Indiana suspect violent long before 7 killings

GARY, Ind. – With hindsight, there were signs years ago of increasing violence against women by Darren Vann, who police said Tuesday has confessed to killing seven women in northwestern Indiana.

Indiana court records from 2004 describe him grabbing a woman in a chokehold, dousing her with gasoline and threatening to set her on fire. He was sentenced to a year in prison.

In 2009, he was convicted in Texas of raping a woman. She told police that when she went to his apartment in Austin he knocked her down and began to strangle her, hit her several times in the face and said he could kill her, court records show. He served time in prison until last year, when he was released and moved back to Indiana.

In both cases, the charges against Vann were reduced as part of plea bargains, and Texas officials deemed him a low risk for violence. He registered as a sex offender in Indiana and police made a routine check in September that he lived at the address he provided.

“He was not on our radar at all,” Gary Police Chief Larry McKinley said at a news conference Tuesday, adding that Vann was never suspected of taking part in homicides in the days or months before his arrest.

Now Vann is charged with the strangulation death of one woman, and police say more charges are expected in a few days after he directed them to the bodies of six more. Authorities in two states are poring over cold case files and missing person reports to determine if there are more victims. He will appear in court today for the first time since his arrest over the weekend.

Several families who have missing relatives have called since the bodies were discovered to ask if their loved ones might have been killed by Vann, said another Gary officer, Cmdr. Del Stout.

Family and friends of victims said police should have known the 43-year-old Vann was a threat and taken reports of women disappearing more seriously.

Vann appeared to keep a low profile and follow the rules after serving a prison sentence for sexually assaulting the woman in Austin.

He registered as a sex offender in Indiana in July 2013 after he moved to Gary, said Patti Van Til, a spokeswoman with the Lake County Sheriff’s Department.

Vann registered again in Indiana this past July, putting him in compliance with a state law that requires sex offenders to re-register at least once each year, she said.

Detectives with the sheriff’s department last checked on Vann on Sept. 14.

“He had registered and complied with the requirements,” Van Til said. “We had the appropriate response from him.”