Ouithreaun C. Stokes, a 28-year-old Black/African American woman, was found dead on April 27, 2007, inside an abandoned rooming house at 3128 North 7th Street in Milwaukee. She had been beaten and strangled. Her killing initially appeared to be another isolated homicide in a city that had investigated several similar deaths over the preceding two decades, but biological evidence recovered during the investigation would eventually connect her death to a much longer series of murders.
Investigators discovered that DNA evidence associated with Stokes matched evidence from the 1997 killing of Joyce Mims. As forensic technology improved and authorities reexamined older unsolved cases, the same unidentified genetic profile was linked to additional women killed in a relatively small area of Milwaukee's north side. The victims had been discovered between 1986 and 2007, and most had been strangled. Until the DNA connections were established, their deaths had generally been investigated as separate cases rather than the work of one offender.
The widening DNA investigation led police to Walter E. Ellis, a Milwaukee man with an extensive criminal history. Ellis should have had a genetic sample entered into Wisconsin's convicted-offender database years earlier, but authorities later determined that the required sample was missing. Reports indicated that another inmate had provided a sample in Ellis's place while the two were incarcerated, allowing Ellis's DNA to remain absent from the system. The failure became especially painful for Stokes's family because a properly collected sample might have identified Ellis before her death.
In 2009, authorities sought a new DNA sample from Ellis. After he failed to report as directed, investigators obtained a toothbrush from his residence and tested the saliva left on it. The resulting profile matched biological evidence connected to Stokes and other victims. An arrest warrant was issued, and Ellis was captured on September 7, 2009, at a motel in Franklin, Wisconsin. Prosecutors initially charged him with two counts of first-degree intentional homicide for the killings of Stokes and Mims, alleging that he had intentionally caused Stokes's death at the North 7th Street property.
As the investigation continued, prosecutors added charges involving five other women: Deborah Harris, Tanya Miller, Irene Smith, Florence McCormick and Sheila Farrior. Authorities concluded that Ellis had killed the seven women during a period spanning approximately 21 years. Evidence in the cases showed a repeated pattern of strangulation, sometimes involving clothing, rope or other materials. Stokes's death was the last homicide included among the seven charged cases and marked the endpoint of the series attributed to Ellis.
Rather than proceeding through seven separate murder trials, Ellis entered no-contest pleas in February 2011. A no-contest plea resulted in convictions just as guilty pleas would have, although Ellis did not formally admit committing the murders. He was convicted of seven counts of first-degree intentional homicide, including the killing of Stokes. On February 24, 2011, a judge imposed seven consecutive life sentences without the possibility of parole, ensuring that Ellis would never be released from prison.
Ellis was later transferred to the South Dakota State Penitentiary under an interstate arrangement. He died in custody in December 2013 from complications associated with diabetes. His arrest, convictions and life sentences formally resolved the criminal case surrounding Stokes's murder, although the broader investigation left continuing questions about whether he may have been responsible for additional deaths. For Stokes's family, the eventual identification and conviction of her killer brought legal accountability, but it came only after years of forensic work and after serious failures in the DNA collection system had allowed Ellis to remain unidentified.
