Case History
The victim was found by deer hunters in St. Helena Parish woods on November 17, 1979. The victim was discovered bound and strangled. He was hog-tied with his hands and feet behind his back. A rope ran from his hands and feet to his neck; when the victim struggled, the rope constricted and caused his death.
Investigators showed a picture of the body around the French Quarter of New Orleans, where some people said he looked familiar but nobody could provide a positive identification.
Two other bodies, one found near Abita Springs, another near Gulfport, Mississippi, may be linked to the case. Both were found in 1978 in remote woods. One victim was tied identically the way this victim was tied; the other, similarly.
The Abita Springs victim was identified as Dennis Turcotte, 22; the Gulfport victim was Raymond Mark Richardson, 17. The similarities in the three cases would indicate that a serial killer was at work in the region in the late 1970s. The victims all were found in desolate areas bound in similar fashion, all were in their teens, slightly built, and all had similar facial features and hair styles. At one time, all three were thought to have lived in the New Orleans area and had ties to the French Quarter or hung out there. They may have been "street kids," possibly male prostitutes.
Turcotte and Richardson worked at the same restaurant in the French Quarter, Jimmy's Coney Island Hot Dog Stand on Royal Street.