Alton Coleman

Despite her non-violent history before the spree, Brown was initially unrepentant for her acts. During the sentencing phase of her first Ohio trial, she sent a note to the judge which read in part: "I killed the bitch and I don't give a damn. I had fun out of it." She was also given a death sentence for the murder of Tamika Turks in Indiana; however that sentence was ultimately commuted to 140 years imprisonment in 2018.

Brown is currently serving her sentence without possibility of parole at the Dayton Correctional Institution in Dayton, Ohio. She finally expressed remorse for her crimes when she apologized to the victims' families in a video in 2005.

On April 25, 2002, the Ohio Supreme Court rejected a claim by Coleman's attorneys that the state's plan to accommodate the large number of victims and survivors who wanted to view the execution would turn it into a "spectator sport". So many victims and survivors of Coleman's crimes were allowed to witness the execution that prison officials had to set up a closed-circuit viewing venue outside of the building. For his last meal, Coleman ordered a well-done filet mignon smothered with mushrooms, fried chicken breasts, a salad with French dressing, sweet potato pie topped with whipped cream, French fries, collard greens, onion rings, cornbread, broccoli with melted cheese, biscuits and gravy, and Cherry Coke.

Brown, who was originally sentenced to be executed in Ohio for her complicity in the crimes, had her death sentence commuted to life imprisonment by Governor Richard Celeste in 1991. In commuting Brown's sentence, Celeste cited her low IQ scores, ranging from 59 to 74, and her "master-slave" relationship with Coleman influencing her actions. Brown was one of eight Ohio death row inmates (including all four of the Ohio's female death row inmates) to have her sentence commuted by Celeste, a staunch opponent of capital punishment, a week before he left office.

The state of Ohio convicted Coleman and Brown, finding them guilty of the rape and murder of Tonnie Storey in Cincinnati and Marlene Walters in Norwood, but not for the murders of Virginia and Rachelle Temple in Toledo. Coleman and Brown were both sentenced to death. Coleman's case was sent to the U.S. Supreme Court several times between 1985 and 2002, but his numerous arguments that his conviction and death sentence were unconstitutional failed to sway the justices. However, Coleman's death sentence in relation to the Storey killing was overturned in a separate proceeding. Despite this, Coleman's death sentence in relation to the Walters murder remained upheld. In addition to the death sentences, Coleman and Brown were each sentenced to twenty years in prison for transporting their kidnapping victim Oline Carmical across a state line.

Coleman and Brown committed their first murder when they killed 9-year-old Vernita Wheat from Kenosha, Wisconsin. After Coleman had befriended her mother, Juanita Wheat, he abducted Vernita and took her to Waukegan on May 29, 1984. Vernita's badly decomposed corpse was discovered on June 19 in an abandoned building four blocks from Coleman's grandmother's apartment. It was determined she had been raped, and the cause of death was ligature strangulation.

In June 1984, Coleman and Brown were in Gary, Indiana and encountered two young girls there: 9-year-old Annie and her niece 7-year-old Tamika Turks. The couple sexually assaulted the two children. Annie survived the violent attack, but Tamika did not; her partially decomposed body was discovered on June 19. The same day, Donna Williams, a 25-year-old woman from Gary, disappeared. On July 11, Williams's decomposed body was discovered in Detroit, Michigan, about half a mile from where her car was found. She had been raped and killed by ligature strangulation.

Debra Brown, one of eleven children, is borderline intellectually disabled, suffered head trauma as a child, and was diagnosed with dependent personality disorder by a psychiatrist. She was engaged to another man when she met Coleman in 1983, but left her family and moved in with him shortly afterwards. Although a willing participant in Coleman's assaults and murders, Brown had no history of violence or any criminal history prior to their relationship.

Alton Coleman (November 6, 1955 – April 26, 2002) was an American serial killer who, along with accomplice Debra Brown, committed a crime spree across six states in the Midwest between May and July 1984 that resulted in the deaths of eight people. Coleman, who received death sentences in three states, was executed by the state of Ohio in 2002. Brown was also sentenced to death in Indiana, but the death penalty was commuted to life imprisonment without possibility of parole in Illinois.

Alton Coleman was born on November 6, 1955, in Waukegan, Illinois. Coleman's mother worked three jobs, and he lived with his 73-year-old grandmother. A middle-school dropout, Coleman was well known to Illinois law enforcement, having been charged with sex crimes six times between 1973 and 1983. Two of those cases were dismissed, with Coleman pleading guilty to lesser charges in two and twice being acquitted. Coleman was scheduled to go on trial in Illinois on charges stemming from the rape of a 14-year-old girl when he fled and began his killing spree.

On July 12, Tonnie Storey, a 15-year-old girl who lived in Cincinnati's Over-the-Rhine neighborhood, disappeared; her body was discovered eight days later. A bracelet that had been stolen from the Temples was found under Storey's body. On the day of Storey's disappearance, the FBI added Coleman to its Ten Most Wanted List as a "special addition". Coleman was just the tenth person since the initiation of the list in 1950 to merit inclusion in such a manner.