[2] The victims also shared in common traits such as poverty, mental illness, and histories of drug abuse and sex work.
[2] In December 2008, a task force consisting of 14 federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies was formed to solve the killings.
[5] Task force investigative reports reveal a series of witness interviews in which local law enforcement were implicated in the murders.
[2] Sheriff's office chief criminal investigator, Warren Gary, was also accused of purchasing a truck suspected of having been used to transport a body for the purpose of discarding evidence.
[1] Frankie Richard, a local strip club owner and suspected drug dealer[1][2] admitted to being a crack addict and to having sex with most of the victims.
[2] Byron Chad Jones and Lawrence Nixon (a cousin of the fifth victim, Laconia Brown) were briefly charged with second-degree murder in the Ernestine Patterson case.
[2] However, the sheriff's office did not test the alleged crime scene until 15 months after Patterson's murder, and found it "failed to demonstrate the presence of blood.