Killer Comparisons: John Eric Armstrong and William Devin Howell
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| Armstrong, above, and Howell, below. |
They both were young white men killing prostitutes, fitting very much the stereotype that we have of a serial killer. They were born only three years apart, and they killed at roughly the same time: One began his killings in 2003 and the other in 1999 (although it could’ve been much earlier than that, based on his confessions after his arrest). But how else do these two serials compare — John Eric Armstrong, known to have killed five people in Michigan, and William Devin Howell, known to have killed seven people in Connecticut?
They are similar in their hatred for prostitutes, certainly. Armstrong was known to have yelled “I hate hookers!” in the process of strangling them, according to his survivors, though we don’t really understand where that hatred came from. For Howell, he has freely spoken during his incarceration about how he saw prostitutes as worthless beings. In fact, he has been very forthcoming in general behind bars, whereas these days Armstrong refuses to discuss his own crimes. Howell began picking up prostitutes at a very young age, and Armstrong may have, as well, while serving in the U.S. Navy right out of high school. And ironically, both of these killers held regular jobs and were family men at the time of their crimes. Each had a wife and children at home (Armstrong had a child on the way at the time of his arrest). They both seemed to have a very binary view of women during their crimes: Prostitutes were “bad,” but the females close to them in their lives, like their wives, were “good.”
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Each of these killers attempted suicide, Howell while behind bars and Armstrong multiple times before being incarcerated.
But there are some interesting areas where their stories diverge. Howell, though he claims to have had a happy childhood, was incarcerated a lot over the years and became an alcoholic at a very young age. Armstrong was never incarcerated before he began killing and had an upbringing that appears very normal on the surface (but there may be some stuff there that we just don't know). Howell buried his victims in shallow graves and they were not found for years, whereas Armstrong left his in places where they could easily be found — the last victim in plain view right at the railroad tracks. Howell picked up prostitutes in a van that he used for his lawn care work, and he kept them there captive for hours as he repeatedly raped them. In fact, he later told police that he really only killed them because he feared they would go to the police. If he could know for sure that they would not report him, he said, he would have just let them go. So sad. Armstrong, on the other hand, had no interest in keeping anyone captive and killed them right there in his Jeep, dumped them, and drove home.
And how about triggers for these killers? What set them off on their killing rampages? Well, for Howell it has been speculated that a possible trigger was his wife suing him for custody of their kids in their divorce. For Armstrong the jury is still out, largely because we actually don’t know when he first killed. It could’ve been in the Navy in the 1990s, or it could’ve been sadly much earlier, even as a teen or possibly as a child.
Learn more about the Howell case, and hear audio clips of him discussing his crimes, in S1E8 of “Making a Serial Killer.”
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