Worse than Bundy and Gacy combined

A 78-year-old man might be responsible for as many as 90 unsolved murders across the US, Texan authorities say.

Samuel Little was handed three life sentences in 2014 after being convicted of strangling three Californian women in the late 1980s.

This year he was charged with the 1994 murder of a Texas woman and was extradited from California in September to assist with investigations.

Since then, Little has claimed to be involved in roughly 90 killings since the 1970s, Ector County District Attorney Bobby Bland said.

"They're able to match up over 30 cases so far," Mr Bland said.

"So far we don't have any false information coming from him."

Little, who sometimes went by the name of Samuel McDowell, looks set to become the worst serial killer in the history of the US.

If his confession proves to be true, his death tally would surpass that of Ted Bundy, who admitted to the rape and murder of 30 women between 1974 and 1978.

He would also eclipse John Wayne Gacy, who sexually assaulted, tortured and killed at least 33 boys and young men between 1972 and 1978.

Photo: Police have linked Little to at least 30 murders. (Facebook: Houma Police Department)

Little would prey on "troubled" women, targeting drug addicts and prostitutes, first taking them down with a knockout punch.

He would then strangle them while masturbating, before dumping their bodies and skipping town.

Authorities first convicted him for the Californian strangulations after matching his DNA with semen and samples found on the victims' clothing, NBC Los Angeles reported in 2014.

But now more grisly details of his killings have come to light.

A 'calming presence'

Arizona interrogator Captain Jason Whitten told the Ledger Enquirer Little was an "intelligent" man who "gave off a calming presence" after interviewing him about the murder of a 23-year-old woman in 1979.

Little spoke of leaving a dance club with the woman, describing he moment she hopped into his car.

"He wringed his hands together, smiled and said, 'I knew she was mine'," Whitten said.

The woman was found strangled and naked, except for a watch.

Photo: Little was linked to dozens of deaths, however, had escaped a murder conviction until 2014. (Facebook: Houma Police Department)

Little was a career criminal, first arrested on a burglary charge when he was 16, and spent 10 years in jail for multiple offences before being pinned for the Californian murders.

He told investigators he learned how to box in prison and eventually became a prize fighter.

Police allege he travelled the country, committing murders as he went.

Little faced court accused of both murder and assault, however he was either acquitted or pleaded guilty to lesser charges.

In 1976, he was given a three-month jail term for assault with the intent to rape after a Missouri woman escaped Little, naked below the waist with her hands bound behind her back with electrical cord.

Little was back in court accused of murdering another Missouri woman in 1982, but grand jurors failed to come to a consensus to indict him.

He was then tried for the murder of a 26-year-old woman in Florida, but was acquitted by a jury in 1984 after it was argued the hairs found on the victim's clothes could have been transferred there from the two bumping together.

In the 1980s he was charged with the attempted murder of two prostitutes in California, but pleaded guilty to lesser charges of assault with great bodily injury and false imprisonment when a jury failed to reach a verdict.

He served just two-and-a-half years in prison and was released on parole.

"It's the craziest rap sheet I've ever seen," Los Angeles Deputy District Attorney Beth Silverman told USA Today in 2013.

"He's gotten break after break after break."

Investigations into the latest 90 murders are continuing.

Jenifer (Zarknorph) said:

An Ohio doctor has been charged with the murders of 25 hospital patients who authorities say were killed with deliberate overdoses of painkillers.

Prosecutions like this only damage patient care. He should have been quietly dismissed and the other staff involved dispersed.

Very different case from Harold Shipman, who really was a monster.

I wasn't sure where to put this story, actually.

Medical News seemed a tad insensitive.

Here's one from Germany

ABC News

German ex-nurse and serial killer convicted of murdering 85 people, jailed for life

Post-war Germany's worst serial killer - a former nurse who killed patients because he liked the feeling of resuscitating them but regularly failed - is sentenced to life in jail.

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