DNA Test Could Find If Trucker Killed Missing Indy Woman

INDIANAPOLIS -- A DNA test could determine if a missing Indianapolis woman was the victim of a man who has confessed to killing six women in four states.

Bruce Mendenhall, 56, of Albion, Ill., was arrested at a truck stop in Tennessee on July 12, one day after Carma Purpura, 31, was last seen at a truck stop on Indianapolis' south side.

Mendenhall told police that he killed a woman he picked up at the truck stop and confessed to killing five other women in Indiana, Tennessee, Alabama and Georgia, authorities said.

Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Detective Tom Tudor said police found Purpura's identification card in Mendenhall's truck.

Police hope a DNA test on blood on clothing found in his truck will determine if the blood is Purpura's.

Mendenhall, who has been charged in killings in Nashville and Birmingham, Ala., told police he killed a woman he picked up at the Indianapolis truck stop and dumped her body in a trash bin near a fast food restaurant off Indiana 37 just south of Interstate 465. Police searched that bin and others at nearby truck stops but found nothing.

"At this point, we're proceeding as if the body will not be recovered," Marion County Deputy Prosecutor Denise Robinson said.