Confessed Serial Killer Provides Sketch of 1972 Laurel Victim

Update October 9, 2019: Our Cold Case Unit continues to work to identify the young woman who serial killer, Samuel Little, confessed to murdering in Prince George’s County back in 1972. Within the last week, detectives sent the victim’s femur to a laboratory in Virginia for extensive DNA testing. As we await those test results, we again ask our community to call us if they have any information that could help detectives determine this young woman’s identity. 

Earlier this week, convicted serial killer, Samuel Little, sketched this drawing of a young woman he confessed to killing in Prince George’s County in 1972. The department’s Cold Case Unit hopes this image will finally lead detectives to uncovering the victim’s name. She is one of approximately 90 women who Samuel Little has admitted to murdering in the country starting back in the 1970s. 

In October of 2018, a Texas Ranger contacted law enforcement in Washington DC with information that Little confessed to murdering someone in the DC region in the early 1970s. That information prompted Prince George’s County Police Cold Case Unit detectives to travel to Texas in November where they interviewed Little.

The now 78 year old is serving multiple life sentences there for murders in California and Texas. During the interview, Little told our investigators specific and previously unreported details about an unsolved murder in Laurel that likely took place in the summer of 1972. In December of that year, a hunter found the skeletal remains of the victim in a then wooded area off of Route 197 and the Baltimore-Washington Parkway. 

After the murder, a medical examiner determined the victim is a Caucasian female, approximately 5’2”–5’6”, with dirty blonde or reddish hair. She was approximately 19 years old at the time of her death. Efforts to identify her at the time of the discovery were unsuccessful.  

According to Little, he picked up the victim at a bus station on New York Avenue in the District of Columbia. Little says the victim indicated she was recently divorced and from the Massachusetts area. She may also have been a mother. Cold Case Unit detectives are now working with multiple agencies, including the FBI, Massachusetts State Police and the Metropolitan Police Department to try to determine her identity. 

                                                                                          

Anyone with information that could help investigators is urged to please call 301-772-4925. Callers wishing to remain anonymous may call Crime Solvers at 1-866-411-TIPS (8477), or go online at www.pgcrimesolvers.com, or use the “P3 Tips” mobile app (search “P3 Tips” in the Apple Store or Google Play to download the app onto your mobile device.)