PROSECUTOR: MAN ACCUSED OF MURDER IN N.J. SLAYING SAYS HE REALLY KILLED 16

A man charged with beating to death a New Jersey resident he says sexually abused him as a child now claims he has killed a total of 16 people, including his exwife and three others in New Mexico, officials said. Authorities have not corroborated his claim.

Sean Lannon, 47, said he killed the four whose remains were found in a vehicle at an airport and “11 other individuals” in New Mexico, Alec Gutierrez, an assistant prosecutor in Gloucester County, N.J., said at a detention hearing Friday, Nj.com reported.

Gutierrez said Lannon had confessed to luring several victims to a home in New Mexico and dismembering some of them.

Authorities said in court documents that Lannon made the admission in a phone call to a relative, who told investigators he expressed remorse. Lannon has been charged only with the death in New Jersey, and his lawyer says his client was provoked. He’s been named a person of interest in the four New Mexico slayings.

Police Lt. David Chavez in Lannon’s hometown of Grants, N.M., said authorities have no indication that his claims about 11 other killings are true and that they aren’t aware of any missingperson or homicide reports that would fit his narrative. However, he said authorities would investigate.

It was a twist in a case that spans the country but has many unanswered questions. Officials from the FBI, U.S. Marshals Service, several police agencies in New Mexico, and police and prosecutors in New Jersey either didn’t respond to requests for comment Saturday or didn’t immediately have more information.

The bodies of Lannon’s ex-wife and three other people were found March 5 in a vehicle in a parking garage at Albuquerque International Sunport, New Mexico’s largest airport. It’s not clear how they were killed.

On March 8, three days after the remains were found in New Mexico, the body of Michael Dabkowski was discovered in his New Jersey home after a welfare check. Sean Lannon is accused of breaking in and beating the 66-year-old to death with a hammer, according to an affidavit.

Lannon told investigators that Dabkowski had sexually abused him as a child and that he had gone to the home to retrieve sexually explicit photos. Dabkowski mentored Lannon and his twin brother through a Big Brothers program in the 1980s, Nj.com reported.

A search for Lannon ended with his arrest in St. Louis on March 10. He was driving a car stolen from Dabkowski. A judge on Friday ordered that Lannon remain behind bars.