In the spring and summer of 1926, a shadow of fear crept over Tampa, Florida, as a series of brutal, unsolved murders terrorized the community. This wave of violence would eventually claim ten lives and lead to the identification of one of the state's most notorious serial killers. Among the victims was Bee Dee Rowell, a 45-year-old male grocery clerk whose death was part of a horrific family massacre that left a lasting scar on the city.
His story is intertwined with rumors of secrets, a string of savage killings, and a desperate search for justice.
On the morning of June 28, 1926, a concerned neighbor noticed an unnerving silence at the Rowell family home at 116 South Nebraska Avenue. Peering inside, she made a gruesome discovery. The house was a scene of unimaginable carnage. Four people had been brutally hacked to death with an axe as they slept. The victims were Bee Dee Rowell; his 94-year-old mother, Caroline Rowell; his 16-year-old daughter, Eva Rowell; and a 40-year-old mechanic named Charles Alexander, who was a tenant rooming with the family. The sheer brutality of the attack shocked even seasoned law enforcement officers.
The investigation into the Rowell family massacre was immediately fraught with speculation. Whispers and rumors spread quickly through the frightened city. One persistent rumor was that Bee Dee Rowell had been killed because he knew too much about another recent, savage murder. Two months prior, on April 28, a woman named Emma Hilliard had been found decapitated. A newspaper vendor known as "Blind Charlie" Manuel was arrested for her murder, found drunk at the scene with a knife. However, it was said that Bee Dee Rowell had told people that Manuel was innocent and that he knew the identity of the real killer. This led many to believe the Rowell family was silenced to prevent the truth from coming out.
For nearly a year, the Rowell murders remained unsolved, adding to the city's growing sense of dread. The break in the case came in May 1927, following another horrific massacre. Five members of the Merrell family were found bludgeoned to death in their home, killed with a railroad spike maul. The investigation into this crime led police to an itinerant worker named Benjamin Franklin Levins, a 38-year-old Florida native. Evidence found near the scene linked Levins to the Merrell murders, and he was arrested.
Once in custody, Levins's story began to unravel, and his connection to the string of slayings became terrifyingly clear. He confessed to the Merrell murders, though he later claimed he had mistaken their home for another family's. He also confessed to the Rowell family killings. His motive for the Rowell massacre was inconsistent; at one point, he claimed he had gotten into a fight with the tenant, Charles Alexander, over a woman and killed the rest of the family so there would be no witnesses. It was also discovered that the first victim, Emma Hilliard, was Levins's ex-wife, lending credence to the theory that Bee Dee Rowell was killed for what he knew about her death.
Benjamin Franklin Levins's trial began in Orlando in July 1927. His defense team argued that his confessions had been coerced by police who threatened to return him to Tampa, where an angry mob had already attempted to lynch him. During the trial, Levins changed his story again, claiming he killed one of the Merrells in self-defense and blaming an associate, Leonard Thompson, for the other deaths. Despite his conflicting accounts, he was convicted of five counts of first-degree murder for the Merrell family slayings and sentenced to death. Thompson was acquitted in a separate trial.
On November 22, 1927, Benjamin Franklin Levins was executed in the electric chair at the state prison in Raiford. He was ultimately proven to be responsible for at least nine murders between 1926 and 1927. While he was convicted for the Merrell case, his confession brought a grim resolution to the slaughter of the Rowell family. The murders left a legacy of fear in Tampa, a chilling chapter in the city's history defined by the savagery of one man and the tragic loss of families like the Rowells, who were destroyed in a single night of brutal violence.
