Derrick Todd Lee

Derrick Todd Lee (November 5, 1968 – January 21, 2016), also known as The Baton Rouge Serial Killer, was an American serial killer who, from 1998 to 2003, terrorized the areas surrounding Baton Rouge and Lafayette, Louisiana, by committing the murders of at least seven women.

Before his murder charges, Lee had been arrested for stalking women and watching them in their homes. Despite this arrest, he initially was overlooked by police because they incorrectly believed the killer was white. Lee was linked by DNA tests to the deaths of seven women in the area in Louisiana and in 2004, he was convicted in separate trials of the murders of Geralyn DeSoto and Charlotte Murray Pace. The Pace trial resulted in a death sentence.

Newspapers suggested Lee was responsible for other unsolved murders in the area, but the police lacked DNA evidence to prove these connections. After Lee's arrest, it was discovered that another serial killer, Sean Vincent Gillis, was operating in the Baton Rouge area during the same time as Lee.

Lee died on January 21, 2016 of heart disease at a hospital in Louisiana, where he was transported for treatment from Louisiana State Penitentiary; he had been awaiting execution at the penitentiary.