6 killed, including child, in mysterious Texas campsite murder

This camper trailer was the scene of a horrible mass murder in East Texas

(Image credit: NBC/YouTube)

last updated 17 November 2015

On Sunday, police in rural East Texas got a 911 call from a parcel of private land near Palestine, and when they arrived they found a man and a woman dead in a camper trailer. Based on the testimony of the woman who made the call, identified as Cynthia Johnson, they arrested William Hudson, 33, who owned the property next door. On Monday, they found four more bodies in a pond on Hudson's property.

Hudson has been charged with one count of murder and is being held on a $2.5 million bond, Anderson County Sheriff Greg Taylor said Monday afternoon. More charges are expected soon. Taylor did not say how the victims died and confessed he had no idea about the motive, since Hudson and the weekend campers did not appear to know one another. Hudson is not cooperating with investigators, Taylor said.

According to news reports, the victims found in the camper were Cynthia Johnson's husband, Carl, and their daughter, Hannah Johnson. The four people found in the lake were Hannah Johnson's 6-year-old son Kade, her boyfriend, Thomas Kamp, and Kamp's two oldest children. Hannah Johnson and Kamp had apparently purchased the land recently. "They bought land probably to camp — come to the piney woods to camp," Taylor said. He said the bodies have been sent to the coroner's office in Tyler. This wasn't Hudson's first run-in with the law. "We handled him for assault within the last few weeks," Taylor said. "He was violent, but it wasn't of this nature." Watch a bit of Taylor's news conference and the scene of the crime below. Peter Weber

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Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.