In the spring of 1987, Mary Milligan, a bright and ambitious 21-year-old woman, was eagerly embarking on a new chapter of her life in Dallas, Texas. A recent graduate of Texas Tech University, she had moved to the city to begin a promising career as a bank management trainee. Her boyfriend at the time, Russell Leachman, remembered her as a "wonderful person" with "such a tender heart."
But on April 13, 1987, Mary's future was stolen in a brutal act of violence that would become the final piece in a terrifying puzzle that had haunted North Dallas for months.
That Monday, Mary had stayed home from work to rest a sprained ankle. When her roommate, Linda Williams, returned to their apartment that afternoon, she made a horrific discovery. Mary was found in the bathtub; she had been sexually assaulted, strangled, and drowned. Investigators quickly noted that items were missing from the apartment, including some of Mary's jewelry and her 1982 Cadillac, which was later found abandoned. The scene was chillingly similar to two other recent homicides in the area, leading police to believe a serial killer was at work. The media had dubbed the unknown perpetrator "The Bathroom Slayer" because each victim had been found in her apartment's bathroom.
The break in the case came swiftly. The day after Mary's body was discovered, Charles Anthony Boyd, a 27-year-old former bank janitor, was arrested after he attempted to pawn several of Mary's personal items. The investigation revealed that Boyd lived in the same apartment complex, directly across the hall from Mary and her roommate. He had a prior criminal record, including convictions for burglary and sexual assault, and had been granted early release from prison in November 1985 after serving less than half of a five-year sentence.
Faced with the evidence, Boyd confessed not only to Mary Milligan's murder but also to the slayings of two other women who had lived in the same apartment complex. The first victim was 37-year-old Tippawan Nakusan, a waitress who was found stabbed and suffocated in her bathtub on July 22, 1986. The second was Lashun Chappell, a 22-year-old nursing home aide, who was found fatally stabbed in her bathroom on September 15, 1986. Boyd had preyed on vulnerable women in his own community, exploiting the proximity his residence afforded him. In Mary's case, her sprained ankle had made her an even more defenseless target.
Prosecutors charged Boyd with three counts of capital murder but chose to proceed to trial only with Mary's case, as it contained the strongest forensic evidence, including blood and hair samples that linked him directly to the crime scene. During the trial, which began in October 1987, Boyd's defense attorneys argued that he was intellectually disabled and therefore should not face the death penalty. However, it took the Dallas jury just 10 minutes to convict him of capital murder. In December 1987, Charles Anthony Boyd was sentenced to death.
Boyd claimed his motive for killing Mary was that she had insulted him, a scenario her boyfriend vehemently disputed, stating she "would never call someone a name." For over a decade, Boyd remained on death row, his appeals focusing on claims of intellectual disability. On August 5, 1999, twelve days before his 40th birthday, Charles Anthony Boyd was executed by lethal injection at the Huntsville Unit in Texas. He initially declined to make a final statement, but as the drugs began to take effect, he claimed his innocence and requested a stay for DNA testing. He was pronounced dead at 6:16 p.m.
The execution brought a final, legal end to the case of the "Bathroom Slayer," but it could not erase the pain and loss he inflicted. Mary Milligan was a young woman with a full life ahead of her, remembered for her kindness and ambition. Her tragic death, the last in a series of brutal slayings, cut short a life of immense promise and left a void in the hearts of those who knew and loved her.
