The murder of Linda Sue Boards
Smiths Grove, Warren County, Kentucky · 1981
Overview
Linda Sue Boards was 23 when she was last seen leaving the Peacemaker's club on 3rd Street in Bowling Green, Kentucky, in May 1981. On May 15, 1981 her body was found on a farm off Hydro-Pondsville Road, about a mile and a half southeast of Smiths Grove in Warren County. Kentucky State Police said she had been raped and strangled. The case went cold for thirty-seven years. In September 2018 the FBI's Violent Criminal Apprehension Program sent the state police a lead: a Texas inmate named Samuel Little, convicted in 2014 of killing three women in Los Angeles County, had begun confessing to a Texas Ranger to some ninety killings across the country, and the method in his California cases matched the way Boards had died. Kentucky investigators went to Texas in October 2018 and interviewed him. On December 12, 2018 a Warren County grand jury indicted Little, then 78, for her murder, the day before he pleaded guilty in Odessa, Texas to the 1994 strangling of another woman. Little eventually confessed to 93 murders committed between 1970 and 2005, and the FBI confirmed about sixty of them. He was never brought to Kentucky to stand trial. He died in a hospital in Los Angeles County on December 30, 2020, aged 80, with the Warren County indictment still pending.
How it was solved
The case was solved by a confession, obtained decades later by investigators who had no new physical evidence of their own. In September 2018 a Kentucky State Police investigator at the Central Forensic Laboratory contacted Post 3 in Bowling Green about a lead from the FBI's Violent Criminal Apprehension Program, ViCAP, which analyzes serial violent and sexual crimes. The ViCAP database had flagged a man whose crimes in California matched the method used to kill Boards. He was Samuel Little, who had been arrested at a Louisville homeless shelter in September 2012 on a California drug warrant after, a U.S. marshal later said, he made the mistake of using an ATM at a gas station on East Broadway. Extradited to Los Angeles, he was convicted in September 2014 of three murders from the late 1980s and sentenced to life without parole. He denied everything for years. Then, in 2018, he began talking to Texas Ranger James Holland, first about a 1994 strangling in Odessa, Texas, and then about dozens more killings, as a bargaining chip to be moved out of the Los Angeles County jail. The Post 3 commander was directed to the Rangers, and Holland, who had recently interviewed Little about the Texas crimes, said he believed Little could be connected to the Boards murder. In October 2018 KSP investigators travelled to Texas and interviewed him about the Kentucky case. The state police said only that information obtained during the interview was presented to the Warren County grand jury, which indicted Little for murder on December 12, 2018. The Associated Press reported that the Kentucky killing matched the methods used in the California murders. Holland's advice to the detectives who came after him was to keep Little talking, not interrupt him and never ask why. Over roughly 700 hours of interviews Little gave details of scores of killings that only the killer would know and drew portraits of his victims from memory. By his death he had confessed to 93 murders; authorities had confirmed nearly sixty and said they had no reason to doubt the rest.
Sources
- KSP Investigation Leads to Indictment in 27 Year-Old Cold Case (December 13, 2018)
“In October of 2018, KSP investigators traveled to Texas to interview the suspect regarding the Kentucky case. Information obtained during the interview led to the case being presented to the Grand Jury and subsequent indictment.”
- Troopers charge man with murder in Kentucky 37-year-old cold case (December 13, 2018)
“Police said Boards was last seen leaving the Peacemaker's club on 3rd Street in Bowling Green. Troopers said she had been raped and strangled to death.”
- Man Who Confessed To 90 Murders Indicted In Ky. Cold Case (December 13, 2018)
“The body of Boards was found on May 15, 1981 on a farm located on Hydro-Pondsville Road, 1.4 miles southeast of Smiths Grove, Ky. She had been raped and strangled.”
- Kentucky grand jury indicts serial killer on murder charge (December 14, 2018)
“Kentucky State Police said in a statement that the Warren County grand jury handed down the indictment Wednesday against Samuel Little in the death of Linda Sue Boards. Police said the Kentucky slaying matched methods used in the California killings.”
- Serial killer who claims to have murdered 90 people indicted in KY cold case (December 17, 2018)
“Now, Little has been indicted for the 1981 killing of 23-year-old Linda Sue Boards, in Smiths Grove, KY. It's unclear if he will be transported to Kentucky to stand trial.”
- Samuel Little
“In December 2018, Little was indicted for strangling Linda Sue Boards, 23, to death in May 1981 in Warren County, Kentucky.”
- U.S. marshal recalls how ATM use doomed America's most prolific serial killer (October 8, 2019)
“Parish said Little made one mistake, using an ATM at a local gas station on East Broadway in Louisville in 2012.”
- Prolific serial killer details murder of woman in Kentucky (October 8, 2019)
“She was like partially concealed by the vegetation. I left her there.”
- Detectives across US grill serial killer, close cold cases (October 17, 2019)
“Keep him talking, don't interrupt him and, no matter what, don't ask why he killed his victims.”
- Man called most prolific serial killer in US history dies (December 30, 2020)
“By the time of his death, Little had confessed to killing 93 people between 1970 and 2005.”
- New Details Released in Unsolved Samuel Little Murders (December 1, 2021)
“Little confessed to committing 93 murders between 1970 and 2005. More than 60 of Little's confessions have been definitively matched to victims through DNA evidence.”
- Investigators ask for public's help to identify remaining victims of serial killer Samuel Little (December 1, 2021)
“Little manually strangled all his victims, save for two, who were drowned.”
- Man's 90 confessed killings include Cincinnati, Covington cases (November 2018)
“Investigators from the FBI's Violent Criminal Apprehension Program found a similar case in Odessa, Texas. When they interviewed Little, he said he was willing to talk in exchange for a move to another prison.”
- Linda Sue Boards, 1957 to 1981
“Stoney Point Baptist Church Cemetery, Smiths Grove, Warren County, Kentucky, USA”