Samuel Little

Lore & Background

Samuel Little was born Samuel McDowell on June 7, 1961, in Reynolds, Georgia. His mother, Bessie Mae, worked as a maid, and his father was 19-year-old Paul McDowell. Little said his teenaged mother was a 'lady of the night' and abandoned him as an infant. He was raised mainly by his grandmother in Lorain, Ohio. By his own account, he began having sexual fantasies about strangling women as a child, starting when he saw his kindergarten teacher touch her neck; as a teenager, he collected true crime magazines depicting the strangulation of women. In 1956, after a conviction for breaking and entering in Omaha, Nebraska, he was held in a juvenile institution. His mother was listed as 'whereabouts unknown.' He later moved to Florida and worked as a cemetery worker and ambulance attendant.

Reader's Guide

Samuel Little's significance lies in the unprecedented scale of his confirmed murders. The FBI's Violent Criminal Apprehension Program has confirmed his involvement in at least 60 murders, the largest number of confirmed victims for any serial killer in American history. His crime spree stretched across the country, with a concentration of murders in Miami and Los Angeles. Little provided sketches for 26 of his victims, although not all have been linked to known murders. His confessions, beginning in 2018 in exchange for a transfer out of Los Angeles County prison, led to the reopening and resolution of numerous cold cases across multiple states. The FBI announced in November 2018 that a team had confirmed 34 of his confessions and was working to match the remainder. His legacy includes both the closure of decades-old cases and the recognition of the vast, often overlooked, scope of serial murder in the United States. Little died on December 30, 2020, while serving a life sentence at California State Prison, Los Angeles County.

Did You Know?

• Little confessed to committing 93 murders across 19 states between 1970 and 2005.
• The FBI's Violent Criminal Apprehension Program confirmed his involvement in at least 60 murders, the most of any serial killer in American history.
• He was arrested 26 times in eleven states by 1975 for crimes including theft, assault, attempted rape, fraud, and attacks on government officials.

Civil War Service and the Guerrilla Years

Frank James entered the Civil War at eighteen, enlisting with the Missouri State Guard in the heavily Confederate western portion of the state. In September 1861, he took part in the siege of Lexington, Missouri, but fell ill during the operation and was left behind when Confederate forces withdrew. He surrendered to Union troops and was paroled, yet upon returning home he was seized by a local pro-Union militia and compelled to swear an oath of allegiance. By early 1863, however, James had abandoned both his parole and that oath, joining the guerrilla band of former saddler Fernando Scott before transferring to the more aggressive command of William Clarke Quantrill. The personal cost of this conflict was severe: Union militiamen raided the Samuel farm and hanged his stepfather, Dr. Reuben Samuel, torturing him to extract information about guerrilla positions. James then participated alongside Quantrill's men in the Lawrence Massacre of August 21, 1863, in which roughly two hundred largely unarmed civilians were killed. He was eventually paroled in Nelson County, Kentucky, in July 1865, though accounts conflict over a subsequent gunfight in Brandenburg that left two soldiers dead and James wounded in the hip.

The Outlaw Years and the Northfield Disaster

Following the war, James became a central figure in the James–Younger Gang, a group of outlaws who carried out at least four armed robberies between 1868 and 1876, each resulting in the deaths of bank employees or ordinary citizens. The gang's most notorious and ultimately fatal endeavor came on September 7, 1876, when they attempted a raid on the town of Northfield, Minnesota. The operation collapsed catastrophically: most members of the gang were either killed on the spot or captured by local authorities, marking the effective end of the group's coordinated criminal activity. James survived the disaster, but the Northfield Raid became the defining charge that haunted him for the next decade, a legal shadow that would follow him until his eventual surrender. The raid's failure also scattered the remaining gang members, forcing them into a more isolated and desperate existence as individual outlaws rather than as a unified band.

Surrender, Trial, and Acquittal

Five months after his brother Jesse was killed in 1882, Frank James made the decision to end his years on the run. He boarded a train to Jefferson City, Missouri, where he had arranged a meeting with the state governor. In a moment that would be remembered for decades, he placed his gun holster directly into Governor Crittenden's hands and spoke of twenty-one years spent in constant pursuit, describing his life as one of unending, anxious vigil. He concluded by telling the governor that no other hand had touched his weapon since 1861. James surrendered on the understanding that he would not be extradited to Northfield, Minnesota. He was subsequently tried on only two charges: the July 15, 1881, Rock Island Line train robbery at Winston, Missouri, in which the engineer and a passenger were killed, and the March 11, 1881, theft of a United States Army Corps of Engineers payroll at Muscle Shoals, Alabama. Former Confederate General Joseph Orville Shelby testified in his favor in the Missouri case. James was acquitted in both jurisdictions, and he was never extradited to Minnesota, never convicted, and never spent time in a penitentiary.

A Life Beyond the Legend

After his acquittal, James settled into a remarkably varied and low-profile existence. He worked as a shoe salesman in Nevada, Missouri, then took a position as a ticket taker at a burlesque theater in St. Louis, where management cleverly advertised that patrons could have their tickets punched by the legendary Frank James. He also served as an AT&T telegraph operator in St. Joseph, Missouri, and spent time on the lecture circuit while living in Sherman, Texas. In 1902, prominent thoroughbred horse trainer Sam Hildreth hired him as betting commissioner at the Fair Grounds Race Track in New Orleans. He later returned to North Texas to sell shoes at Sanger Brothers in Dallas, and by July 1914 the Tacoma Times reported he was picking berries at a Washington state ranch with plans to purchase a nearby farm. He also participated in a Chicago investment group that acquired Fletcher Terrell's Buckskin Bill's Wild West Show, the third-largest of its kind. In his final years, James returned to the family James Farm, where he gave tours for a quarter. He died there on February 18, 1915, at age seventy-two, leaving behind his wife Annie Ralston James and one son.

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