9 Investigates: Osceola County sex battery suspect could be linked to unsolved murder

OSCEOLA COUNTY, Fla. — Documents filed in Texas suggest a man behind bars for a sexual battery in Osceola County has killed in Florida before.

Samuel Fertic was convicted for the death of his ex-wife in 2001.

In June, Osceola County deputies arrested Fertic on allegations he physically and sexually abused a woman for hours.

A woman told detectives she went to Fertic’s home to borrow money.

The woman said when she got to his house, Fertic said, “You need to die. You remind me of my ex-wife, I’m going to kill you.” She said he told her she was “the devil, she possessed demons inside of her, and God wanted him to kill her," reports said.

When deputies served a warrant at his home, they said Fertic set the house on fire.

Fertic was found underneath the burning home and arrested.

Channel 9’s Janine Reyes found out the suspect may have been involved in an unsolved murder in 1992, when Ruth Haut’s body was discovered on Old Hickory Tree Road.

It’s the same street where Fertic lived until authorities pulled him from the home he’s accused of setting on fire.

When deputies arrested Fertic on June 10, they had to close roads and place on a school on lockdown because they said he was dangerous and had an extensive criminal history.

A homicide arrest in El Paso, Texas, in 2001 landed him in prison for 10 years.

A jury convicted him of aggravated battery with a deadly weapon for the death of his ex-wife, Lisa King.

Documents prosecutors filed during the Texas trial accuse Fertic of, "murder--several incidents they allege happened between 1990 and 1996 in Osceola County,” saying Fertic "bragged" that he "killed several different people and disposed of the remains in an orange grove in Florida."

Reyes showed the documents to Osceola County investigators to find out if they'd ever investigated the claim.

They said they were not provided the information to formally investigate.

In their arrest warrant affidavit from June, the detective wrote that during the sexual battery, Fertic, "Ranted about the murders he had committed and how it was God's desire for him to kill (her) his victim.”

Reyes searched unsolved murder cases from Osceola County in the '90s and found Haut’s case. Detectives found a body in an orange grove on Hickory Tree Road, which is now called Old Hickory Tree Road, where Fertic's family owns property and where he lived.

El Paso prosecutors and a detective came to investigate Fertic in 2001.

Osceola County deputies said they have no record of them reporting those other possible murders.

Cox Media Group