Jerrid Joseph Powell Has Been Charged with Serial Murder

What Kind of Serial Killer Targets the Homeless - and Why?

Between November 26th and 29th, 2023, a predator murdered three homeless men sleeping alone on the city streets of L.A. The first victim, thirty-seven-year-old Jose Bolanos, died around 3 AM on November 26. Sixty-three-year-old Mark Diggs was pushing a shopping cart in the Skid Row area of down L.A. when he was gunned down at approximately 4:55 AM on November 27, and a third – a Sam fifty-two-year-old man – died when he was shot two days later around 2:30 AM.

In all three murders, video footage revealed a common pattern: a lone man exits the same vehicle, approaches and shoots the slumbering victim, and flees in the same vehicle. Law enforcement used license plate reading technology to track the killer's vehicle after identifying it on surveillance video, enabling his apprehension.

While police never used the term "serial killer," they had little doubt that a single serial offender was turning unhoused people into prey. Fortunately, the hunter has now been captured. 

The Alleged Perpetrator

The Los Angeles Police Department has arrested 33-year-old Jerrid Joseph Powell in connection with the recent killings of four men across Los Angeles County over four days. Powell was already in custody for his alleged involvement in a fatal follow-home robbery in San Dimas on November 28. Jerrid Joseph Powell was arrested on November 30 in Beverly Hills on suspicion of murdering 42-year-old Nicholas Simbolon in his San Dimas garage. Deputies say Powell followed him home from an E.V. charging station in West Corvina. According to LAPD Chief Michel Moore, a gun believed to be the weapon used in Simbolon's murder was found in Powell's car when Beverly Hills police pulled him over. 

After his arrest, investigators found a handgun in his vehicle that matched shell casings from the shootings of three homeless men in Los Angeles on November 26th, 27th, and 29th as they slept. Surveillance footage also connected Powell to all four murders. The homeless shootings all occurred in the early mornings in different areas of L.A. The victims were shot without provocation as they slept in alleys, streets, or other open spaces.

Investigators believe Powell targeted the victims at random and has no previous connections to them. He does, however, have a diverse and violent criminal history, with complaints dating back to 2016. His convictions ranged from driving with a suspended license to public intoxication to drug possession. The most serious charge was for assault with a deadly weapon on 3/25/2018.  

The Vulnerability of the Unhoused

We know that the number of sex workers targeted by serial killers has significantly increased in the past twenty years. As other vulnerable groups (hitchhikers, unsupervised children, young women walking alone at night) have all but disappeared, remaining pockets of vulnerability have been even more susceptible. In addition, serial predators often target sex workers because of the mistaken belief that no one cares about them or they won't be missed. 

These same risk factors are true of the unhoused. In addition, the number of unhoused persons has increased in the past twenty years. And so has the violence they've experienced; in Los Angeles in 2021, eighty-five people experiencing homelessness were murdered, the highest number ever recorded.

A 2022 San Diego County report determined the homeless community faced murder rates 19 times higher than the non-homeless. Attempted murder showed an even more pronounced 27 times higher rate. Assault, sexual assault, and elder abuse similarly demonstrated significantly elevated incidence versus the general public.

What Kind of Serial Killer Shoots Homeless People – and Why?

There have been several serial predators who have targeted the unhoused. Despite having his own apartment, alleged serial killer Jeremy Skibicki, currently charged with the murders of four First Nations women in Winnipeg, often hung around soup kitchens and homeless shelters, scoping out vulnerable women and then offering to provide food, shelter or drugs.  

On March 16, 2022, thirty-year-old Gerald Brevard III was arrested in connection with five separate shootings of homeless men in Washington, D.C., and New York City. Two of them died. These attacks occurred over ten days between March 3 and 13th. In October of 2021, Miami-Dade County, Florida, officials found a sleeping man who had been stabbed to death on the cold, hard pavement of Miami Avenue and 1st Street. The victim was 59-year-old Manuel Perez, a homeless individual. 

The murderer struck again. Surveillance footage in a separate incident captured a muzzle flash of bullets flying from the driver's side of a Dodge Charger. After a third attack, investigators were able to link the crimes to twenty-five-year-old real-estate agent Willy Maceo, who, when searched, had a gun matching bullets recovered from crime scenes.   

Serial violence against the homeless is not just an American crime, nor is it new. The Skid Row Stabber knifed eleven homeless persons to death in three months between October 1978 and January 1979. Suspected Russian serial killer Elena Luppi claimed at least four confirmed homeless victims and possibly four more between 1988 and 1999.

I'm not aware of anyone who has published research on the motives of serial killers who target homeless victims. But, from my investigation, it seems like they typically fall into two categories: thrill kills and mission-oriented murderers. (Jeremy Skibicki, who allegedly targeted young First Nations women who happened to be homeless – as opposed to targeting homeless people per se - would be an exception). It also seems as if serial killers who target this group are more likely to go on crime sprees – to start killing and target multiple people in a short amount of time before they are caught. 

Unlike sexually motivated serial killers, thrill killers who target the homeless seem to get off on the thrill of targeting their victims and prefer weapons we associate with hunters – guns, and knives. Accused serial killer Willy Maceo would fall into this category, as would Itzcoatl Ocampo, a then-twenty-three-year-old Iraqi war veteran who stalked and stabbed to death four homeless men in 2012. 

Mission-oriented serial killers tend to focus on specific types of people they believe they need to rid from the world." Gerald Brevard III, on the other hand, was identified by some experts as a mission-oriented serial killer. However, given the long string of crimes preceding his serial murders, including sexual assault, possession of drug paraphernalia, and attempted breaking-and-entering, it's hard to imagine idealogy was his motive. Between July 2014 and February 2015, a Moscow gang of four men and one woman killed fourteen homeless people in an attempt to “cleanse the city.”

In August 2023, eighteen-year-old William Innes told friends he was going "hobo hunting" before killing a sixty-year-old homeless woman; fortunately, police arrested him after only one murder. This happened right in my own backyard - San Diego.

The Bottom Line

Crimes against the homeless are not new, nor are they confined to the United States. But a person viewing other human beings as target practice or trash puts all of us in danger, whether we're sleeping in tents or snug in our bed behind locked doors. 

Thanks for reading this week’s Mind Detective. I always welcome your comments and suggestions - and keep the likes coming if you enjoy what you read. Please pass this along to your true crime friends. And if you watch true crime on YouTube, check out my YouTube channel, Unmasking a Murderer.