NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- A man arrested Thursday and charged with killing a woman at a Nashville truck stop last month is suspected in at least five other similar slayings in Tennessee, Alabama, Georgia and Indiana, police said.

Related: Video | Images | PDF: Bruce Mendenhall Affidavit

Bruce Mendenhall, 56, of Albion, Ill., was charged with criminal homicide after being questioned by police at the same truck stop along Interstate 24 in north Nashville where Sara Nicole Hulbert was found dead with gunshot wounds on June 26.

Police said Detective Sgt. Pat Postiglione went to the truck stop on Thursday to conduct a follow-up interview in the investigation of Hulbert's death.

When he got there he saw a truck fitting the description of a vehicle that was spotted the night before Hulbert's body was found. The detective said the driver, Mendenhall, appeared nervous when being questioned and granted permission to look inside his cab.

“He seemed somewhat cooperative, a little nervous maybe, but cooperative anyway. And I notice on the left of the driver’s door, there were several bloodspots. Obviously, that heightened our suspicions at that point,” Postiglione said.

Mendenhall was taken into custody when the detective spotted what appeared to be blood inside the cab, police said in a news release.

During questioning, the driver gave a statement implicating himself in Hulbert's death, as well as the death of Symantha Winters, 48, of Nashville, whose body was found June 6 stuffed in a trash can at another truck stop in Lebanon, 26 miles east of Nashville.

Police, who have been investigating whether the two Tennessee slayings were related to each other and a series of other slayings of women across the South, said Mendenhall also implicated himself in one death in Alabama, another in Georgia and two in Indiana.

When asked if Mendenhall could be connected to other deaths, Postiglione said "that's probably a pretty good possibility."

Mendenhall went through night court Thursday evening and is expected to be back in court next week, a police spokeswoman said.

Mendenhall has not hired an attorney yet according to officials.

Authorities in Albion, which is in Edwards County in southeastern Illinois, said they had just learned of the allegations from Tennessee authorities on Thursday night and had not yet been able to investigate Mendenhall's background.

“You never want it in your county, your jurisdiction. … I hate it that it has to be anywhere. But it does make me feel better that he is in custody now that we know this,” said Edwards County, Ill., Sheriff Scott Meserole.

Mendenhall had been driving the truck for Quality Oak Products in Noble, Ill., for about a year, company owner Dan Davis said. Davis declined to discuss the case further, but said the case was "a complete shock to us."

Albion ayor Ryan Hallam said Mendenhall was a bit odd but familiar to folks in the Edwards County town of about 2,000 people.

Hallam said the town is in disbelief that the married father of two could be a killer.

Authorities said when Mendenhall’s wife, Linda, heard about the allegations she did not take them well. She and her oldest daughter are now staying with relatives.

Police said Linda Mendenhall would often travel with Bruce Mendenhall on long trips.

Officials in Illinois said that Mendnhall once ran for mayor in Albion and that Mendenhall’s neighbors called him “half crazy.”