The Deadliest Serial Killer in U.S. History

Samuel Little became one of the most terrifying names in American true crime history, not because he was loud, flashy, or even well-known for most of his life, but because he wasn’t. For decades, Little moved from city to city, blending into the background while leaving behind a trail of women who would be dismissed, misclassified, or forgotten by the systems that were supposed to protect them. Today, the FBI considers Samuel Little the most prolific serial killer in United States history based on the number of murders he confessed to, and the number investigators have been able to confirm.

Little’s story is one of long-term violence hiding in plain sight. He wasn’t a criminal mastermind in the way people imagine serial killers to be, but he understood something far more useful: which victims were least likely to be searched for, believed, or prioritized. That knowledge, paired with his mobility and the era he operated in, helped him evade capture again and again—until DNA and determined investigators finally closed in.

Samuel Little

Samuel Little was born in Reynolds, Georgia, and raised mostly in Lorain, Ohio. His early life was unstable, and he later described his childhood in ways that suggested neglect and abandonment. As he grew older, he became involved in petty crime and began building a criminal record that would follow him for the rest of his life. He didn’t settle down in one place. Instead, he drifted across the country, repeatedly getting arrested for crimes like theft, fraud, assault, and sexual violence. He was in and out of jail so often that, in hindsight, it feels almost unbelievable that he wasn’t stopped sooner. But for much of his adult life, law enforcement agencies across different states had no reason to connect him to the same pattern of death.

His crimes escalated into murder, and the way he killed was chillingly consistent. Samuel Little’s method was typically hands-on and brutal: he would strike a woman—often with his fists—to incapacitate her, then strangle her. Strangulation is a particularly insidious method because it can leave minimal evidence, especially in cases where a victim’s lifestyle or circumstances already led authorities to assume overdose, accident, or natural causes. Little relied on that. Many of the women he targeted were already living on the margins—sex workers, women battling addiction, unhoused women, or women without strong support networks. He chose victims who were less likely to trigger headlines or multi-agency investigations.

For years, he kept going.

The turning point came in 2012, when Little was arrested in Kentucky. He was taken into custody on a narcotics-related warrant, and eventually extradited to Los Angeles. This arrest, like so many before it, could have been just another entry in his long criminal history. But this time, DNA changed everything. Investigators were able to connect Little to unsolved murders in Los Angeles from the late 1980s, and the case began to unravel. What started as a breakthrough in a few cold cases quickly turned into something much bigger—because once Little’s name was attached to one murder, it opened the door to re-examining dozens of others.

In 2014, Samuel Little was convicted in Los Angeles for the murders of three women. Those victims were Carol Linda Alford, Audrey Nelson Everett, and Guadalupe Apodaca. Carol Linda Alford, 41, was killed on July 13, 1987. Audrey Nelson Everett, 35, was killed on August 14, 1989. Guadalupe Apodaca, 46, was killed on September 3, 1989. These murders were linked through DNA, and the evidence finally held strong enough to put Little away for life. He received three consecutive life sentences without the possibility of parole.

For many killers, that would have been the end of the story. For Samuel Little, it was only the beginning of what the world would learn.

Samuel Little Victims

After his conviction, Little began talking—slowly at first, then in a flood of confessions that stunned even seasoned investigators. He claimed he had killed 93 people between 1970 and 2005. Ninety-three. The number was so massive that it sounded impossible, and yet investigators kept finding details in his accounts that lined up with real cases. The FBI’s Violent Criminal Apprehension Program (ViCAP) became a key part of sorting through his claims. Little wasn’t just giving vague statements—he was offering locations, timelines, physical descriptions, and details about the victims that were sometimes accurate enough to match unsolved murders.

One of the most haunting aspects of Samuel Little’s confessions was the way he remembered faces. During interviews, he drew portraits of women he claimed to have killed, sketching them from memory with unsettling confidence. These drawings weren’t just disturbing—they became investigative tools. The FBI released some of the portraits publicly in hopes that someone would recognize a face and finally put a name to a long-unknown victim.

As more cases were confirmed, Little’s status shifted from “serial killer” to something even more horrifying: a man who may have murdered more women than anyone else in modern U.S. history.

Beyond Los Angeles, Little was tied to murders in other states, including Texas and Ohio. In 2018, he pleaded guilty to the murder of Denise Christie Brothers in Odessa, Texas. Denise was 32 years old and a mother of two. She was killed on February 2, 1994. Little received another life sentence, though he was already never getting out.

In 2019, Little pleaded guilty in Ohio to additional murders, further cementing the reality that his crimes spanned decades and states. Among the victims connected to him were Annie Lee Stewart, Mary Jo Peyton, and Rose Evans. Annie Lee Stewart was 32 when she was killed on October 11, 1981, in Cincinnati, Ohio. Mary Jo Peyton was 21 when she was killed in 1984 in Cleveland, Ohio. Rose Evans was 32 when she was killed on August 24, 1991, also in Cleveland. These names are only a fraction of the women he confessed to killing, but they represent what confirmation looks like: a case matched, a victim identified, and a family finally given the truth.

One of the most tragic parts of the Samuel Little case is that many of his victims remain unidentified. In numerous confessions, he gave only partial names or vague details—sometimes remembering a nickname, a first name, or a physical description. Some victims were known only by where they were found or where he claimed to have killed them. For years, their stories sat in files as “Jane Doe” cases, with no closure and no justice.

Little’s confessions also exposed something deeply uncomfortable about the way society and law enforcement treated certain victims for decades. Many of the women he murdered were written off in death just as they had been overlooked in life. Some were found in dumpsters, abandoned buildings, alleys, or rural areas. Some were ruled overdoses. Some were never even officially classified as homicide until years later. Little’s crimes highlight how easily predators can thrive when victims are marginalized and the system doesn’t respond with urgency.

Even with his confessions, proving each case is difficult. Confession alone is not always enough to close a case legally, especially if remains were never found, evidence was lost, or the original investigation was incomplete. That’s why the FBI and local agencies have worked case by case, verifying what they can. At least 50 of Little’s confessions have been confirmed, and investigators continue to examine others.

Samuel Little died in custody on December 30, 2020, at the age of 80. He never faced trial for most of the murders he admitted to, and many families never got the chance to see him held accountable in court. But his death didn’t end the work. Even now, investigators are still trying to match his confessions to real victims, identify unnamed women, and bring long-overdue closure to cases that were once considered hopeless.

The Samuel Little case isn’t just about a killer’s violence—it’s about what happens when people disappear and the world doesn’t stop. It’s about the gaps between jurisdictions, the limitations of older investigative methods, and the way certain victims were treated as disposable. It’s also about how much can be uncovered when someone finally connects the dots, when DNA speaks louder than denial, and when investigators refuse to let the dead remain nameless.

Samuel Little spent decades slipping through the cracks. The women he killed deserved far more than that. The only thing left now is to keep naming them, keep identifying them, and keep telling the truth about what happened—no matter how long it takes.