Richard Louis Hunter
Richard Louis Hunter is a convicted American serial killer and forger. A day laborer, Hunter raped and killed four elderly women in Atlanta between March and April 1986, robbing their apartments afterwards. He later pleaded guilty to the murders and numerous robberies, and was sentenced to life imprisonment.
Murders
The first victim was 85-year-old Annie Rochelle Copeland, who lived alone in a small apartment in southwest Atlanta. She was found by a neighbor, a minister, on March 1, 1986, who became worried after knocking on the door and receiving no reply. She was found lying on her bed in the fetal position, covered with a bedspread and blanket, and her face covered by a pillow and her blue nightgown. The apartment had been turned upside down, with items from a pocketbook strewn about and a bloody pillowcase placed between her legs. The perpetrator had managed to enter by cutting the screen of a living room window and pulling out the windowpane. The killing scared other elderly residents living near Clark University, who took additional measures to protect themselves in case the perpetrator struck again.Only a few days later, on March 6, 25-year-old Felton Clements went to check on his 61-year-old mother Aretha, who lived alone in northwest Atlanta, only to find her dead and her apartment ransacked. Mrs. Clements had been manually strangled and then wrapped up in her bedspread, nightgown disarranged, her head put against the foot of the bed and her right leg beneath her. Her plants had been overturned, her drawers emptied, and her 25-inch color TV set and pocketbook stolen. There were no suspects in this case either, as Aretha rarely left her home except when visiting her best friend or for treatment at Grady Memorial Hospital.
The situation repeated on March 11, with the discovery of the body of 62-year-old Dena Mae Mike, a blind woman who hadn't been seen in two days. Similarly to Copeland and Clements, she had either been smothered, and several objects had been placed on her head, including a sweater, a pillow, a plastic garment bag with clothing on hangers and a duffel bag. Like Copeland, her nightgown had been trampled with, and a bloody pillowcase was found between her legs. Her killer had apparently entered through a kitchen window. With Mike's death, law enforcement from Atlanta Homicide began to make connections between the recent murders: all of the victims had been elderly black women, living alone off social security benefits, within one general area, and all had had their apartments burgled and items stolen after death. The GBI was involved in the investigations, and residents of the area were queried about any suspicious individuals in the area.
For the four following weeks, the murders ceased before abruptly resuming with the killing of 65-year-old Grace Hill on April 9. She was found by her friends, partially naked on her living room floor in northwest Atlanta, suffocated to death and possibly sexually assaulted. The killer, who had entered through an unlocked back door, had put a newspaper over her chest, and a doll between her legs. With her death, the authorities officially announced to the media that they were investigating all four deaths as the work of a serial killer.