Serial Killer Todd Kohlhepp May Have More Victims, Search Underway in South Carolina

Jeff Kohlhepp has already pleaded guilty to murdering seven people.
Jeff Kohlhepp has already pleaded guilty to murdering seven people. Handout

A tipster called in the information.

A search is underway for two more possible victims of serial killer Todd Kohlhepp, based on information from a tipster, authorities said.

Investigators in Spartanburg County, South Carolina, are using cadaver dogs to look for human remains on the side of Interstate 26 after receiving information that Kohlhepp claimed to have hidden the bodies of two more victims in a wooded area in Enoree, Sheriff Chuck Wright told reporters on Wednesday.

"He is a serial killer," Wright said.

Kohlhepp pleaded guilty in May 2017 to murdering seven people in South Carolina, making him one of the country's most notorious killers.

The sheriff said his department had received a credible tip that Kohlhepp had said he buried two corpses off the the highway in 2003. Wright did not identify the tipster.

Wright said he was frustrated that deputies had so far been unable to find substantiating information, such as missing persons reports from that time. 

“We haven’t been able to corroborate any missing persons around the timeframes and we went back a few years before that to make sure he didn’t mistake the times. We just haven’t been able to corroborate a lot of his story,” the sheriff told reporters.

Nonetheless, Wright said he and his deputies are obligated to pursue the tip as far as they can.

Kohlhepp is serving seven life sentences after he acknowledged burying three of his victims on his 100-acre farm in Woodruff. He also admitted fatally shooting four other people in 2003.

In 2016, Wright and his deputies discovered kidnap victim Kala Brown "chained like a dog" around the neck in a shipping container on Kohlhepp's property. The woman had been banging on the metal box and told authorities there were four bodies buried on the farm.

Kohlhepp eventually admitted to those killings and the others to avoid the death penalty.

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