In the winter of 2003, Melanie Ruth Camilini, a 29-year-old White female and mother of two from Seymour, Connecticut, vanished. She was last seen in the Waterbury area sometime in January with two men. Camilini had been grappling with substance abuse and had a pattern of disappearing for periods, which initially complicated her case. Her family, however, grew concerned when they could not contact her, and her mother officially reported her missing in April of that year.
For years, her whereabouts remained a painful mystery for her loved ones.
The painful uncertainty surrounding Melanie's disappearance finally came to a grim end in the spring of 2015. Law enforcement, investigating a series of unsolved disappearances, returned to a wooded area behind a shopping plaza in New Britain. This area, which one perpetrator would later call his "garden," had already yielded the remains of other missing women years prior. In April 2015, investigators unearthed the skeletal remains of four more individuals. Through forensic testing, one set of remains was positively identified as those of Melanie Ruth Camilini.
The investigation into Camilini's death and the deaths of the other women whose remains were found in the same location led to one man: William Devin Howell. Already incarcerated for the manslaughter of another woman who disappeared in 2003, Howell became the prime suspect in a string of serial killings. Evidence from his van, including bloodstains and videotapes, had long pointed to his involvement in other violent crimes. Investigators built a case against him, and he was eventually charged with the murders of Camilini and five other women.
In November 2017, William Devin Howell pleaded guilty to the murders of Melanie Ruth Camilini and five other victims. He was sentenced to six consecutive life sentences, ensuring he would spend the rest of his life in prison. During his sentencing, a tearful Howell apologized to the families of his victims, referring to his own actions as "monstrous, cowardly and selfish." His conviction brought a final, albeit somber, conclusion to the long and agonizing search for justice for Melanie Ruth Camilini and the other women whose lives he had taken.
