What did Kenneth Marshall do? Indiana man sentenced to 130 years in prison over multiple 2000 cold cases

Marshall was linked to a 22-year-old crime spree that went cold (image via Jeremy Wadsworth/The Blade)
Marshall was linked to a 22-year-old crime spree that went cold (image via Jeremy Wadsworth/The Blade)

On Monday, 56-year-old Indiana man Kenneth Marshall was sentenced to life in prison over 8 felony charges, including one murder and three sexual assault-related crimes.

According to Law & Crime, using modern developments in DNA technology, Indiana authorities were able to link Kenneth Marshall to 8 felony charges that date back to 2000.

He was accused by prosecutors of a crime spree that spanned a 7 month period. His DNA was collected by police due to an unrelated case in which he was accused of assaulting a girlfriend in Lake County, Arizona.

After Marshall's DNA was uploaded to the database, he was linked to three separate cold cases, including murder, physical violation, and child abuse.

In court, Lucas County Judge Stacy Cook condemned Marshall's actions. She said:

“Science wasn’t there, and so you got away.”

She added:

“But you are a predator in every sense of the word. You saw them, and you took advantage of them.”

Kenneth Marshall was sentenced to 130 years in prison with the possibility of parole. He was convicted on charges of murder, aggravated murder, felony assault and five counts of rape.


The alleged crimes of Kenneth Marshall

According to ABC, the earliest crime authorities linked Kenneth Marshall to was the physical violation and murder of 19-year-old Chrishana Logan, who was discovered in her apartment in April 2000, with signs of strangulation.

Authorities linked the DNA at the Logan crime scene to another case that took place in August 2000, just 4 months later, when a 17-year-old Toledo teen was violated.

Soon after, Marshall's DNA was recovered once more, this time in relation to the heinous abuse and violation of a 13-year-old who was assaulted on an early October morning while on her way to school.

While authorities determined by 2005 that the same individual was most likely involved in all three of these cases, there wasn't a development until 2021, when Marshall was booked for an unrelated assault case on his then girlfriend.

Michael Bahner, an assistant Lucas County Prosecutor, commended the tenacity of Indiana authorities in pursuing the cold cases over a course of more than two decades. He said:

“We feel good for the victims obviously. It’s a crime that happened 22 years ago now, and members of the cold case unit and Toledo Police Department kept looking for him.”

He continued:

“I think it just sends a good signal to the community that even if something bad happens to you we’re not going to stop looking.”

The two surviving victims, who are now adults, testified against Marshall in court this year. Judge Cook told the court that the disturbing nature of their statements played a role in the severity of Marshall's sentence.

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