; Gary Leon Ridgway, a former truck painter who killed 48 prostitutes, runaways and drug addicts in the Seattle area; John Wayne Gacy, who was executed in 1994 for killing 33 young men and boys in Chicago from 1972 to 1978; and Jeffrey Dahmer, who killed and dismembered 17 people in Milwaukee from 1978 to 1991.
Browne told investigators that his killings began in 1970, when he broke the neck of a fellow soldier in Korea in a fight over a prostitute, Maketa said. Between then and 1993, he killed in Colorado, Louisiana, Texas, Washington state, California, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Arkansas and Mississippi, Maketa said.
The convict told Hess that in 1983 he killed two women in his hometown, Coushatta, La., according to The Gazette newspaper of Colorado Springs, which interviewed Hess. Browne said he killed mostly women, strangled most of his victims and stabbed or shot others, the newspaper reported.
Browne grew up as one of nine children in a hardscrabble family, said Johnny Norman, the sheriff in Red River Parish, which includes Coushatta.
Norman, a schoolteacher in the 1960s, said Browne was in his physical education class in eighth and ninth grades. He recalled Browne as smart but aloof and with a short fuse.
"He was a loner, but not somebody you'd expect to do this," Norman said.
(source: Associated Press)