Daniel Lee Corwin of Temple, Texas is a serial killer who is not often talked about.
He was from a small town, upper-middle-class, and respected religious family. His father supervised a factory, however, at one point his family lost their home and had to move into a motorhome.
He never seemed to fit in. He was quiet and in school, he would cut his nails with a hunting knife. He always had a blank face, flat affect. It may come as no surprise to you that he had killed his sister’s cat in his youth.
His first known sexual assault victim was a babysitter, his teenage neighbour.
She noticed the sliding door was ajar, locking it behind her. A naked teenage Danny pops out, covers her mouth, and sexually assaults her. Before leaving the scene, he turns to her and asks for his shirt back then says “you don’t know me I live on the other side of the town”.
Months later he was investigated for the crime but passed the lie detector test and was never arrested.
In 1975, he pushes himself into classmate Brenda Evans’s car, wheels it out of the parking lot and drives a mile down into a rural area. She fights back and kicks him in the crotch. Then he slowly stabs the knife into her chest. She did not die as her bra may have saved her life. She lives to this day.
Unfortunately, the Presbyterian church intervenes in this case against him, claiming that he must have been led on and was lured into it by the victim. Rumours of Brenda being loose and wild spreads. They asked that he be given probation. A deal was made by her father to spare her from being traumatized all over again. Danny gets 40 years with a chance of parole.
Texas prisons in the 1970s were overcrowded and he soon became popular with the people working in the prison as he knew how to work on their cars. At this time, he was put on antipsychotics but they ended up stopping as he did not like the side effects. He was then out of prison in 6 years.
Danny went back to church after his release and babysits for a churchgoer named Becky. Becky was attracted to him and soon they became an item. Danny wasn’t able to consummate their relationship and soon they grew apart.
After Danny went to University in Madisonville, a 72-year-old named Alice Martin disappears walking her dog, then found several days later, cut up and raped.
It’s suspected that Danny was driving around scouting for victims.
Later that fall, Debra Erwin was found raped and stabbed to death in a rural area in Huntsville.
Huntsville police call Danny’s boss. He mentions that he’s aware that Danny had a rape charge.
When he was brought in, he seemed very polite to the police. They thought that since he seemed very nice that he was not involved and eventually let him go.
The police claimed that he was compliant and not upset when he was brought in. At the time they chose to suspect Erwin’s husband instead, even though he had an alibi.
On Halloween, Mary Carrell Risinger, and her 4-year-old went to a beauty pageant with her daughter. On their way home, they stopped at an open-air car wash.
15 minutes after they had pulled up, three women rushed into the sheriff’s office, which was nearby, saying a dead woman was in the car wash.
A detective who was out trick-or-treating with his family happened to drop by and decided to go to the scene.
When he arrived, a hose was still firing water. There was blood near a white car and in the car was a child in a red dress. She had kept the car locked and he convinced her to open it. When the doors open she says to him “The bad man killed mommy”. Her dress wasn’t red, it was white and soaked in blood. He checks for wounds, but the blood was not hers.
At this point, the police still have not suspected Danny. However, his boss does notice Danny coming to work with a bandage across his hand.
Following spring, Wendy Gant went out to ride her horse at Kyle Field. She got into her pickup, when she turned, Danny held a knife to her face. He ties her to the seatbelts. She tried to scream but the windows were closed and no one heard her. He drives out of the area, claiming he was just taking her car.
They went into a trail off in the woods and sexually assaulted her. He then ties her to a tree, slits her throat and leaves.
Despite the wound, she was still alive. She manages to escape and cover her neck to slow the bleeding. He was still in the parking area so she quietly hid behind a tree until he left.
Afterwards, she staggers into the parking lot and collapses. A county employee notices her and brings her to a hospital where she is stabilized. But she’s unable to speak due to the injury.
With written notes, she lets them know that she can recognize her attacker. A sketch artist was brought in. Wendy was determined to help them identify him. The next day the sketch was circulated and it was instantly recognizable as Danny Corwin.
The state police call Danny’s boss and tell him that this was their guy. The pickup truck was scanned for prints and they had a match. Danny had no idea that they had their sights set on him. Eventually, they surround his rental house, hoping he’d come outside. Soon he was tackled and arrested.
Danny gets sentenced to life in prison. The police were still frustrated at several murders that he may or may not have committed.
In prison he gets screened and questioned, he was asked why he did what he did, while he doesn’t deny it, he says “I don’t know”.
By the following week, he just confesses to all the above attacks. He claims that during each crime, he had a “pressure” in his head, a fog would descend and he would not remember much about it until it was over. He finally gets on death row in the late 80s.
Two women interview Danny, telling him how their lives were ruined. He was in his 40s at this point. He first insisted that he can’t remember details and he didn’t know why he did it. Eventually, he blames it all on the rape he experienced in jail as a teenager.
On December 7, 1998, he was taken into the death chamber with small viewing rooms for the family of the victims, he rambled for 8 or so minutes, thanking the two women for “allowing him to be a part of their lives”, then died by lethal injection.
Further reading/listening:
The Demon Next Door by Bryan Burrough
Tenfold More Wicked Podcast
Note: Originally posted on Reddit by me
