ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. – For three decades, nobody knew for certain what happened to 12-year-old Jennifer Odom after she got off a school bus on a typical day in 1993. The girl was found dead in a Florida orange grove not long after.
Now, authorities in Hernando County say a DNA match has identified her killer as Jeffrey Norman Crum, 61, who is already serving two life sentences for a 2015 sexual battery and attempted murder conviction. State Attorney Bill Gladson said Thursday prosecutors will seek the death penalty in the Odom case.
“This is every parent's nightmare,” Gladson said at a news conference in Brooksville, a city of about 7,000 people roughly 50 miles (80 kilometers) north of Tamp...