Serial Killers: Going for The Record

Did he or didn't he? That's what cops want to know about Donald Leroy Evans, 34, a drifter from Galveston, Texas, who claims to have murdered 60 people in a 10-year rampage across 20 states. If true, the boast would make Evans the nation's most prolific serial killer. But police and FBI investigators are skeptical, and began a thorough investigation last week.

The case came to light two weeks ago -- just as Milwaukee mass-murderer Jeffrey Dahmer was making headlines -- when Louisiana police arrested Evans. He told them he had kidnapped, raped and strangled Beatrice Routh, a 10-year- old homeless girl, on Aug. 1. As proof, he led police to her body in a grassy field off a rural Mississippi highway. Last week a murder charge in the Routh case was filed against Evans in Mississippi. Federal kidnapping charges will follow this week.

At this point, only Evans knows for sure how many people he killed. But there are indications that Routh was not his only victim. According to his court-appointed attorney, Fred Lusk, Evans has told police about two prostitutes he claims to have killed in Florida in 1985. Pieces of evidence gathered in Fort Lauderdale and Daytona Beach, Lusk said, "basically match in detail what Evans told investigators." Evans says that most of his victims were women, and that he strangled and sexually assaulted many of them. He claims that he can lead investigators to "every one" of his victims.

"It's hard to say what kind of person Donald Leroy Evans is," said Lusk. "He fits your description of a middle-aged Caucasian with above-average intelligence." A 1987 psychiatric evaluation quoted in the Washington Post found Evans to be suffering from a "lifelong history of behavioral difficulties and frank mental illness." Evans, who has been hospitalized for psychiatric treatment and once attempted to commit suicide, has a lengthy arrest record. Sentenced to 15 years in prison for sexual assault in 1986, he was released on parole last April. His main wish now, said his attorney, is to receive the death penalty.