Steven Brian Pennell

Who was Steven Brian Pennell?

Steven Brian Pennell, aka The Route 40 Killer, was convicted of the murders of two New Castle County, Delaware women and suspected of three more. Pennell, an electrician by trade, picked up his victims in his van along U.S. 40 near Bear, a corridor known for prostitution activity.

Pennell was arrested November 29, 1988 for the June 1988 murders of two Newark, Delaware women, Shirley A. Ellis, 23, in November 1987, and Catherine A. DiMauro, 32, in June 1988. Pennell was identified as the suspect by carpet fibers found on a victim's body; the fibers were from a carpet located on the floor of his van. He was convicted in November 1989, but the jury deadlocked on the death penalty vote; he was sentenced to life for these crimes in a 1990 trial.

Prosecutors were preparing to try Pennell for the murders of Michele A. Gordon, 22, of New Castle County, and Kathleen Anne Meyer, 26, of Newark, in September 1988. Pennell suddenly pled no contest, on the condition that he receive the death penalty. His plea of no contest to the murder of Kathleen Meyer in 1991 arose once DNA evidence linked him to the case.

Pennell was also suspected of the August 1988 murder of Margaret Lynn Finner, 27, but the decomposition of the body hampered their ability to develop sufficient evidence.