Tommy Lynn Sells
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Tommy Lynn Sells is an American Serial Killer. He was born with a fraternal twin sister on June 28, 1964 in Oakland, California, but lived mostly in Frisbee, Missouri.
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[edit] Youth
Tommy Lynn and his twin sister Tammy Jean contracted meningitis when they were eighteen months old. While Tommy suffered a high fever, he survived. His sister died from the inflammation. Shortly thereafter Tommy was sent to live with an aunt, Bonnie Woodall in Holcomb, Missouri. He lived with Woodall until he was five. Tommy's family lived in Frisbee, Missouri as a child. When Tommy was eight he began spending time with an adult man named Willis Clark from a neighboring city who would later be identified as a child molestor.[1]
[edit] Middle years
Sells started traveling in order to find work. Because he was indigent at the time, he hitched rides, hopped trains and at one point stole a vehicle. He held several different jobs, often doing menial labor. His limited education rendered him under-qualified for many higher paying jobs.
[edit] Murders
While working as a carny in Montana during the summer of 1985 Sells met Ena Cordt. According to Sells, Cordt invited him to her home where they had consensual sex. The bodies of Cordt and her four-year-old son were found three days later.
Sells is suspected as the perpetrator for the following crimes:
- The murder of Suzanne Korcz in New York during May, 1987
- The November, 1987 murder of a family in Illinois.
- Killing a co-worker in Texas during April 1998. [2]
[edit] Arrests and confessions
Sells has recently claimed to have killed upwards of seventy people, according to an interview with Columbia University forensic psychiatrist and personality expert Dr. Michael H. Stone in Discovery Channel's Most Evil. Sells is most well known for his last murder, which happened on December 31, 1999 in the Guajia Bay subdivision, west of Del Rio, Texas where he fatally stabbed 13-year-old Katy Harris sixteen times and slit the throat of 10-year-old Krystal Surles. Surles survived and received help from her neighbors. Ultimately, Sells was apprehended using a sketch from the victim's description.
Tommy Lynn Sells is currently on Death Row in Livingston, Texas.
[edit] Book
Through the Window by Diane Fanning tells the story of his life and of the 10-year- old girl who brought him to justice.
[edit] External link
- Complete details of Tommy Sells murders (from crimelibrary.com)
