Early life

Sells and his twin sister, Tammy Jean, contracted meningitis

Meningitis

Meningitis is inflammation of the protective membranes covering the brain and spinal cord, known collectively as the meninges. The inflammation may be caused by infection with viruses, bacteria, or other microorganisms, and less commonly by certain drugs...

when they were 18 months old. While Sells suffered a high fever, he survived. His sister, however, died from the inflammation. Shortly thereafter, Sells was sent to live with his aunt Bonnie Woodall in Holcomb, Missouri

Holcomb, Missouri

Holcomb is a city in Dunklin County, Missouri, United States. The population was 696 at the 2000 census.-Geography:Holcomb is located at .According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of , all land....

. He lived with Woodall until he was five.

When Sells was eight he began spending time with a man named Willis Clark, a man from a neighboring city. Clark would later be suspected of child molestation.

Sells started traveling in order to find work. Because he was homeless at the time, he hitched rides, hopped trains and at one point stole a vehicle. He held several different jobs, often doing menial labor.

Murders

Sells has claimed he committed his first murder at age 16.

In July 1985, when he was 21 years old, Sells was working at a carnival in Forsyth, Missouri

Forsyth, Missouri

Forsyth is a city in Taney County, Missouri, United States. The population was 1,686 at the 2000 census. It is the county seat of Taney County. The town is part of the Branson, Missouri Micropolitan Statistical Area-Geography:...

. There he met Ena Cordt, 35, who had brought her 4-year old son to the carnival as a treat. Cordt found Sells attractive and invited him back to her home that same evening. According to Sells, he had sex with Cordt, but awoke during the night to find her stealing from his backpack. Seizing her son's baseball bat, he beat her to death. He also murdered her son in case he could be used as a witness. The two badly bludgeoned bodies were found three days later, by which time Tommy Lynn Sells had moved on.

In 1997, 10-year-old Joel Kirkpatrick, son of Julie Rea Harper, was murdered. His mother was convicted, but the conviction was overturned. Her family told police Sells had invaded their home and killed Kirkpatrick because the mother was rude to Sells earlier that night at a nearby convenience store. Then, in 2002, author Diane Fanning

Diane Fanning

-Early life and education:Fanning was born Diane Lynn Butcher in Baltimore, Maryland. She attended Perry Hall High School, then Lynchburg College in Virginia, where she majored in chemistry.-Career:...

 corresponded with Sells. In a letter to Fanning, Sells confessed to murdering Kirkpatrick. Fanning's testimony before the prisoner review board, according to the Innocence Project

Innocence Project

An Innocence Project is one of a number of non-profit legal organizations in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand dedicated to proving the innocence of wrongly convicted people through the use of DNA testing, and to reforming the criminal justice systems to...

, helped land Harper a new trial and, ultimately, an acquittal. Fanning's resulting book, Through the Window, details Sells' cross-country crime spree.

Sells is also suspected to be the perpetrator in the following crimes:

• The murder of Suzanne Korcz in New York
  New York
  New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
  
   during May 1987
• The November 1987 murder of the Dardeen family in Illinois.
• Killing a co-worker in Texas
  Texas
  Texas is the second largest U.S. state by both area and population, and the largest state by area in the contiguous United States.The name, based on the Caddo word "Tejas" meaning "friends" or "allies", was applied by the Spanish to the Caddo themselves and to the region of their settlement in...
  
   during April 1998.
• The murder of Katy Harris in Texas in 1999.
• The sexual assault and murder of a child, Hailey McComb in Lexington, KY

Arrests and confessions

Sells has recently claimed to have killed upwards of 70 people, according to an interview with Columbia University

Columbia University

Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...

 forensic psychiatrist

Forensic psychiatry

Forensic psychiatry is a sub-speciality of psychiatry and an auxiliar science of criminology. It encompasses the interface between law and psychiatry...

 and personality expert Dr. Michael H. Stone in Discovery Channel

Discovery Channel

Discovery Channel is an American satellite and cable specialty channel , founded by John Hendricks and distributed by Discovery Communications. It is a publicly traded company run by CEO David Zaslav...

's Most Evil

Most Evil

Most Evil is an American forensics television program on Investigation Discovery presented by forensic psychiatrist Michael Stone of Columbia University. On the show, Stone rates murderers on a scale of evil that he has developed...

.

On December 31, 1999, in the Guajia Bay subdivision, west of Del Rio, Texas

Del Rio, Texas

Del Rio is a border city in and the county seat of Val Verde County, Texas, United States.. Del Rio is connected with Ciudad Acuña via the Lake Amistad Dam International Crossing and Del Río-Ciudad Acuña International Bridge...

, Sells fatally stabbed 13-year-old Kaylene 'Katy' Harris 16 times and slit the throat of 10-year-old Krystal Surles. Surles survived and received help from her neighbors. Ultimately, Sells was apprehended using a sketch from the victim's description.

Tommy Lynn Sells is currently on death row

Death row

Death row signifies the place, often a section of a prison, that houses individuals awaiting execution. The term is also used figuratively to describe the state of awaiting execution , even in places where no special facility or separate unit for condemned inmates exists.After individuals are found...

 in the Allan B. Polunsky Unit near Livingston

Livingston, Texas

Livingston is a town in Polk County, Texas, United States. The population was 5,433 at the 2000 census. It is the county seat of Polk County. Livingston was settled in 1835 as Springfield. Its name was changed to Livingston and became the county seat of Polk County in 1846.The Alabama-Coushatta...

, Texas

Texas

Texas is the second largest U.S. state by both area and population, and the largest state by area in the contiguous United States.The name, based on the Caddo word "Tejas" meaning "friends" or "allies", was applied by the Spanish to the Caddo themselves and to the region of their settlement in...

. The TDCJ received him on November 8, 2000.

External links

• Complete details of Tommy Sells murders (from crimelibrary.com)
• Interview with Tommy Lynn Sells "(from 20/20)*