On August 17, 2005, 39-year-old Lori Sullivan was stabbed in the neck at the mattress store where she worked in Haverton, Pennsylvania. An unsuspecting customer discovered her body and called 911. In episode 6 of season 1 of Investigation Discovery’s The Fog of Murder police recall piecing together the clues to find Lori’s killer.
Lori Sullivan’s husband Kevin Sullivan drove her to work at Verlo Mattress Factory Store, where he would later stab her in the neck three times. After he dropped Lori off at work, Kevin ran some errands and bought a pack of cigarettes. When he returned, Lori told him news that made him fly into murderous rage: her son Steve O’Neill wanted to move back in with her, but he could only do that if Kevin left their home.
Kevin asked Lori how she would be able to pay her bills if he moved out, and she said she’d get help from her exes. Kevin accused her of cheating with her ex-husbands, and he says she told him she could sleep with whoever she wanted. That’s when Kevin claimed Lori came after him with a hunting knife. In court, he described her as like “King Kong.”
He says he accidentally stabbed her three times when they fell over a chair while he was trying to defend himself.
The prosecution argued that Lori was stabbed three separate times, which could not be achieved by an accident.
Kevin also had a gash in his arm, which he claimed he didn’t know how he got. His wound was determined to be self-inflicted with a box cutter.
Cigarette butts found at the scene indicate that Kevin smoked two cigarettes while his wife bled to death in front of him. At some point, he also visited the bathroom, where he left blood droplets. He then drove to his brother’s house and told him he did something stupid. Kevin’s brother immediately called Lori’s phone to see if she was okay, and this voice message helped lead police to Kevin.
Before her death, Lori had sought out “protection from abuse” orders against her husband, suggesting that Kevin’s abuse of Lori had been ongoing and escalated to her murder when she tried to leave him.
Kevin Sullivan
Kevin is serving a life prison sentence for his cold-blooded crime.
