Main South Woodsman

The Main South Woodsman is an unidentified serial killer who murdered between three and five prostitutes in Worcester, Massachusetts, from 2002 to 2007. His nickname derives from the Main South neighborhood, where he picked up most of his victims.

The prime suspect in the murders, Alex Scesny, was identified in 2008, due to the fact he had a history of sexual abuse and was suspected in the murder of a sex worker. Although convicted of the aforementioned offenses, he has never been charged in the Main South Woodsman cases, all of which remain unsolved.

Murders All of the Woodsman's known victims were Hispanic women with slim builds, short statures, dark hair color and aged between 29 and 42 at the time of their deaths. Each of them engaged in prostitution in some way, and suffered from drug addiction.

The killer's first confirmed victim was 29-year-old Carmen Rudy, who went missing from Worcester on September 30, 2002. She had two children. Rudy suffered from a drug addiction for which she underwent treatment at the Linda Fay Griffin House, a substance abuse treatment facility. Her skeletonized remains were discovered almost a year after her disappearance on September 29, 2003, on the campus of the Hillside School in Marlborough. She was a mother of three children who had a history of prostituting herself, as well as having a drug addiction and a criminal record for possessing drugs. She had been released from a jail in Framingham in December 2002. Initially, Montalvo's identity could not be established due to the severe decomposition of her body, due to which she was named "Jane Doe No. 1" in the criminal case. On March 3, 2004, the body of 33-year-old Dinelia Torres, missing since the fall of 2003, was found in a wooded area near Hudson, approximately two kilometers away from where the previous victims' remains had been found. As a teenager, Torres gave birth to a child and dropped out of school, and after the baby's father left her, she developed a drug addiction. According to her friend, she had not slept for several days due to her heavy intake of drugs and hallucinations. Eight days later, her body was found in York, Maine, and she was identified via her tattoos. Strangely, she was found fully clothed and her jewelry had not been stolen. Like the other victims, Morello had a history of prostitution and drug abuse, having been convicted of drug possession in 1995. She had two children, but spent the last years of her life being repeatedly incarcerated, living on the streets or with acquaintances. Her cause of death was not revealed, as the police claimed that it would compromise their investigation and any possible connection she might have had with the other victims. During the investigation, investigators were inclined to believe that the killer was a person known to the victim, because according to her sister Marilyn, before going on a date with a young man, Oliveira would leave his details and cell phone number in case it was a stranger, but this time did not. According to the profile, the perpetrator was likely a blue-collar worker (possibly a construction worker, maintenance worker or truck driver); aged 28–41; fond of fishing and hunting; likely drove a pickup truck or sport utility vehicle; from a dysfunctional family where he possibly experienced physical or sexual abuse that led to him developing feelings of hatred towards his mother; unmarried; addicted to pornography and frequented Worcester's red-light districts. Experts also speculated that he lived in Worcester or neighboring cities for a long time, had possibly been incarcerated before, was a voyeur and tortured animals.

Since 1996, Scesny displayed aggressive behavior towards women and had been arrested on several occasions for assault and rape. In 1996, he was arrested on charges of beating a prostitute, rape and attempted strangulation of a woman, and sexually assaulting a young girl. However, some of the charges were later dropped after the victims failed to appear in court, and the rest were reduced, due to which he received a relatively lenient sentence. In the spring of 2012, he was convicted for the murder of Stone and sentenced to life imprisonment, but was acquitted of the West Boylston rape. He attempted to have his conviction overturned in 2015, but did not succeed.

As of March 2025, Scesny has not been charged with any of the other murders, although he remains a suspect. Currently, both the confirmed and suspected murders all remain unsolved.