In the winter of 1992, the life of 27-year-old Alice Denise “Tina” Taylor was tragically cut short in Gulfport, Mississippi. A Black female and mother of five, her disappearance on December 7, 1992, left her family searching for answers for over two and a half decades. Witnesses last saw Taylor at the Flamingo Club on Alabama Avenue in North Gulfport on the evening of her disappearance.
A bartender recalled seeing her between 4 and 5 p.m., and her boyfriend last saw her in the club's parking lot between 9 and 10 p.m.
For 26 years, a cloud of uncertainty hung over the fate of Alice Taylor. Her children grew up hearing various stories about what might have happened to their mother, none of which brought them any closer to the truth. The painful mystery finally began to unravel with the confessions of one of the most prolific serial killers in U.S. history, Samuel Little. Already serving life in prison for the murders of three women in Los Angeles, Little began confessing to a staggering number of killings across the country.
Little admitted to strangling Taylor and leaving her body under some tires on the side of a road in Gulfport, between Mississippi and Alabama avenues, on December 11, 1992. His confession was part of a broader admission to killing as many as 90 women in 19 states over several decades. Little's detailed recollections of his crimes, despite a hazy memory for dates, helped investigators link him to numerous cold cases, including Taylor's. The confession brought a painful but necessary closure to Taylor's family, who finally learned the truth about her death. Her aunt, Ann Taylor, expressed relief that the truth had come to light, emphasizing that Taylor had done nothing to deserve her fate.
Samuel Little was convicted of eight murders and ultimately confessed to 93, with law enforcement confirming his involvement in at least 60. His confessions provided answers for many families like the Taylors who had been left in the dark for years. Little died in a California hospital on December 30, 2020. While he was never tried specifically for the murder of Alice Denise Taylor, his confession provided the only official resolution to her case. Authorities in Harrison County have continued to review other cold cases to determine if Little was responsible for any other unsolved murders in the area.
