Detroit Serial Killer: Untested Rape Kits and Ignored DNA Hits

DeAngelo Kenneth Martin is the Detroit serial killer who murdered four women and sexually assaulted others on the city’s east side between 2018 and 2019, and who is now serving 45 to 70 years in prison after pleading guilty in 2022. His victims were middle-aged women found face down in vacant houses. His case became notorious not only for the killings themselves but for what a Detroit Police internal affairs report later called a “total systemic breakdown” — roughly 15 years of missed DNA matches, untested rape kits, and ignored warnings that let him remain free.¹

The Women He Killed

Martin’s four confirmed murder victims were all women in their fifties. Each was discovered inside an abandoned home in Detroit, face down, with a used condom recovered nearby.

Annetta Nelson, 57, found February 2018 in a vacant home on Winthrop Street. She died of blunt force trauma.²
Nancy Harrison, 52, found March 19, 2019, on Coventry Street. Cause of death: blunt force trauma.
Trevesene Ellis, 55, found March 24, 2019, on Linnhurst Street. Decomposition prevented a definitive cause of death.
Tamara Jones, 55, found June 5, 2019, in a vacant home on Mack Avenue. Cause of death was also undetermined because of decomposition.³

Martin was also linked to the deaths of two additional women, Deborah Reynolds and Yvonne Cobern, though he was never formally charged in those cases.³ At sentencing, Annetta Nelson’s twin sister, Anita Nelson-Reed, told the court she believed there were more.⁴

The Survivors Who Led Police to Him

Two women survived Martin’s attacks, and their resistance is what broke the case open. Detroit Police Chief James Craig said both women “fought and they live today.”⁵

On June 3, 2019, a woman in her fifties was grabbed from behind, choked unconscious, and dragged into a vacant house on Mack Avenue. When she came to, Martin was on top of her with her clothing partially removed. She fought back with a box cutter she carried for protection, stabbed him several times, jumped out of a window, and ran to a nearby gas station. She initially misidentified her attacker, but investigators matched Martin’s DNA to blood on her sweatpants.⁶

A second survivor had been attacked in early May 2019 at the home of Martin’s grandparents, where he raped and stabbed her. Martin was later bound over for trial on charges of sexual assault and attempted murder in that case. Chief Craig said police linked the crimes through a shared “signature” and that outreach to sex workers generated tips that advanced the investigation.⁵

Arrest, Plea, and Sentence

On June 7, 2019, Detroit police publicly named Martin as a person of interest. He was arrested that night without incident at a bus stop, initially on a warrant for the rape of a 26-year-old woman in his grandmother’s basement.⁷ DNA testing then linked him to all four homicides and to two additional rapes committed in 2019.

On September 18, 2019, prosecutors formally charged him with the murders of Nelson, Harrison, Ellis, and Jones, and he was held without bond. The original charges included four counts of first-degree premeditated murder and four counts of first-degree felony murder, along with kidnapping, assault with intent to murder, and multiple counts of criminal sexual conduct in separate cases.⁸

On September 2, 2022, Martin pleaded guilty to four counts of second-degree murder and to two criminal sexual conduct cases under an agreement that reduced the first-degree charges. The deal called for 45 to 70 years on the murder counts and 20 to 40 years on the sexual conduct counts, served concurrently.⁹ Wayne County Assistant Prosecutor Maria Miller confirmed the sentence had been agreed upon before the plea.¹⁰ Wayne County Circuit Court Judge Regina Thomas imposed the sentence on October 6, 2022. Martin received credit for 1,097 days already served.⁴

How He Stayed Free for 15 Years

A 247-page Detroit Police internal affairs report, later obtained by the Associated Press, documented repeated failures stretching back to 2004 and concluded that the department’s handling of evidence and leads amounted to a “total systemic breakdown.”¹

Untested Rape Kits

In 2004, a 41-year-old woman named Sylvia Sampson reported being raped. Her sexual assault kit was placed in a police warehouse and never tested, alongside more than 11,000 other kits, some dating to 1980.¹¹ The backlog was discovered in 2009, and Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy launched a years-long effort to test every kit. That initiative eventually identified 841 serial offenders and led to more than 250 convictions.¹²

In 2012, a state crime lab notified Detroit police that Martin’s DNA matched the Sampson kit. Detectives did nothing for four years. When they finally looked into it in 2016, they discovered Sampson had died, and closed the case.¹¹

Ignored DNA Hits

Martin’s DNA had been in a national database since at least 2009, following convictions that included receiving a stolen car. Beyond the Sampson case, his DNA was linked to a 2015 rape kit from a 50-year-old woman who reported being beaten and sexually assaulted in a vacant home. Police closed that case after the victim declined to cooperate. In 2017, a third rape kit matched Martin’s DNA, but investigators could find no record that the victim had ever reported the crime. None of these matches produced an arrest or a search warrant to confirm Martin’s identity. The internal affairs report found that the sex crimes unit did not properly handle DNA hits and that officers were confused about the criteria for classifying someone as a serial rapist.¹

The Wrong Man Arrested for Nelson’s Murder

After Annetta Nelson’s body was found in February 2018, police arrested Rudolph Henderson, a 43-year-old homeless man seen on video dragging her body from a vacant house. Henderson told investigators he had stumbled on the body while looking for crack cocaine and moved it because he thought no one else would find her. He was charged with first-degree murder and released about a week later when additional video showed he was not the killer.¹³ Two months after that dismissal, a state crime lab matched Martin’s DNA to evidence from Nelson’s body. Even then, police did not obtain a search warrant to confirm the match or press hard to find him. An apprehension team was dispatched and failed to locate him. Commander Michael McGinnis later said: “Sitting here today, would I have liked to have seen a more aggressive apprehension effort made in 2018? Yes, I absolutely would have.”⁷

Missed Contacts With Other Agencies

Between Nelson’s murder in early 2018 and his arrest in June 2019, Martin had repeated contact with law enforcement outside Detroit. In September 2018, Wayne State University police ticketed him for disorderly conduct. That same month, Ferndale police arrested him for lying about his identity. In December 2018, he was arrested in Southfield for assaulting a girlfriend and served about two weeks in the Oakland County Jail after pleading guilty to a misdemeanor. By May 2019, he was wanted in Southfield for violating probation. Detroit police never alerted any of these agencies that he was a homicide suspect, so none of them flagged him.¹

The internal affairs report found that while officers had “neglected their duties,” no individual mistakes rose to the level of criminal conduct. Two officers were briefly suspended.¹¹ The department said it has since changed how it manages DNA leads and handles crime victims.⁷ Families of the victims questioned whether police would have acted faster had the women not been members of vulnerable populations, including those struggling with addiction, mental illness, or homelessness.¹

Why the Vacant Houses Mattered

All four murder victims were found inside abandoned houses on Detroit’s east side, structures that also sheltered squatters, drug activity, and other violence. Police Chief Craig invoked the “broken windows” theory, arguing that concentrated blight draws further criminal behavior.¹⁴

At the time of Martin’s arrest, the city had roughly 18,000 vacant structures remaining, even after demolishing more than 18,000 in the previous five years. After the bodies were found, the city began boarding up vacant houses within a one-mile radius of the crime scenes, and Mayor Mike Duggan proposed a $200 million bond issue to deal with the rest.¹⁴ Community groups, including the church organization Deliverance and Praise, had been boarding up and rehabilitating homes in the area since 2017.¹⁵

1
WXYZ Detroit. Total Systemic Breakdown: Missteps Over Years Allowed Detroit Serial Killer to Roam Free
2
ABC News. Suspected Serial Killer Charged in Murders of Women Found Dead
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Fox 2 Detroit. Detroit Serial Killer DeAngelo Martin Sentenced for Murders of Women
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WXYZ Detroit. Detroit Serial Killer DeAngelo Martin Sentenced to Prison for Murders, Kidnappings, Rapes
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CBS News. Surviving Victims Fought Off Suspected Detroit Serial Killer
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WXYZ Detroit. Woman Testifies That She Stuck Suspected Serial Killer DeAngelo Martin With Box Cutter Multiple Times
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Fox 2 Detroit. Over 15 Years of Missteps by Police Let Detroit Serial Killer Roam Free
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WDIV Detroit (ClickOnDetroit). DeAngelo Martin
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WDIV Detroit (ClickOnDetroit). Detroit Man Gets 45-70 Years for Killing 4 Women in 4 Separate Attacks, Sexually Assaulting 2 Others
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The Detroit News. Detroit Serial Killer Sentenced for Killing 4 Women, Sexually Assaulting 2
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CBS News Detroit. Total Systemic Breakdown: Missteps Over Years Allowed Detroit Serial Killer DeAngelo Martin to Roam Free
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WXYZ Detroit. Testing of Wayne County’s Backlogged Rape Kits Leads to Hundreds of Convictions
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MLive. Murder Charge Dismissed Against Henderson
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The Detroit News. Possible Serial Murders Shine Light on Detroit Vacant Homes
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WDIV Detroit (ClickOnDetroit). Detroit Serial Killer Case Draws Attention to Vacant Homes