"This offender is every woman's worst nightmare."

"This offender is every woman's worst nightmare."




In November 1987, a teenage couple looking for a make-out spot along Route 40 in Delaware suddenly stumbled upon a horrifying sight: the brutalized corpse of a 23-year-old former sex worker named Shirley Ellis. She had been bound, gagged, and tortured, then beaten to death with a hammer. 

About seven months later, construction workers found the body of sex worker Catherine DiMauro at a work site nearby. She had also been tortured and beaten with a hammer — and authorities quickly realized they were dealing with the very first serial killer in Delaware history. 




Several months and three more victims later, investigators finally captured this unhinged predator, who turned out to be a mild-mannered married man with two kids named Steven Brian Pennell. But though he may have seemed like a "normal" guy, the details of his crimes proved that he was anything but. 

This electrician-turned-serial killer kept a horrifying "torture kit" in his work van, including pliers, whips, handcuffs, needles, and knives that he used on his victims — before finishing them off by beating their heads in with his hammer.

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