Photo: Indiana State Police
More than 30 years after three women were robbed, sexually assaulted and murdered at inns in Kentucky and Indiana, police have identified their killer.
At a press conference Tuesday, Indiana State Police said Harry Edward Greenwell, who is deceased, was responsible for the deaths of Vicki Heath, Margaret “Peggy” Gill and Jeanne Gilbert. Police said Greenwell, who died in 2013 at the age of 68, was also responsible for sexually assaulting a fourth woman.
Greenwell was finally identified through “investigative genealogy,” according to police.
“I’d like to believe that whatever each of us defines as justice, or what each of us might define as closure, that we’re all now able to share the healing process knowing the long-known attacker has now been brought out of the dark, into the light,” Gilbert’s daughter, Kim Wright, said at the press conference, theIndianapolis Starreported.
Indiana State Police Sgt. Glen Fifield says police are looking to see if Greenwell, who had an extensive criminal history spanning from 1963 to 1998, is responsible for additional slayings.
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“We will look anywhere the evidence takes us,” Fifield tells PEOPLE. “The I-65 runs from Gary, Indiana, to the Gulf of Mexico so we are talking hundreds of miles. Investigators have long believed it was not isolated to these 4. It was always their hunch because of the violent nature of the crimes.”
“It wouldn’t surprise me if it led to more closures,” he adds. “I hope it does. If we can answer the question with ‘no he is gone’ I think that would be a good thing.”
Dubbed the “I-65,” or “Days Inn” killings, Greenwell robbed and murdered three young women, all of them working in motels in Indiana and Kentucky.
His first known victim was Vicki Heath on Feb. 21. 1987. Heath, a front desk clerk working a night shift, was fatally shot at the Super 8 Motel in Elizabethtown, Ky.
Indiana State Police
Almost two years later, on March 3, 1989, Margaret “Peggy” Gill, a 24-year-old overnight auditor, was murdered at the Days Inn in Merrillville, Ind. Jeanne Gilbert, a 35-year-old part-time auditor, was killed the same day at a Days Inn in Remington, Ind. Both women were also shot.
On Jan. 2, 1990, a fourth victim was sexually assaulted at the Days Inn in Columbus, Ind., but was able to escape.
In the early 2000s, Gilbert, Heath and the survivor were linked through DNA evidence.
In 2019, the Indiana State Police asked the FBI for assistance with investigative genealogy.
“The detectives were able to generate some leads through DNA analysis and the investigative genealogy provided additional leads,” says Fifield. “It gave them someone to look at. We never had a suspect or a name to look at prior to it. We had the suspect’s DNA but were never able to link it to one specific person until recently.”
According to an Indiana State Police press release, “it was determined that the probability of Greenwell being the person responsible for the attacks was more than 99 percent.”
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Fifield says he doubts they will ever determine why he murdered and attacked the women.
“I don’t know if we will ever know the motive,” he says. “The common denominator was the location close to I-65. For whatever reason he stopped at those hotels. Maybe he found them convenient but with him gone we will never know. Those are answers that will haunt us.”
If you or someone you know has been sexually assaulted, please contact the National Sexual Assault Hotline at 1-800-656-HOPE (4673) or go torainn.org.
source: people.com
