In the winter of 2003, the life of 20-year-old Shawanda Denise McCalister, a certified nursing assistant, was tragically cut short. On January 10th, she was discovered in her Jacksonville, Florida, apartment on Arco Drive, the victim of a brutal strangulation. McCalister, who was pregnant at the time of her death, was found with a cord around her neck, her hands bound.
The initial investigation looked at those close to her, including her on-again, off-again boyfriend who found her body after returning from school and being unable to enter the apartment. However, he was soon cleared as a suspect.
The investigation into Shawanda's death quickly revealed a chilling connection to other recent homicides in the Jacksonville area. Detectives noted the striking similarities between her murder and that of 19-year-old Nikia Kilpatrick, who was also pregnant and found strangled in her apartment just days earlier. This discovery led police to suspect they were dealing with a serial killer. As they delved deeper, the trail led them to a 32-year-old cab driver named Paul Durousseau. Investigators uncovered that Shawanda had been a passenger in his Gator City Taxi on the day she was killed. Cab company records became a key piece of evidence, showing a significant gap of over three hours between when Durousseau picked up McCalister and his next fare.
Paul Durousseau was arrested in February 2003 on a probation violation for a prior sexual assault conviction. By June of that year, he was charged with five counts of first-degree murder, including the death of Shawanda McCalister. The case against him was built on a mountain of evidence, including DNA, cell phone records linking him to the victims, and the testimony of witnesses who had seen a tall man in a Gator City cab near the crime scenes. Durousseau was ultimately tried and convicted for the murder of another victim, Tyresa Mack, with the details of Shawanda's case and others presented as evidence of a larger pattern of violence. In December 2007, Paul Durousseau was sentenced to death for his crimes. The investigation confirmed that he targeted young, single African American women, using his position as a cab driver to gain their trust before raping and strangling them. This brought an end to his reign of terror but left a permanent void in the lives of the families of his many victims, including that of Shawanda Denise McCalister.
