KENNER, La. — A call from the television show Unsolved Mysteries helped Kenner Police make an arrest in an 11-year-old double murder case and now has them checking on second case where a couple was found shot to death and floating in Lake Pontchartrian.
Kenner Police say that 35-year-old Dernell Nelson of LaPlace has been booked on two counts of first-degree murder for a killing in Kenner where a couple was shot to death inside of a car in June 2010.
According to Kenner Police, Hermania Ellsworth and Charles Davis were found shot several times in a crashed vehicle in the 700 block of Farrar Avenue in Kenner. The couple’s 3-year-old child was found injured from the crash in the back seat. He had not been shot.
Approximately three weeks later, the bodies of Herbert Glass and Lynette Williams were found floating in Lake Pontchartrain. Glass and Williams had both been shot and were bound by duct tape. Police also believed those killings to be related to the killings of Ellsworth and Davis, because Glass and Williams resided in the 700 block of Farrar Avenue in Kenner.
In addition, a vehicle that belonged to Glass and Williams had been found burned on an exit to I-59 the day before the bodies were found in the lake.
Kenner Police worked with St. Tammany homicide detectives at the time, and they say Nelson was one of the possible suspects, but no arrest was made at the time.
The case was reopened in March of 2021 after Unsolved Mysteries called the Kenner Police.
Kenner Police said the case was assigned to Detective Nick Engler who began reviewing investigative reports, lab results, phone records and witness statements.
Engler was able to connect Nelson to the Kenner killing of Ellsworth and Davis by DNA and other evidence, according to police.
Anyone having any information are asked to contact the Kenner Police at (504) 712-2222 or Crimestoppers at (504) 822-1111.