The Daytona Beach killer is an American serial killer responsible for the murders of four women in the Daytona Beach, Florida area from December 2005 to December 2007. The involvement of a serial killer was feared after the discovery of the first three victims. On September 16, 2019, Daytona Beach Police announced that 37-year-old Robert Hayes, previously arrested for first-degree murder in 2016, had been linked to three of the four killings using DNA evidence.
Victims
The first known victim was 45-year-old Laquetta Gunther, who was found in an alley on December 26, 2005. She had been shot in the back of the head. DNA was recovered from the scene. The second victim was 34-year-old Julie Green, found January 14, 2006. She had also been shot in the back of the head. No DNA was recovered, but tire tracks were found. The tires were for a 2003 Taurus or Sable and in fact the exact tires were later found. Just over a month later, on February 24, 2006 police found the body of Iwana Patton, 35, on a dirt road. She had been shot, but not in the back of the head, and possibly had struggled with her killer. DNA was recovered, along with a shell casing that allowed police to identify the make and model of pistol used. Ballistics from recovered bullets and recovered DNA matched. Authorities received an anonymous telephone call describing the location of Patton's body, but the caller was eventually identified and questioned, and is not a suspect in the killings. All three women are believed to have worked as sex workers in the Daytona Beach area. Police believe the victims voluntarily accompanied their killer, possibly in a vehicle, and were subsequently murdered and dumped in the same area of Daytona Beach. The killer did not attempt to conceal the bodies. The remains of Stacey Charlene Gage, 30, were found on January 2, 2008. She had been shot in the head. Police believe she was killed December 11, 2007. Police have further stated that the circumstances surrounding the case are eerily similar to the three previous unsolved homicides. Unlike the first three victims, Gage did not have a criminal record involving prostitution. However, she did have a history of drug problems. The van Gage was driving the night she disappeared was later recovered. A woman named Rachel Elizabeth Bey was found strangled and sexually battered on the side of a road in 2016. She has been linked to the murders.
Other possible victims
In October 2006, the body of known sex worker Lisa Marie French, 39, was found in Sanford, Florida. Police first reported that French had been strangled to death, but autopsy results were inconclusive in regards to the cause of her death. Daytona Beach Police Chief Mike Chitwood has since disclosed that French was probably not the victim of foul play. Serial rapist Jerry Lee Williams Jr., whom authorities accuse of attacking six women and killing two, pleaded guilty to raping and suffocating Lisa Marie French, 39, of Casselberry, whose body was found behind a Sanford warehouse. He was sentenced to life in prison. The Orlando Sentinel reported that, "According to the FBI, the four killings are among 28 in Florida that are unsolved and connected to serial killings that the bureau suspects were committed by long-haul truckers. Those include 19 deaths along the Interstate 4 corridor between Tampa and Daytona Beach...", but it also noted that "all but one local law-enforcement agency denies any serial-killer cases on its books." The Sentinel identified as two possible further victims Regan Kendall, whose dismembered body was found near Osceola Parkway and Boggy Creek Road in Osceola County in July, and Kelly Lanthorne, who was found near South Orange Blossom Trail in Orange County.
Attempts to solve
The Daytona Beach PD used field DNA kits to take DNA samples from motorists fitting the profile of a white male with a girlfriend. The samples were taken to a lab to match with genetic material taken from the crime scenes.
Robert Hayes
On September 15, 2019, Palm Beach County officials arrested Robert Hayes, 37, at his West Palm Beach home for the March 7, 2016, killing of Rachel Bey. DNA found on Bey matched DNA recovered from Gunther and Green, two of the Daytona Beach Killer's victims and ballistics tests connect Hayes to the killing of Patton.. Lori Napolitano, chief of the Florida Department of Law Enforcement's forensics department, reported that DNA collected from Daytona Beach Killer victims was run through a genetic database used by people trying to find long-lost relatives and a link to Hayes was established. Hayes was put under surveillance and police collected a used cigarette butt surreptitiously that linked him to the killings. Additional testing after his arrest confirmed the link.
Legal Proceedings
Hayes is currently being charged with four counts of first-degree murder for the killings of Laquetta Gunther in 2005, Julie Green and Iwana Patton both in 2006 and the 2016 murder of Rachel Bey. Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty for Hayes.
