Seminole Heights slayings: Man, 24, faces four counts of murder

Howard Altman Times staff writer
Jonathan Capriel

Published: November 28, 2017
Updated: November 29, 2017 at 08:15 AM

TAMPA — One of the most intense dragnets in city history ended Tuesday with a tip to a police officer sitting in a McDonald’s doing her paperwork.

The investigation raced from there. A 24-year-old man was taken in for questioning. Crime tape went up. Officers descended on the Ybor City fast food joint, then a family home in Sulphur Springs. Television cameras stood watch. So did residents, wondering what it all meant. Anxious relatives of the victims waited for the news: Was an arrest finally at hand?

That night, Tampa Police Chief Brian Dugan told the city that the six-week hunt for the Seminole Heights serial killer was over.

Howell Emanuel Donaldson III was arrested on four counts of first-degree murder. He is accused of shooting and killing three men and one woman as they made their way along their own neighborhood streets.

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