Eugene McWatters

Eugene Wayman McWatters Jr. (June 20, 1978 – September 9, 2024), known as The Salerno Strangler, was an American serial killer and sex offender who attacked several homeless women in Port Salerno, Florida, from 2003 to 2004, strangling three of them to death. McWatters was arrested once again in 2001, after injuring his girlfriend's father with a gun, but he only served three months for violating his probation.

In February of the following year, he was arrested for assaulting his landlord's son, but the charge was dropped after a lack of evidence was put forward. On March 24, 2004, McWatters raped another woman, 43-year-old Jackie Bradley. During the attack, McWatters choked and strangled Bradley to death. He took her body and dumped in a ditch filled with shallow water, where he attempted to bury it underneath a pile of rocks.

Trials and imprisonment The trial began in September 2006. Prosecutors claimed that McWatters was a calculating killer, who lured in his victims with promises of drugs and alcohol, and that he remembered everything. McWatters’ attorneys claimed that McWatters only confessed because he enjoyed attention, but that he didn't kill any of the victims. Ultimately he was found guilty and sentenced to death on December 4, 2006. For the next eight years, McWatters remained on Florida's death row awaiting execution. In 2014, a judge awarded McWatters a new trial, on the grounds that his original defense team did a poor job. He died in prison in 2024.