Ottis Toole

Ottis Toole was born and raised in Jacksonville, Florida. Toole's father was an alcoholic who abandoned him, while his abusive mother would dress him in girls' clothing and call him Susan.[1] As a young child he was a victim of sexual abuse and forced incest at the hands of many close relatives and acquaintances, including his older sister and a next-door neighbor. He stated that his maternal grandmother was a Satanist who exposed him to various Satanic practices and rituals in his youth, including graverobbing.[2] Toole claimed this abuse began when he revealed his homosexuality to his family.[1]

Toole was often classified as having a mild intellectual disability, with an intelligence quotient (IQ) of 75.[1] He also had epilepsy, which resulted in frequent grand mal seizures. Throughout Toole's childhood, he frequently ran away from home and often slept in abandoned houses. He was a serial arsonist from a young age and was sexually aroused by fire.[3]

In the documentary Death Diploma, Toole stated that he was forced to have sex with a friend of his father's when he was five years old. He felt he knew that he was gay when he was 10 years old and that he had a sexual relationship with a neighborhood boy when he was 12. Toole dropped out of school in the ninth grade and began visiting gay bars. He also stated he had been a prostitute as a teenager and that he became obsessed with gay pornography at some point.[1]

Toole stated that he committed his first murder at the age of 14; after being propositioned for sex by a traveling salesman, Toole ran over the salesman with his own car.[1] Toole was first arrested at the age of 17 in August 1965 for loitering.

Much information on Toole between 1966 and 1973 is unclear, but authorities believe that he began drifting around the Southwestern United States and that he supported himself by prostitution and panhandling. While living in Nebraska, Toole was one of the prime suspects in the 1974 murder of 24-year-old Patricia Webb. Shortly after, he left Nebraska and briefly settled in Boulder, Colorado. One month later, he became a prime suspect in the homicide of 31-year-old Ellen Holman, who was murdered on October 14, 1974. With many accusations against him, Toole left Boulder and headed back to Jacksonville.

In early 1975, Toole returned to Jacksonville after drifting and hitch-hiking through the American South. On January 14, 1976, he married a woman 25 years his senior. She left him three days later, after discovering his homosexuality. Toole later said during an interview that his marriage was a tactic meant to conceal his true sexuality.[1]

Lucas (left) and Toole together

In 1976, Toole met Henry Lee Lucas at a Jacksonville soup kitchen,[1] and they likely developed a sexual relationship.[4] Toole later claimed to have accompanied Lucas in 108 murders, sometimes committed at the behest of a cult called "The Hands of Death". Police, however, discounted the uncorroborated claim of the cult's existence.[1]

On January 4, 1982, Toole barricaded 65-year-old George Sonnenberg in a boarding house where he was living in Jacksonville and set the house on fire. Sonnenberg died a week later of injuries he sustained in the fire. In April 1983, Toole was arrested for an unrelated arson incident in Jacksonville. Toole confessed to the crime and was sentenced to 20 years in prison.[5] Toole signed a confession stating that he and Sonnenberg had begun a sexual relationship and, after the two had an argument, Toole set Sonnenberg's home on fire.[6]

Two months later in June, his accomplice Henry Lee Lucas was arrested for unlawful possession of a firearm. It was then Lucas began boasting about the murderous rampage orchestrated by the two. At first, Toole had denied involvement but later began backing up Lucas's confessions. Lucas also backed Toole's confession to the murder of Adam Walsh. Journalist Hugh Aynesworth and others investigated for articles that appeared in The Dallas Times Herald. It was calculated that Lucas would have had to use his 13-year-old Ford station wagon to cover 11,000 miles (18,000 kilometers) in one month i.e., around 370 miles (600 km) per day, to have committed the crimes police attributed to him. Lucas became widely regarded as a compliant interviewee who was used by police to clear up unsolved murders that he had not been involved in, aided by Toole giving false statements in collaboration.[7]

During Toole's trial for murdering George Sonnenberg, Toole claimed that he did not light the home on fire and only signed the confession so he would be extradited back to Jacksonville.[6] On April 28, 1984, a jury found Toole guilty of first degree murder and sentenced him to death.[5][8] Later that year, Toole was found guilty of the February 1983 strangulation murder of a 19-year-old Tallahassee, Florida woman, and received a second death sentence; on appeal, however, both sentences were later commuted to life in prison.

After his incarceration, Toole pled guilty to four more Jacksonville murders in 1991 and received four more life sentences.[9]

Toole died of cirrhosis at the Florida State Prison on September 15, 1996, at the age of 49. His body went unclaimed and he was buried in the Florida State Prison cemetery.[18]

• List of serial killers in the United States
• List of serial killers by number of victims