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Steven Pennell

Also known as: The Route 40 Killer, Corridor Killer

Active
1987–1988
Region
New Castle County, Delaware, USA
State
DE
Kind
Serial
Status
Executed
Victims
4

Steven Brian Pennell, a married electrician and father of two, abducted and killed women he picked up along U.S. Route 40 south of Wilmington in 1987 and 1988, using his van. An undercover officer posing as a sex worker on Route 40 got close to the van, noted its plate and matched its blue carpet to fibers found on victims, and he was arrested in November 1988. A jury convicted him of the murders of Shirley Ellis and Catherine DiMauro in 1989; he later pleaded no contest to the murders of Michelle Gordon and Kathleen Meyer and asked to be put to death. He was executed on March 14, 1992, the first execution in Delaware in 46 years.

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Victims

We remember the people whose lives were taken.

Timeline of locations

  1. November 1987
    U.S. Route 40 corridor, New Castle County (Abduction, approximate area)

    Pennell picked up his victims along a stretch of Route 40 south of Wilmington. Police called him the "corridor killer". An undercover officer working this stretch identified his van in September 1988.

  2. September 20, 1988
    Chesapeake and Delaware Canal (Recovery site, approximate area)

    Michelle Gordon's body was found on the rocks along the canal two days after she disappeared.

  3. March 14, 1992
    Delaware Correctional Center (now James T. Vaughn Correctional Center), Smyrna (Prison)

    After waiving his appeals, Pennell was executed by lethal injection in a trailer at the prison at 9:49 a.m. on March 14, 1992.

Active at the same time, nearby

A coincidence of time and place, not a connection. All overlaps

Sources

Each location also lists its own sources in the data file.