Born in Fort Wayne, Indiana on Christmas Eve 1939, Dean Corll aka ‘’The Candyman’’ was considered one of America’s worst serial killers of that time, often likened to fellow serial killer John Wayne Gacy for their mutual obsession with young males and their closeted homosexuality.
Despite suffering from a heart condition Corll joined the Army in 1964. This is said to be where he encountered his first sexual experience with a man, in turn causing him to realise that he was homosexual. He was granted honorable discharge after just 10 months of serving.
His Mother owned a sweet shop and Corll often handed out sweets to his favourite young boys, earning him the nickname ‘’The Candyman’’. After the sweet shop had shut down for good Corll became an electrician at the Houston Lighting and Power Company. He befriended two young men, David Brooks and Elmer Wayne Henley, who became his partners in crime, sodomizing and murdering young boys.
On the 25th of September 1970 at the age of 31, Corll claimed his first known victim, hitchhiking 18 year old University of Texas Student Jeffrey Konen.
Most of Corll’s victims were middle class boys that came from rough areas of Houston such as ‘’The Heights’’ where his crimes were less likely to be investigated. Ten days before Christmas two teenage boys, Danny Yates, 15, and James Glass, 14, were lured to Corll’s apartment and strangled. Another double murder occurred on the 30th of January 1971 when Corll killed brothers Donald, 17, and Jerry Waldrop, 13. Four more victims were claimed in 1971, including a former employee of the Corll sweet shop.
The killings continued into 1972. On May 21st he murdered Billy Baulch, 17, who had also worked for Corll. Billy’s friend Johnny DeLome, 16, was brutally killed the same day having been shot in the head and strangled by Henley. On July 19th 1973 Corll murdered Billy Baulch’s younger brother Tony, 15.
Corll’s modus operandi was to give Brooks and Henley $200 to lure young boys to his home where he would give them drink and drugs until they passed out. They were then stripped, strapped to a board and sodomized and tortured until they were murdered - sometimes days later. One investigator revealed that a victim had his ‘’pubic hairs pulled out one by one, a glass rod shoved up his penis and a large bullet-like instrument pushed up his rectum’’.
The murders ended on August 8th 1973 when 17 year old Henley telephoned the police to confess, ‘’I just killed a man…’’ His victim was Corll who he had shot 6 times in the head, back and shoulder. Police at first refused to believe Henley’s story of serial killing but were eventually convinced when he told them the names of the boys who had been missing and led them to Corll’s boatyard where some of the victims bodies had been buried.
In August 1974 Henley was sentenced to life imprisonment but in December 1978 his conviction was overturned. He was retried in june 1979 and again sentenced to life. Brooks received a life term in march 1975.
