Stephen Marshall (murderer)

Stephen Alexander Marshall (August 9, 1985 – April 16, 2006) was a 20-year-old American-Canadian man who travelled from Nova Scotia to Maine with the intention of shooting and killing convicted sex offenders in an act of vigilantism. Using the names and addresses of convicted sex offenders retrieved through searching publicly available sex offender registries in the United States, Marshall drove to the houses of two convicted sex offenders and killed them, before later shooting and killing himself in Boston, Massachusetts as police were stopping the bus he was on.

Early life
Stephen Alexander Marshall was born on August 9, 1985, in Fort Worth, Texas, to parents Ralph Arthur Marshall and Margaret Malia Diekelmann. Marshall moved with his family to Cape Breton, Nova Scotia when he was a child. His parents divorced in 1996. In 1999, Marshall moved to Culdesac, Idaho, with his father, Ralph, who served three years as mayor. Marshall was charged with aggravated assault when he was 15, in April 2001, after he brought an AR-15 rifle onto his lawn where two youths were fighting. While his father went to live in Arizona, and later Maine, Marshall moved back to his mother's home in Cape Breton during the summer of 2003. He attempted to enlist in the Army, but was rejected because of his asthma.

Killings
Out of 34 sex offenders listed on the Maine registry, Marshall took down the information on 29 of them.

On April 13, 2006, Marshall left his North Sydney (now part of Cape Breton Regional Municipality) home in Nova Scotia, driving to visit Houlton, Maine, where his father lived. During his trip, Marshall's car broke down in Sackville, New Brunswick, so he called for his father to pick him up. On the evening of April 15, Marshall stole his father's Toyota pickup truck as well as three of his firearms: a .45 automatic handgun, a .22 caliber handgun, as well as a rifle. He began by driving on Interstate 95 towards the houses of registered sex offenders in LaGrange, some of which he passed, though he continued towards Milo, where, according to police, he likely drove on State Route 16. Throughout the multiple Milo residences of sex offenders that he drove by, Marshall chose the home of 57-year-old Joseph Gray, who, at around 3 a.m. on April 16, was shot and killed through his front window. He had shot and killed Gray while sleeping in his living room. His wife woke up to their dogs barking. Gray had fallen asleep to watching Forensic Files prior to his killing. Later that morning, at 8:15 a.m., Marshall arrived at a mobile home in Corinth, resided by 24-year-old registered sex offender William Elliott, and knocked on his door. After Elliot answered, Marshall repeatedly shot him to death before fleeing, though not without having the license plate of his father's truck recorded by Elliott's girlfriend.

Marshall drove his father's truck to Bangor and abandoned it as well as the rifle that he brought with him. At 1:45 p.m., he boarded a bus headed for Boston, Massachusetts. The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) were later notified about Marshall potentially being a passenger by Maine State Police, who helped replace the bus after breaking down around Lewiston a few hours earlier. Shortly before arriving at the South Station in Boston at 8:15 p.m., Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority Police stopped the bus and boarded it. Before he could be apprehended, Marshall shot himself in the head and died later that night at Boston Medical Center. At the time of his death, Marshall was deemed a person of interest for the shootings. Later investigation of the laptop he had brought with him indicated that he had gone to the residences of four other sex offenders.

Casualties

 * Joseph Gray, 57 (convicted of raping a child under 14)
 * William Elliott, 24 (convicted of the statutory rape of his girlfriend, who was days away from her 16th birthday)

Aftermath
After his suicide, authorities investigated his computer. They found an animation of Jesus armed with an assault rifle while knocking on someone's door. Witnesses reported that Marshall had converted to Christianity shortly before the killings. At one point, he referred to pedophiles as "scums of the Earth".

Similar incidents
In 2003, 56-year-old Lawrence Trant committed arson attacks against the residences of seven registered sex offenders and attacked another one by stabbing him with a kitchen knife in Concord, New Hampshire. During an interview with the Bangor Daily News, Trant, then-imprisoned at New Hampshire State Prison, said "I understand perfectly why he did it" in regards to Marshall's shootings.

On August 27, 2005, almost one year prior to Marshall's murders, 35-year-old Michael Anthony Mullen from Washington state used the Whatcom County's digital sex offender database to shoot and kill two convicted child rapists: 49-year-old Hank Eisses and 68-year-old Victor Vasques. Mullen gained entry to both of their homes by pretending to be an FBI agent. After Mullen admitted to the murders, he received a prison sentence of over 44 years after two second-degree murder were pled guilty by him. Mullen died in prison on April 15, 2007.

Cultural depictions
In 2018, filmmaker Marc Bisaillon released With Love (L'Amour), a thriller film inspired by Marshall's case.