The killing of at least seven people, whose bodies were buried behind a New Britain, Connecticut, shopping center has led multiple law enforcement sources to identify William Devin Howell as the serial killer responsible.
The 45-year-old is currently incarcerated at a Connecticut prison on separate manslaughter charges.
Howell’s is spending 15-years at the Garner Correctional Institution stemming from the homicide of Nilsa Arizmendi, a 33-year-old Wethersfield resident who vanished in 2003. Her body was never found.
Howell was put on trial for her murder but pleaded to the lesser charge of manslaughter, according to the state Division of Criminal Justice.
Howell was arrested in North Carolina in 2004 and his van was seized as evidence. Arizmendi was last seen entering his van before she disappeared. Authorities found Arizmendi’s blood in the van, as well as the blood of an unidentified person. They also found video that shows two other women. Their identities and fates remain unknown.
Howell was working odd jobs in Connecticut at the time of Arizmendi’s disappearance.
Investigators have now recovered the bodies of at least seven people from a wooded area behind the shopping plaza at 593 Hartford Road, where a local hunter found the first set of remains in 2007.
Police have declined to officially name the suspected serial killer, citing an ongoing investigation, but have said that the person they are looking at is no longer a threat to the community. Multiple sources have leaked William Devin Howell’s name to the press.
Four of the seven victims have so far been identified – all as women who vanished in 2003.
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