Do you know this trans woman murdered by a serial killer in the 1970s?
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A prison inmate in California has confessed to strangling 93 women – including trans women – over the course of decades.
Investigators have verified around 60 of serial killer Samuel Little’s confessions and they are seeking the public’s help with finding out more information about five of his victims.
One of those was an 18-year-old black transgender woman from Miami, Miami Herald reports.
Serial killer Samuel Little met black transgender teenager in a Miami bar in the 1970s.
Little said he met the woman in a bar called The Pool or Pool Place in either 1971 or 1972 and that her name was Marianne. He believes she had a boyfriend or ex-boyfriend called Wes.
Marianne reportedly lived with a group of transgender women in the Liberty City or Brownsville areas of Miami.
In his confession, Little said he was driving in his car – a gold Pontiac – with Marianne when he pulled off Highway 27. He brought her to a place that may have been a sugarcane field where he strangled her. He said he left her body off a dirt road on the way to a swamp.
Little was initially convicted of the murders of three women between 1987 and 1989. However, he claims to have killed women across 19 states over the course of almost 50 years.
Little was sentenced to life imprisonment in 2014.
He went on trial for three murders in 2014 and was found guilty and sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole.
Last year, the Ector County District Attorney announced that he had confessed to countless murders and may have killed more than 90 women.
It is as yet unclear how many trans women Little killed.
Trans women can face disproportionate levels of violence, and trans women of colour in the United States are particularly susceptible.
At least 18 trans people have been killed in the US this year alone, most of them trans women of colour
Of the at least 18 trans people killed in the US so far this year, most have been trans women of colour.
Just earlier this month, black trans woman Bee Love Slater’s body was found burned in a car in Clewiston, Florida.
Her death is not being investigated as a hate crime just yet, but Sheriff Whiddon, who is investigating the case, said it’s “kind of leading toward that way”. Investigators have identified James Richemond as a person of interest in the case.
