Although violent crime has thankfully been on the downswing throughout much of the Lone Star State, there are some glaringly obvious dark details in our past. Texas has been the scene of some gruesome stories, including one which many people may not yet be aware of. In fact, a serial killer, having confessed to committing more murders than anyone else in history made his home in Montague County throughout much of the 1980s and is believed to have committed homicides numbering in the dozens.
Henry Lee Lucas was convicted of 11 murders, although he confessed to more than 3,000. Nicknamed “The Confession Killer” as well as “The Highway Stalker,” his story isn’t dull by any stretch of the imagination, though morbid and rather shocking. The fact that it took place in small-town Texas just seems to make it all the more unbelievable.
Having an extremely troubled childhood, Lucas’ dad died of hypothermia following a bizarre railroad accident in which his legs had been severed. Prostitution was his mother’s line of work, and during that time, she forced Lucas to cross-dress in public. Subsequently, you might not be surprised to hear that the first murder he committed in the state of Michigan was that of his mother. Having had a very intense argument with her about whether he should return home to care for her in her elder years, the result was her brutal homicide, for which he served 10 years of his sentence. He was released due to prison overcrowding in June of 1970.
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Following that, he left for Ringgold, Texas, taking his 15-year-old, mentally handicapped niece, Freida Powell, with him to work for an ailing woman by the name of Kate Rich. Both Lucas and Powell were promptly fired by Rich’s family because of incompetence and the fact that they were writing checks off of Rich’s bank account. From there, they went to the streets and hitchhiked for a time, eventually being taken in at the nearby community of Stoneburg by the minister of a commune named the “House of Prayer.” It’s not quite known at which point Powell disappeared, however, Lucas had originally claimed that she left after becoming homesick, but later he admitted to killing her. It was during his interrogation for her murder that he confessed to killing Kate Rich as well, along with more than 3,000 others. Much of these claims were determined to be false, but that didn’t negate the fact that his involvement in 11 murders had been proven.
Lucas had originally been sentenced to death for the murder of an unidentified woman named “Orange Socks.” However, questions about his guilt arose when it was found that he had been given the case file to read, resulting in many of the details he had told police. In 1998, President George W. Bush had commuted his sentence to life in prison, but three years later, Lucas died in his cell as a result of heart failure. A documentary, including actual interrogation footage and law enforcement interviews regarding Lucas’ case file, is available for viewing on YouTube here, uploaded by the Jonathan Frenlie channel. As far as serial killer stories go, it comes highly recommended for its in-depth review and truly frightening details.
