A South Carolina man arrested earlier this week after a missing woman was found chained inside a metal storage unit has admitted to killing at least seven people, including the woman's boyfriend, the local sheriff said Saturday.
Spartanburg County Sheriff Chuck Wright said that Todd Kohlhepp, 45, confessed to shooting and killing four people at a local motorcycle shop in 2003.
"God is good," Wright said, adding that the community is no longer wondering who's responsible for the "four people who were brutally murdered."
Kohlhepp's confession came one day before the 13th anniversary of the deaths of the owner, service manager, mechanic and bookkeeper of Superbike Motorsports in Chesnee.
Wright says Kohlhepp also showed law enforcement officers Saturday the gravesites of two of his other victims buried on his 95-acre property near Woodruff. Details of those cases were not immediately available.
Earlier Saturday, authorities identified a seventh body found at the site as belonging to 32-year-old Charles Carver, who vanished with his girlfriend, 30-year-old Kala Brown, earlier this year when the two answered an ad for work on the property.
Kohlhepp, in handcuffs and wearing an orange jumpsuit, was at the site for less than an hour. Wright said the 45-year-old suspect had been "very cooperative" and had "told us some stuff nobody else ought to know."
The sheriff says it's possible more bodies will be uncovered.
Kohlhepp's confessions were the latest twist in a bizarre case that gained national attention Thursday, after Spartanburg County deputies were brought to his property by the last known cellphone signals of Carver and Brown.
Brown, who was found chained by her neck in a metal storage container, told investigators that Kohlhepp shot and killed her boyfriend in front of her.
"They're obviously heartbroken," Wright said after talking to Carver's family. "It's terrible. I do think this helps with a little bit of closure. .. We prayed for God to show us, and He did."
Carver died of multiple gunshot wounds. An anthropologist is helping determine how long Carver was buried, said Coroner Rusty Clevenger. He declined to say how many times Carver had been shot.
Kohlhepp is charged with kidnapping the woman. Authorities say more charges are coming.
Kohlhepp is a registered sex offender who spent his 20s in prison after being convicted of raping a teenaged neighbor after forcing her into his home at gunpoint and tying her up. At the time, Kohlhepp's father told court officials the only emotion the teen was capable of showing was anger, and a neighbor called him a "devil on a chain."
Police said Kohlhepp had a crush on the 14-year-old girl, who was friendly, but not romantic toward him. After raping her, he said he would kill her 6-year-old and 3-year-old siblings that she was babysitting if she called the police. His first question to officers when he was arrested was how long he was going to have to spend in prison, according to court papers.
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