Tommy Kneeland

Tommy was 17 and wife Barbara Jean Toller was 15 when they married in Tarrant county Texas in 1967. On October 23, 1967, they had a son, Tommy Ray Kneeland Jr. There is a record of Tommy and Barbara Jean having divorced on June 16 1975 - they had 2 children at the time. When Tommy was 25 he became a convicted serial killer. He was initially caught with the murder of Mary Jane Handy (age 17) and Robert Gholson (age 15). Tommy was working as a mechanic at the time and was dispatched to repair a broken down tractor-trailer. Unfortunately, within five minutes of Tommy arriving to repair the truck, Mary and Robert's car got a flat tire nearby while they were travelling to Fort Worth. Tommy picked up Mary Jane and Robert as they were hitchhiking, and took them into the woods where he raped Mary and murdered both of the teenagers with a pocket knife. Tommy was already under investigation for two other murders - that of Mrs. Nancy Mitchell, a Kermit housewife, in 1970, and Miss Carla Walker of Benbrook in 1974. During the trial, prosecutors said to the jury in an emotional plea that they must find him "guilty of two of the most horrible murders this county has ever seen". It took the jury only 40 minutes to find Tommy guilty and sentence him to two life terms. See Two life terms handed Kneeland in 2 slayings for details. Tommy was released on parole in 1987 after serving only 13 years. He was ultimately found guilty for numerous crimes of which you can read about at Serial killer paroled, prosecutor upset UPI Oct 14 1987