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PENN Thomas Lee

*1948

PENN William

*1941

1966

Verdict/Urteil:

At first, the only similarity between the crimes appeared to be the killer's choice of weapon. In the six weeks ending on May 24, 1966, a half-dozen victims were cut down at random in Richmond, Virginia, their ranks including male and female, black and white. It would require an error by a boastful gunman for police to crack the case, and they would nearly lose a seventh victim in the process. For openers, the chosen victims seemed to fit no pattern that police could recognize. Mosille Spencer, age 78, was a black night clerk at a local motel, gunned down on April 10. Willie Sexton, shot nine times in the back, was also black, but only 21 years old. The first female victim, another black, was 16-year-old Cynthia Johnson, shot twice in the chest and dumped near Oakwood Cemetery on May 10. All three had been stripped of their wallets, cash, and I.D., shot multiple times at close range with a .22-caliber handgun. On May 20, the first white victims - 20-year-old Addison Wilkins and 41-year-old Malcolm Norment attended a local church to observe a scheduled debate between spokesmen for the NAACP and the Ku Klux Klan. The Klansmen didn't show, and disappointed members of the audience were homeward bound when Wilkins and Norment met their killers. Found near Oakwood Cemetery the next morning, both had been robbed of their wallets, Wilkins shot ten times and Norment seven times with .22-caliber weapons. Another white victim, 52-year-old James Carter, was shot twelve times in the stomach, back and head before he was discarded in some nearby woods. Thus far, police had counted 40 wounds in half a dozen victims, recovering 32 slugs for comparison with suspect weapons. Their break came in the form of a 14-year-old survivor, raped, shot twice and left for dead by a black assailant who boasted of killing two white men on May 21. She recognized her attacker, and warrants were issued for 18-year-old Thomas Penn, seeking his arrest on charges of rape and attempted murder. The following day, brother William Penn, age 25, was added to the suspect list. By May 29, both men were in custody, Thomas Penn freely admitting his role in all six murders. Convicted of Cynthia Johnson's death on December 17, he was sentenced to life imprisonment, still unable to answer the question of motive. In answer to the nagging query, he responded, "I can't give the jury any reason." None was needed any longer, as the bailiffs led him off to serve his time.

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