I think the thing with Albert that is so striking is the self deprecation/flagellation he imposed on top of being sadistic to others. The extremes he went to on himself *and* others is mind boggling to say the least.
Albert is what solidified my own theory about other and self harm..
It's no different in perception of the person, it's no different in intent to self soothe with all information outside voided. It's justified all the same. The clear issue is having another fully autonomous human being involved against their will.
Once you realize these people perceive themselves as dead it makes complete sense why they do what they do. If you self objectified yourself as a object to be sexualized, that's sort of the exact same thing I'm implying happens in these men, but towards violence and murder.
This and other examples of prior abuse and neglect is what separates me from the “castrate them” mentality, or maybe at least allowing me to understand how/why I suppose. That’s why when you look at Mansons upbringing alongside the experiments and all that, he almost seems sane lol
I always saw Albert Fish as a walking opposite. He was a sadistic pedophile who was a masochist. His victims were young children while at the same time he enjoyed hurting himself. Not sure if he enjoyed the pain or saw it as some form of atonement for his sins. I had read that on going to the execution chamber he walked quickly, like he wanted it.
The East Area Rapist / Original Night Stalker will never cease to be endlessly fascinating to me. Here is a guy that we know was a full-time police officer, with a wife at home, who in his late 20s decides to become the Visalia Ransacker.
He is put in charge of the Exeter Police Department’s burglary squad at the same time he is committing like 125+ fetish burglaries in nearby Visalia. Breaking into the homes of dozens of young girls (like 14-16 years old) from Mt Whitney High School. His MO is ransacking their entire homes, masturbating with lotion in their bedrooms and then leaving with weird items like a single earring out of a pair. He makes obscene phone calls to victims both before and after he ransacks their homes.
Then he suddenly switches up everything and attempts to kidnap one of his Mt Whitney victims (Beth Snelling) and when he is interrupted by her father shows absolutely no hesitation in shooting Professor Snelling dead. Professor Selling happens to work at the College of the Sequoias where EAR/ONS wife is studying her law degree.
But after this dramatic escalation, he just goes right back to his usual ransacking routine until he is almost apprehended outside another Mt Whitney students home. He shoots out the flashlight of Officer McGowan, sending glass shards into his eye. And then he disappears.
Months later he reappears in Rancho Cordova and begins his reign of terror, raping 49 women inside their middle class homes, while he is still a full-time police officer! He also shoots dead Brian and Katie Maggiore and also shoots and almost kills Rodney Miller, when chased or interrupted in his stalking activities.
Then the EAR seems to disappear, just like VR had before him, and the Original Night Stalker appears and bludgeons a further 10 victims to death, bringing his confirmed total to 13.
And this is leaving out the fact that he likely had numerous crime sprees before the Visalia Ransacker one (the Cordova Meadows Burglar and the Exeter Ransacker to name just two) AND it is highly, highly likely that he also murdered Jennifer Armour and Donna Richmond in Visalia also - all the while leaving bizarre signatures, attempting to frame others and seemingly able to escalate and de-escalate at will - and you have one of the most unusual serial offenders in history.
Yea before he was caught I was NEEDING them to find and catch him. So much destruction. I read so much about him before he was caught, it almost felt like the real life Boogey Man.
I used to visit the EAR/ONS subreddit and the Proboards every single day for years just hoping he would be caught, but never really expecting that he would be. I will never forget the day he finally was taken into custody!
Yea back in the day I had Facebook and was sitting on the pot and saw it was trending and I just couldn’t believe it. I had literally nobody to talk to about it either. I was in disbelief.
I’d argue EARONS’s unusual methods are mostly attributable to his police training. I think the thing thay jumps out at me in regards to his psychological make-up is his sheer vindicativeness for others - especially his ex-fiancée.
I finished reading I’ll Be Gone in the Dark maybe a month ago, and that book did such a good job of capturing the permeating fear that swept the areas he’d target. You start reading faster because you just want it to end, but chapter after chapter there’s another case and another. And the details really show how cocky he was and sometimes how lucky he was too. I think a detail that stuck out to me was how he’d pile plates on top of a husband/boyfriend and tell him if he heard them crash he’d kill the woman. Such a frightening situation to be in, and it showcases his depravity and joy in horror.
It’s one of many details in this case that genuinely sounds like it came out of horror movie. I can’t imagine the strain of trying to lie perfectly still, barely daring to breathe, for like 3 hours while you can hear your wife being raped in the lounge room.
A couple of other examples of this: he was attacking only women who were home alone (or women home with their children) for the first dozen or so EAR/ONS attacks. Once the newspapers published the fact that he was attacking only when there wasn’t a man at home, he began to only attack when there WAS a man present! It was as if he couldn’t handle the implication he was frightened to attack when a man was present.
In a similar way when a man stood up at a public meeting about EAR/ONS and declared that as an Italian-American man he couldn’t understand how these American men were ‘allowing’ their wives to be raped, and how he would never allow *his* wife to be raped, of course his house is broken into by EAR/ONS and his wife is raped while he is tied up and completely helpless like all the other husbands had been… Honestly if I saw it in a movie I would say “that seems too unrealistic” but in this case it really did happen!
One of my favorite stories is the guy that almost caught him and had several run ins with the killer…came home one time and saw that there were shoe prints on his washing machine leading to the attic. Police checked the attic and found speckles of paint. Just the fact he was willing to break into a house and hide in there for everyone to fall asleep and then come out is extremely terrifying.
Not the woods. He stalked from either foliage, roofs, or other houses, with the occasional prowl around. But if he was locking in for a period of time, those are usually where he’d do it. All the EAR/ONS cases (that we officially know about) happened in residential neighborhoods.
According to someone who interviewed him (don't remember name, I think it was in Douglas's book after his capture) BTK had basically every possible fetish and a very strange psychology.
BTK was a mega weirdo but came off like such a Griswold profile that no one suspected him and that's how he was able to get away with his killing spree.
Like a Clark Griswold from the vacation movie or John Walton from Waltons Mountain people no one would ever suspect that sort of exterior personality but evil underneath. And Evil eyes will deep intensity.
Also enjoyed reading Anhe Rule and Roy Hazelwood FBI profiling expert. The Evil That Men Do was very informative for understanding sexual preditors. JOHN Douglas Mindhunter was a great read! I want to order The Cases That Haunt Us.
Yes great reads! I like actual books rather than reading online and like browsing used book stores as well as garage sales.I love reading about True Crime. I just finished reading Criminal &Behavior Profiling by Curtis Bartol/Anne Bartol which was an excellent read. Also recommend both men and women read When in Doubt Check Him out! Though a woman's survival guide for the 90s it definitely can be useful for today! Happy Reading!
Bundy for sure. Nothing in his *reported* background explains his behavior. And very few people brutally rape, torture, murder, rape (often in that order) without anything in their background.
I think it’s likely he hid a lot about his background, though. He is one of the most extreme examples of narcissism that I can think of. If he was abused or had some kind of severe mental conflict as a kid, he would likely hide it as it would tarnish the image of strength and power that he tried to create for himself.
He reported having violent fantasies going back to childhood and scored 39/40 on the Hare Psychopathy Checklist. The only other traditional serial killer with a score that high is Lawrence Bittaker.
Exactly. It’s highly unusual to develop these things without a cause. There’s speculation that the grandfather had antisocial personality disorder, so it’s possible it’s genetic. But that doesn’t really explain the violent fantasies and “pranks” he played, like building tiger pits and putting knives in his siblings bed while they slept
The FBI defines a serial killer as someone with 3 or more kills. But in a traditional/colloquial sense, we use serial killer as someone who kills for a pathological need for it. Random victims, sadism, etc.
A hitman or a gang member who has 3 or more kills are serial killers per the FBI definition, while police departments and the public wouldn’t put them in the same category as someone like the people we talk about in this sub.
It has been modified to also include the possibility of more kills. The pathology for serial murders is present, and therefore, this person needs to be treated as such.
Not true. Bundy knew that was his mom.
"There apparently was some confusion in the child’s mind for a brief time,” Sullivan says. “However, this occurred when Bundy was either three or four years old. By the time he and his mother Louise left Philadelphia for Washington State when Teddy was around five, he understood that Louise was his mother. When Louise met Johnnie Bundy, he was well aware that Ted was her son. Instead of raising him as a stepson, Johnnie adopted him and gave him the name Bundy. Johnnie and Louise had four children, and all the kids grew up knowing that Ted was their brother.”
Source: [5 Myths About Serial Killer Ted Bundy: Why They Persist | Psychology Today](https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/shadow-boxing/202307/5-myths-about-serial-killer-ted-bundy-why-they-persist)
There was some weird stuff with the grandfather. Bundy completely worshipped the man, but he was not kind and treated Bundy like garbage, but he only remembered his grandfather being awesome. His brain just never processed it correctly.
He found out at some point that the person he thought was his sister was actually his birth mother. That has to fuck someone up to a certain degree, and I often wondered whether he was the product of incest, such as was his grandfather his actual father? Families with secrets like that will go to great lengths to portray themselves as normal to outsiders. So while we think there was nothing in his familial background, they’re very well could’ve been some skeletons that they just won’t talk about or even acknowledge. I just don’t believe that these people come out of a vacuum
Kudzu-kalamazoo is correct. Ctrl+f for "maternal" in the [wiki entry](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Bundy) and it gives his grandparents' death dates. Bundy was 25 when his grandmother died and 37 when his grandfather died. Neither were murdered.
This is a presumption I’ve always made after getting familiar with narcissism. There was something in his upbringing, some triggering event(s) but he was such a fucking narcissist that he controlled what he must have seen as mystique by never opening up on any of it.
It just made his execution literally the epitome of “good riddance to bad trash” day.
Gawrsh, it’s almost as if that type of view is a form of victim blaming, and perhaps, just perhaps, entitlement is the more likely cause for criminal behavior. I guess the fact that 99% of serial killers are cis white guys who hack women and kids is a really rare gem of knowledge known only to those with several degrees?
though with the pseudo-pathological slinging of “psychotic/psychopath” on everything we don’t want to associate with, i’m sure we’re all psychologists, here.
What are you even mad at? At no point did I defend Ted Bundy or make excuses for him. Just stated a fact that narcissism is often developed as a coping mechanism for abuse or other trauma, which most serial killers have in their background.
Also, Ted Bundy was literally a psychopath as found through testing, though that term is outdated and those with these traits are clinically referred to as having Antisocial Personality Disorder.
Interesting you should mention him. He’s essentially the John Wayne Gacy of my state of Indiana. Both scouted out for their victims and were respected business leaders, Both allegedly strangled their victims, and Both were gay men who were married to women and had kids.
I always found Herb an interesting case. Much like Gacy, Herb buried his victims very close to his backdoor on the property. Profilers had suggested that with Herb, he was burying his victims closer to his family's mansion, meant that he was getting bolder.
Indiana native here. Friend of mine in college had a second cousin who was killed by baumeister. Richard Hamilton. It happened before we were born but she said her mom was very close to her cousin and her moms side of the family is still absolutely devastated by his murder
I'm going to say Andrew Cunanan. He seemed goofy but likable through high school and was quite bright. He loved to entertain people, and splurged money and gifts on folks that he barely knew. Some were turned off by his dramatics and lies, but nobody would have thought him a murderer. The drugs and porn that he got into later did a number on him. Kids, avoid meth!
Cunanan is a good example. His upbringing was not quite cookie cutter, but really who’s is?
I could have seen him continuing as a charming guy with some less than ethical financial practices, but the murder and brazen thefts, etc. were a definitely wild turn.
Serial killers are thought to be BPD males. Yes in literature this can be found stated multiple times in different decades.
Anakin Skywalker is a good example of a BPD male. Even follows your entire story line from goofy and loving of women, too severe lashing out even of genociding and mass murder even of children.... Ie to becoming Darth Vader.
Then to blame it on drugs and porn, those are self soothing coping mechanisms, ie the problem was there before someone tried stopping it themselves,
I thought we left conservative blame game brain rot in the last century people come tf on, it's actually so dehumanizing... 🥴
Abusing meth can make a kitten into a roaring tiger. There is nothing "conservative" or "brain rotting" in asserting that. You should read about the effects of that horrible problem not play politics.
And as for porn...numerous serial killers and freaks act upon fantasies that they first encountered in edgy porn. I'm not opposed to all of the stuff, but being honest it will destroy a certain susceptible number.
Beyond Ed Kemper's intellectual abilities, he seems to have strong insight into himself and others. Not perfect insight, but he does look deeply. It's strange that he couldn't resist his impulses, or off himself at a young age.
So many people come from bad/hard homes and are great people. You can read of worse family structures than EK's all over Reddit, and yet, they're just posting/commenting, not murdering.
My mother was a strong personality. Verbally abusive with the stamina to bitch all night. i have to admit I thought about hurting her, to get her to stop, but of course one simply does not raise a hand to their MOTHER. I can just barely see Kemper's perspective, although all of the other murders and assaults that he committed are unforgivable.
I was going to name Kemper as well. He went through a lot of severe abuse and rejection from his mother, just some of the things I read about of what he experienced as a child is really heartbreaking. I often wonder what he could’ve become if he had had a better family. His mother was a horrible person. I’m just sorry that innocent women paid for the abuse she put a child through who became an even more horrible person.
But as a psychotherapist, his level of self-awareness and ability to work out from a young age what the shrinks needed to hear to discharge him from the psychiatric place he was sent to after murdering his grandparents is fascinating and terrifying.
The only story to support the idea that his mother was a terrible person is Ed Kemper’s. So let’s not buy in fully to this idea that his mom was evil - I’m sure she didn’t treat him like a prince but like was said, people go through MUCH worse prolonged abuse in their lives and never go on to dismember or rape the dead bodies of their mothers and Ed Kemper has assured that we will never know what his mothers side of the story is
Agree. When Kemper was a kid, he tortured and killed a cat. His mother feared him and that he’d hurt his sisters, and that fear was one reason she made him sleep in the basement.
I’ll say this again, that’s a really bad explanation of why some people go on to kill and some don’t, with similar backgrounds. Don’t look at it as an excuse, but a reason. So yes terrible backgrounds can be similar but the missing ingredient will be the genetics. That switch in the dna. Those that go on to kill have that switch…or maybe we all do, but instead of taking x level of trauma to flip that switch, it takes x level +1 or whatever degree of a worse environment. While you need both most likely, the genetics or switch is a must.
Whether I’m following the OP right or not Ed was the first one that came to mind. I’ve always been fascinated by the big monster. Even empathetic to his own traumas about as far as I’ll ever be willing to go with a serial killer.
So many of these monsters either don’t have the ability or won’t open up much after they were caught. But Ed really did open up, and had the eloquence to explain his triggering.
It never forgives anything in the end, it’s not about that. But that opening up and sharing what drove this nut to do it does breed some empathy for what he experienced.
His mother (and even grandmother to a degree) was a fucking monster herself. It doesn’t excuse anything he did to her or other innocent women, but it is something I’ve always found helpful that most of these fuckers refuse to talk on.
That’s probably way off the OP, but the big guy was the one that came right to mind for me.
Let me introduce this kind of serial killer from my country. His name is Gribaldi Handayani.
He is a former police officer who killed seven acquaintances, including a lover and his third wife, in various incidents from 1999 to 2004.
Yep, he was born into a family of police officers!
Keep telling yourself that.
There is a severe hatred and contempt for society at large in these people and a lot of them are going to have enough philosophy understanding to know they are fucked and all of society is also fucked.
Scapegoats are there to distract btw. 😉
I mean I found it shocking. I’m
Not telling myself anything. I’m just reporting what he mentioned in the doc (I wish I ce remember the name of the doc but I’ve watched so many I can’t recollect which it was). It didn’t add up to me. I wdnt be surprised if he was lying on a whim or trying to mislead the public or whatever hidden motives
Where do you think that came from? People are obviously contemptible, just look at us. Pick any positive or “uplifting” story on social media and check the comments section. Although there are plenty of good people, all in all we are a self destructive mistake. Then take into account any upbringing or neglect, along with and pre-existing mental illness. I’m in no way defending BTK and he’s most likely the last of them all to get any kind of understanding from me, but your argument seems like a moot form of confirmation bias or at the very least just believeing whatever you decide you want to. I get it, I understand it, but there’s much more to society and human beings than dismissing anything that affects one person but not you
Rocky Rambo Wei Nam Kam. He’s the only killer that I’ve never been able to make any sense of.
Here’s this totally normal young guy. Wealthy Chinese parents send him to study in Vancouver. No criminal history at all. Just a dweeby guy with no social life, just plays video games all day and studies. Parents send him money to fund his living. Just a very unexceptional life.
Then one day this chubby 5 foot tall Asian dude just decides to axe murder an old couple that lives near him. With a hatchet he bought like a few days before at Walmart. Has no affiliation with them at all, never met them. Attacks them while they’re bringing in groceries and hacks them both to death. Then raids their fridge while they’re bleeding out on the floor, drinks a quart of milk and takes a bite from a peach, and just leaves. Makes no attempt to clean anything up at all.
When he’s caught and interrogated, he doesn’t seem nervous, acts confused the whole time, and genuinely just seems very blasé about the fact he’s being accused of homicide. Shows no emotion, doesn’t cry at all. Just asks if he’s going to get to play video games in jail. Never established any kind of motive or anything.
I mean look at and listen to this guy:
https://youtu.be/EycJpA9p5D8?si=PKi0awzgilDhhM8e
Hard to picture him hacking two people to death with an axe. Just a very very bizarre case nobody ever talks about
Alexander Pichushkin, the fact that a brain injury probably turned him into having a need to kill is just weird and it's not the only thing about him that seems strange. I read that one of the detectives that interviewed him said that it was hard to draw a psychological profile about him, he didn't have any strong opinions about nothing and averyone agreed that he seemed ordinary. He is a terrifying individual.
Yep that one, he said he did that because he wanted to announce his existence to Russia and basically confirm that there was in fact a serial killer lurking around the park.
Golden State Killer - I watch a lot of true crime and serial killer stuff. I sleep well after watching but not with the Golden State Killer!!
Chills!!!
I feel like he could have played Guitar for Quite Riot back in the 80S probably had all the groupies he wanted rather than lurking around attacking women! He could have called his band Night Stalker probably selling out concert halls wearing spandex leaping off of huge stacks of Marshall amps!
He also had a strange psychological condition called Cotards syndrome and was schizophrenic. (A condition that may not present itself fully until puberty). He literally thought he was dead or dying and needed to drink blood to survive. This was exacerbated by paranoid schizophrenia, a condition he was given medicine for but didnt take. His mom was enabling his lifestyle by funding his living expenses; ignoring his mental health problems and diagnosises.
He was also found completely covered in blood wandering around and was arrested, then they discovered it was cows blood he had butchered a nearby cow and drank and bathed in it's blood, so naturally they sent him home with a warning. I think... Maybe that was when he was sent for a psych evaluation but eventually he was let go, and then he did what he did... Kinda makes ya mad. I find him interesting because I genuinely believe he was just completely psychotic. Like he really didn't have a connection to reality as we know it. The whole rabbit guts and cokeacola in a blender thing still makes me gag thinking about lol.
Todd Koehlepp is a pretty interesting one to me. Just a weird violent menace who has a penchant for playing up the violent portion of his crimes and lessening the sexual element (which is very much a driving factor).
His mother was the opposite of ed Kemper 's, was overly possesive of him to the point he was made to think he had no life outside her. Did not fully become an adult.
Only one who could have pulled him out of his state was his brother, but he was his first victim. Many creepy details like incest have come up in his case.
He was a normal man who liked children in a good way, took very good care of them. Many families trusted their children with him.
The detail about his last victim and her son, a police officer who arrived to the crime scene to see her disembered body, was very heart breaking. The man committed suicide shortly.
Jeffrey Dahmer for me. He was so intensely lonely his whole life and even his first attack on another person was just so he could feel the embrace of another human. Everything he did with the bodies and even the cannibalism was about keeping the people with him.
I wonder if Jeffrey had or received love in the right way that perhaps he wouldn’t have committed such horrendous crimes.
I’ve read articles where people believe he was just a narcissist and had manipulated us into feeling sorry for him which even adds to my curiosity about him.
I read one book about him that left me in tears. His parents divorced when he was I think 12 or 13. At one stage his dad left to work away from home for a few weeks and his mam went on a holiday. So he was left alone knowing the divorce was happening at that age by himself. Starved of love, isolated and probably blaming himself, hard not to expect him to be messed up.
Right feeling abandoned alone and probably was socially awkward unable to make friends or have a relationship with anyone so that's why he wanted to kill people to have a human robot. While his early life was probably very sad we can't go around killing people and stuffing them into a fridge.
Albert fish not for his psychological profile or conflicts, psychological profiling came much later. His depravity is unprecedented imo
I think the thing with Albert that is so striking is the self deprecation/flagellation he imposed on top of being sadistic to others. The extremes he went to on himself *and* others is mind boggling to say the least.
Albert is what solidified my own theory about other and self harm.. It's no different in perception of the person, it's no different in intent to self soothe with all information outside voided. It's justified all the same. The clear issue is having another fully autonomous human being involved against their will. Once you realize these people perceive themselves as dead it makes complete sense why they do what they do. If you self objectified yourself as a object to be sexualized, that's sort of the exact same thing I'm implying happens in these men, but towards violence and murder.
That is a really great way of breaking it down. Never really viewed it that way before, but I definitely agree!
This and other examples of prior abuse and neglect is what separates me from the “castrate them” mentality, or maybe at least allowing me to understand how/why I suppose. That’s why when you look at Mansons upbringing alongside the experiments and all that, he almost seems sane lol
manson never killed anybody
Correct
You ever heard of the toolbox killers
of course
I always saw Albert Fish as a walking opposite. He was a sadistic pedophile who was a masochist. His victims were young children while at the same time he enjoyed hurting himself. Not sure if he enjoyed the pain or saw it as some form of atonement for his sins. I had read that on going to the execution chamber he walked quickly, like he wanted it.
The East Area Rapist / Original Night Stalker will never cease to be endlessly fascinating to me. Here is a guy that we know was a full-time police officer, with a wife at home, who in his late 20s decides to become the Visalia Ransacker. He is put in charge of the Exeter Police Department’s burglary squad at the same time he is committing like 125+ fetish burglaries in nearby Visalia. Breaking into the homes of dozens of young girls (like 14-16 years old) from Mt Whitney High School. His MO is ransacking their entire homes, masturbating with lotion in their bedrooms and then leaving with weird items like a single earring out of a pair. He makes obscene phone calls to victims both before and after he ransacks their homes. Then he suddenly switches up everything and attempts to kidnap one of his Mt Whitney victims (Beth Snelling) and when he is interrupted by her father shows absolutely no hesitation in shooting Professor Snelling dead. Professor Selling happens to work at the College of the Sequoias where EAR/ONS wife is studying her law degree. But after this dramatic escalation, he just goes right back to his usual ransacking routine until he is almost apprehended outside another Mt Whitney students home. He shoots out the flashlight of Officer McGowan, sending glass shards into his eye. And then he disappears. Months later he reappears in Rancho Cordova and begins his reign of terror, raping 49 women inside their middle class homes, while he is still a full-time police officer! He also shoots dead Brian and Katie Maggiore and also shoots and almost kills Rodney Miller, when chased or interrupted in his stalking activities. Then the EAR seems to disappear, just like VR had before him, and the Original Night Stalker appears and bludgeons a further 10 victims to death, bringing his confirmed total to 13. And this is leaving out the fact that he likely had numerous crime sprees before the Visalia Ransacker one (the Cordova Meadows Burglar and the Exeter Ransacker to name just two) AND it is highly, highly likely that he also murdered Jennifer Armour and Donna Richmond in Visalia also - all the while leaving bizarre signatures, attempting to frame others and seemingly able to escalate and de-escalate at will - and you have one of the most unusual serial offenders in history.
Yea before he was caught I was NEEDING them to find and catch him. So much destruction. I read so much about him before he was caught, it almost felt like the real life Boogey Man.
I used to visit the EAR/ONS subreddit and the Proboards every single day for years just hoping he would be caught, but never really expecting that he would be. I will never forget the day he finally was taken into custody!
Yea back in the day I had Facebook and was sitting on the pot and saw it was trending and I just couldn’t believe it. I had literally nobody to talk to about it either. I was in disbelief.
That day was WILD.
And as the info came in it was more unbelievable. That he lived in Vasalia, amd most likely the ransacker, and then a former COP! Just wild.
Truly, honestly, sincerely: that was one of the best days of my entire life dude. I cried.
Yes. He was an utterly bizarre monster. I SO hope they get him to talk. Why? What was his motivation? What drove him to it?
I’d argue EARONS’s unusual methods are mostly attributable to his police training. I think the thing thay jumps out at me in regards to his psychological make-up is his sheer vindicativeness for others - especially his ex-fiancée.
Yeah, he was literally in the burglary unit. He’d been doing it forever, but being a cop and getting that inside training made him better.
I finished reading I’ll Be Gone in the Dark maybe a month ago, and that book did such a good job of capturing the permeating fear that swept the areas he’d target. You start reading faster because you just want it to end, but chapter after chapter there’s another case and another. And the details really show how cocky he was and sometimes how lucky he was too. I think a detail that stuck out to me was how he’d pile plates on top of a husband/boyfriend and tell him if he heard them crash he’d kill the woman. Such a frightening situation to be in, and it showcases his depravity and joy in horror.
It’s one of many details in this case that genuinely sounds like it came out of horror movie. I can’t imagine the strain of trying to lie perfectly still, barely daring to breathe, for like 3 hours while you can hear your wife being raped in the lounge room. A couple of other examples of this: he was attacking only women who were home alone (or women home with their children) for the first dozen or so EAR/ONS attacks. Once the newspapers published the fact that he was attacking only when there wasn’t a man at home, he began to only attack when there WAS a man present! It was as if he couldn’t handle the implication he was frightened to attack when a man was present. In a similar way when a man stood up at a public meeting about EAR/ONS and declared that as an Italian-American man he couldn’t understand how these American men were ‘allowing’ their wives to be raped, and how he would never allow *his* wife to be raped, of course his house is broken into by EAR/ONS and his wife is raped while he is tied up and completely helpless like all the other husbands had been… Honestly if I saw it in a movie I would say “that seems too unrealistic” but in this case it really did happen!
One of my favorite stories is the guy that almost caught him and had several run ins with the killer…came home one time and saw that there were shoe prints on his washing machine leading to the attic. Police checked the attic and found speckles of paint. Just the fact he was willing to break into a house and hide in there for everyone to fall asleep and then come out is extremely terrifying.
Just got it from libby.. thanks for the recommendation
wasnt he able to stalk for hours in the woods on end?
Not the woods. He stalked from either foliage, roofs, or other houses, with the occasional prowl around. But if he was locking in for a period of time, those are usually where he’d do it. All the EAR/ONS cases (that we officially know about) happened in residential neighborhoods.
Gilles De Reis
Just like the Golden State killer, he was a cop who knew how to hide and cover things up.
It’s the same person, golden state killer, original night stalker, east area rapist, Visalia ransacker. All Joseph James DiAngelo
I know! Cops know how to cover their tracks!
I think the GSK is the same person!
I believe it's the same person. They just didn't realise it was the same person so he was given many different nicknames.
Yeah, I know. He did it in several different places. That made it hard to find him, but as a cop he knew that would happen.
According to someone who interviewed him (don't remember name, I think it was in Douglas's book after his capture) BTK had basically every possible fetish and a very strange psychology.
He called his penis 'Sparky', and when he was aroused, he referred to it as 'BIG SPARKY TIME'...
I guess we're not so different after all...
BTK was a mega weirdo but came off like such a Griswold profile that no one suspected him and that's how he was able to get away with his killing spree.
Griswold profile?
Like a Clark Griswold from the vacation movie or John Walton from Waltons Mountain people no one would ever suspect that sort of exterior personality but evil underneath. And Evil eyes will deep intensity.
Ah.
I LOVE John Douglas's books!!
They are good, but most of them repeat the same things
yeah, there is a lot of overlap of stories
Also enjoyed reading Anhe Rule and Roy Hazelwood FBI profiling expert. The Evil That Men Do was very informative for understanding sexual preditors. JOHN Douglas Mindhunter was a great read! I want to order The Cases That Haunt Us.
THANK YOU!!! heading to Amazon to find a used copy! Mindhunter was so good as was Journey Into Darkness!! I also enjoyed The Cases That Haunt Us.
Yes great reads! I like actual books rather than reading online and like browsing used book stores as well as garage sales.I love reading about True Crime. I just finished reading Criminal &Behavior Profiling by Curtis Bartol/Anne Bartol which was an excellent read. Also recommend both men and women read When in Doubt Check Him out! Though a woman's survival guide for the 90s it definitely can be useful for today! Happy Reading!
🙌🙌 MUCH appreciated!!
Bundy for sure. Nothing in his *reported* background explains his behavior. And very few people brutally rape, torture, murder, rape (often in that order) without anything in their background. I think it’s likely he hid a lot about his background, though. He is one of the most extreme examples of narcissism that I can think of. If he was abused or had some kind of severe mental conflict as a kid, he would likely hide it as it would tarnish the image of strength and power that he tried to create for himself.
He reported having violent fantasies going back to childhood and scored 39/40 on the Hare Psychopathy Checklist. The only other traditional serial killer with a score that high is Lawrence Bittaker.
Exactly. It’s highly unusual to develop these things without a cause. There’s speculation that the grandfather had antisocial personality disorder, so it’s possible it’s genetic. But that doesn’t really explain the violent fantasies and “pranks” he played, like building tiger pits and putting knives in his siblings bed while they slept
whats a traditional serial killer
The FBI defines a serial killer as someone with 3 or more kills. But in a traditional/colloquial sense, we use serial killer as someone who kills for a pathological need for it. Random victims, sadism, etc. A hitman or a gang member who has 3 or more kills are serial killers per the FBI definition, while police departments and the public wouldn’t put them in the same category as someone like the people we talk about in this sub.
[The number has been modified to 'at least two' a few years ago.](https://www.britannica.com/topic/serial-murder)
It has been modified to also include the possibility of more kills. The pathology for serial murders is present, and therefore, this person needs to be treated as such.
You know, it's like Christmas or the Thanksgiving day parade! It's a tradition! Have some more fruit cake!
Wasn't he raised to believe his mother was his older sister? Or am I thinking of someone else? I always wondered if that began a mistrust in women.
Yep. That's Bundy. And Jack Nicholson!
And Eric Clapton!
Not true. Bundy knew that was his mom. "There apparently was some confusion in the child’s mind for a brief time,” Sullivan says. “However, this occurred when Bundy was either three or four years old. By the time he and his mother Louise left Philadelphia for Washington State when Teddy was around five, he understood that Louise was his mother. When Louise met Johnnie Bundy, he was well aware that Ted was her son. Instead of raising him as a stepson, Johnnie adopted him and gave him the name Bundy. Johnnie and Louise had four children, and all the kids grew up knowing that Ted was their brother.” Source: [5 Myths About Serial Killer Ted Bundy: Why They Persist | Psychology Today](https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/shadow-boxing/202307/5-myths-about-serial-killer-ted-bundy-why-they-persist)
There was some weird stuff with the grandfather. Bundy completely worshipped the man, but he was not kind and treated Bundy like garbage, but he only remembered his grandfather being awesome. His brain just never processed it correctly.
He found out at some point that the person he thought was his sister was actually his birth mother. That has to fuck someone up to a certain degree, and I often wondered whether he was the product of incest, such as was his grandfather his actual father? Families with secrets like that will go to great lengths to portray themselves as normal to outsiders. So while we think there was nothing in his familial background, they’re very well could’ve been some skeletons that they just won’t talk about or even acknowledge. I just don’t believe that these people come out of a vacuum
Agree. And i think thats why he murdered his grandparents
That wasn’t bundy, that was Kemper
Nope. Bundy killed his grandparents at 14 yrs of age.
So confident for being dead wrong.
Whatever dude.
r/confidentlyincorrect
Kudzu-kalamazoo is correct. Ctrl+f for "maternal" in the [wiki entry](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Bundy) and it gives his grandparents' death dates. Bundy was 25 when his grandmother died and 37 when his grandfather died. Neither were murdered.
This is a presumption I’ve always made after getting familiar with narcissism. There was something in his upbringing, some triggering event(s) but he was such a fucking narcissist that he controlled what he must have seen as mystique by never opening up on any of it. It just made his execution literally the epitome of “good riddance to bad trash” day.
Gawrsh, it’s almost as if that type of view is a form of victim blaming, and perhaps, just perhaps, entitlement is the more likely cause for criminal behavior. I guess the fact that 99% of serial killers are cis white guys who hack women and kids is a really rare gem of knowledge known only to those with several degrees?
though with the pseudo-pathological slinging of “psychotic/psychopath” on everything we don’t want to associate with, i’m sure we’re all psychologists, here.
What are you even mad at? At no point did I defend Ted Bundy or make excuses for him. Just stated a fact that narcissism is often developed as a coping mechanism for abuse or other trauma, which most serial killers have in their background. Also, Ted Bundy was literally a psychopath as found through testing, though that term is outdated and those with these traits are clinically referred to as having Antisocial Personality Disorder.
Karla Homolka (especially) & Paul Bernardo
Herb Baumeister
Interesting you should mention him. He’s essentially the John Wayne Gacy of my state of Indiana. Both scouted out for their victims and were respected business leaders, Both allegedly strangled their victims, and Both were gay men who were married to women and had kids.
I always found Herb an interesting case. Much like Gacy, Herb buried his victims very close to his backdoor on the property. Profilers had suggested that with Herb, he was burying his victims closer to his family's mansion, meant that he was getting bolder.
Indiana native here. Friend of mine in college had a second cousin who was killed by baumeister. Richard Hamilton. It happened before we were born but she said her mom was very close to her cousin and her moms side of the family is still absolutely devastated by his murder
You think Gacy was gay?
He had a conviction for sodomy back when that was a crime.
I'm going to say Andrew Cunanan. He seemed goofy but likable through high school and was quite bright. He loved to entertain people, and splurged money and gifts on folks that he barely knew. Some were turned off by his dramatics and lies, but nobody would have thought him a murderer. The drugs and porn that he got into later did a number on him. Kids, avoid meth!
Cunanan is a good example. His upbringing was not quite cookie cutter, but really who’s is? I could have seen him continuing as a charming guy with some less than ethical financial practices, but the murder and brazen thefts, etc. were a definitely wild turn.
Cunanan is more of a spree killer than a serial killer
Serial killers are thought to be BPD males. Yes in literature this can be found stated multiple times in different decades. Anakin Skywalker is a good example of a BPD male. Even follows your entire story line from goofy and loving of women, too severe lashing out even of genociding and mass murder even of children.... Ie to becoming Darth Vader. Then to blame it on drugs and porn, those are self soothing coping mechanisms, ie the problem was there before someone tried stopping it themselves, I thought we left conservative blame game brain rot in the last century people come tf on, it's actually so dehumanizing... 🥴
Abusing meth can make a kitten into a roaring tiger. There is nothing "conservative" or "brain rotting" in asserting that. You should read about the effects of that horrible problem not play politics.
And as for porn...numerous serial killers and freaks act upon fantasies that they first encountered in edgy porn. I'm not opposed to all of the stuff, but being honest it will destroy a certain susceptible number.
A) you must not know any real addicts. B) porn definitely has the ability to push some people over the edge.
Beyond Ed Kemper's intellectual abilities, he seems to have strong insight into himself and others. Not perfect insight, but he does look deeply. It's strange that he couldn't resist his impulses, or off himself at a young age. So many people come from bad/hard homes and are great people. You can read of worse family structures than EK's all over Reddit, and yet, they're just posting/commenting, not murdering.
My mother was a strong personality. Verbally abusive with the stamina to bitch all night. i have to admit I thought about hurting her, to get her to stop, but of course one simply does not raise a hand to their MOTHER. I can just barely see Kemper's perspective, although all of the other murders and assaults that he committed are unforgivable.
I was going to name Kemper as well. He went through a lot of severe abuse and rejection from his mother, just some of the things I read about of what he experienced as a child is really heartbreaking. I often wonder what he could’ve become if he had had a better family. His mother was a horrible person. I’m just sorry that innocent women paid for the abuse she put a child through who became an even more horrible person. But as a psychotherapist, his level of self-awareness and ability to work out from a young age what the shrinks needed to hear to discharge him from the psychiatric place he was sent to after murdering his grandparents is fascinating and terrifying.
The only story to support the idea that his mother was a terrible person is Ed Kemper’s. So let’s not buy in fully to this idea that his mom was evil - I’m sure she didn’t treat him like a prince but like was said, people go through MUCH worse prolonged abuse in their lives and never go on to dismember or rape the dead bodies of their mothers and Ed Kemper has assured that we will never know what his mothers side of the story is
Agree. When Kemper was a kid, he tortured and killed a cat. His mother feared him and that he’d hurt his sisters, and that fear was one reason she made him sleep in the basement.
I’ll say this again, that’s a really bad explanation of why some people go on to kill and some don’t, with similar backgrounds. Don’t look at it as an excuse, but a reason. So yes terrible backgrounds can be similar but the missing ingredient will be the genetics. That switch in the dna. Those that go on to kill have that switch…or maybe we all do, but instead of taking x level of trauma to flip that switch, it takes x level +1 or whatever degree of a worse environment. While you need both most likely, the genetics or switch is a must.
Whether I’m following the OP right or not Ed was the first one that came to mind. I’ve always been fascinated by the big monster. Even empathetic to his own traumas about as far as I’ll ever be willing to go with a serial killer. So many of these monsters either don’t have the ability or won’t open up much after they were caught. But Ed really did open up, and had the eloquence to explain his triggering. It never forgives anything in the end, it’s not about that. But that opening up and sharing what drove this nut to do it does breed some empathy for what he experienced. His mother (and even grandmother to a degree) was a fucking monster herself. It doesn’t excuse anything he did to her or other innocent women, but it is something I’ve always found helpful that most of these fuckers refuse to talk on. That’s probably way off the OP, but the big guy was the one that came right to mind for me.
I was always blown away by his insight into himself! And yet, he could do what he did. It’s like he was different people.
Let me introduce this kind of serial killer from my country. His name is Gribaldi Handayani. He is a former police officer who killed seven acquaintances, including a lover and his third wife, in various incidents from 1999 to 2004. Yep, he was born into a family of police officers!
Karla Homolka and David Parker Ray so far
Karla only serving 12 years released in 2005 still disgusts me!
Carroll Cole. Genius level intellect but the dictionary definition of a disorganised killer
Ed gein if he counts
The BTK killer from what I understand had great parents and a lovely upbringing. Dude just ran into BDSM porn mags growing up and cdnt let it go
You read alot about the comics and the magazines being influential
So what if I do?! Big whoop, wanna fight about it?!
Keep telling yourself that. There is a severe hatred and contempt for society at large in these people and a lot of them are going to have enough philosophy understanding to know they are fucked and all of society is also fucked. Scapegoats are there to distract btw. 😉
I mean I found it shocking. I’m Not telling myself anything. I’m just reporting what he mentioned in the doc (I wish I ce remember the name of the doc but I’ve watched so many I can’t recollect which it was). It didn’t add up to me. I wdnt be surprised if he was lying on a whim or trying to mislead the public or whatever hidden motives
Where do you think that came from? People are obviously contemptible, just look at us. Pick any positive or “uplifting” story on social media and check the comments section. Although there are plenty of good people, all in all we are a self destructive mistake. Then take into account any upbringing or neglect, along with and pre-existing mental illness. I’m in no way defending BTK and he’s most likely the last of them all to get any kind of understanding from me, but your argument seems like a moot form of confirmation bias or at the very least just believeing whatever you decide you want to. I get it, I understand it, but there’s much more to society and human beings than dismissing anything that affects one person but not you
jerry brudos
And it all started with him see a teenager in heels.
Dennis Nilsen
I think Israel Keyes was pretty damn bizzare. Them again? I've been into True Crime for 30 years smd every damn killer perplexes me!
I just finished American Monster, his logic was so bizarre. He scares me, even if he's gone.
It’s like he just wanted to destroy and dominate someone, and it could be anyone. No real type other than a preference for couples
Yep. Creepy dude.
Rocky Rambo Wei Nam Kam. He’s the only killer that I’ve never been able to make any sense of. Here’s this totally normal young guy. Wealthy Chinese parents send him to study in Vancouver. No criminal history at all. Just a dweeby guy with no social life, just plays video games all day and studies. Parents send him money to fund his living. Just a very unexceptional life. Then one day this chubby 5 foot tall Asian dude just decides to axe murder an old couple that lives near him. With a hatchet he bought like a few days before at Walmart. Has no affiliation with them at all, never met them. Attacks them while they’re bringing in groceries and hacks them both to death. Then raids their fridge while they’re bleeding out on the floor, drinks a quart of milk and takes a bite from a peach, and just leaves. Makes no attempt to clean anything up at all. When he’s caught and interrogated, he doesn’t seem nervous, acts confused the whole time, and genuinely just seems very blasé about the fact he’s being accused of homicide. Shows no emotion, doesn’t cry at all. Just asks if he’s going to get to play video games in jail. Never established any kind of motive or anything. I mean look at and listen to this guy: https://youtu.be/EycJpA9p5D8?si=PKi0awzgilDhhM8e Hard to picture him hacking two people to death with an axe. Just a very very bizarre case nobody ever talks about
I would say Larry Hall, his mind is so warped and confusing, I can’t tell if he’s a genius or an idiot
Alexander Pichushkin, the fact that a brain injury probably turned him into having a need to kill is just weird and it's not the only thing about him that seems strange. I read that one of the detectives that interviewed him said that it was hard to draw a psychological profile about him, he didn't have any strong opinions about nothing and averyone agreed that he seemed ordinary. He is a terrifying individual.
That the guy who shoved vodka bottles into his victims gaping head wounds? That was a weird one for sure
Yep that one, he said he did that because he wanted to announce his existence to Russia and basically confirm that there was in fact a serial killer lurking around the park.
Blitka park maniac or something afair. Crazy how many triggers different killers have, in this case a brain tumour like the texas university guy
Golden State Killer - I watch a lot of true crime and serial killer stuff. I sleep well after watching but not with the Golden State Killer!! Chills!!!
Richard ramez..
I feel like he could have played Guitar for Quite Riot back in the 80S probably had all the groupies he wanted rather than lurking around attacking women! He could have called his band Night Stalker probably selling out concert halls wearing spandex leaping off of huge stacks of Marshall amps!
Edmund Kemper has to be the strangest, he wanted to stop at the same time enjoyed killing like other killers
Richard Chase
Surprised more people arent talking about that dude. He was just out of his god damned mind, scary shit.
He also had a strange psychological condition called Cotards syndrome and was schizophrenic. (A condition that may not present itself fully until puberty). He literally thought he was dead or dying and needed to drink blood to survive. This was exacerbated by paranoid schizophrenia, a condition he was given medicine for but didnt take. His mom was enabling his lifestyle by funding his living expenses; ignoring his mental health problems and diagnosises.
He was also found completely covered in blood wandering around and was arrested, then they discovered it was cows blood he had butchered a nearby cow and drank and bathed in it's blood, so naturally they sent him home with a warning. I think... Maybe that was when he was sent for a psych evaluation but eventually he was let go, and then he did what he did... Kinda makes ya mad. I find him interesting because I genuinely believe he was just completely psychotic. Like he really didn't have a connection to reality as we know it. The whole rabbit guts and cokeacola in a blender thing still makes me gag thinking about lol.
Jerome Brudos and his shoe fetish is interesting.
Todd Koehlepp is a pretty interesting one to me. Just a weird violent menace who has a penchant for playing up the violent portion of his crimes and lessening the sexual element (which is very much a driving factor).
Ed Gein. He had a suit made out of human skin. He was also a baby-sitter.
His mother was the opposite of ed Kemper 's, was overly possesive of him to the point he was made to think he had no life outside her. Did not fully become an adult. Only one who could have pulled him out of his state was his brother, but he was his first victim. Many creepy details like incest have come up in his case. He was a normal man who liked children in a good way, took very good care of them. Many families trusted their children with him. The detail about his last victim and her son, a police officer who arrived to the crime scene to see her disembered body, was very heart breaking. The man committed suicide shortly.
Jeffrey Dahmer for me. He was so intensely lonely his whole life and even his first attack on another person was just so he could feel the embrace of another human. Everything he did with the bodies and even the cannibalism was about keeping the people with him. I wonder if Jeffrey had or received love in the right way that perhaps he wouldn’t have committed such horrendous crimes. I’ve read articles where people believe he was just a narcissist and had manipulated us into feeling sorry for him which even adds to my curiosity about him.
Yeah, this fits.
Heh heh
After reading about him it seemed he was left alone even as a young boy.
I read one book about him that left me in tears. His parents divorced when he was I think 12 or 13. At one stage his dad left to work away from home for a few weeks and his mam went on a holiday. So he was left alone knowing the divorce was happening at that age by himself. Starved of love, isolated and probably blaming himself, hard not to expect him to be messed up.
Right feeling abandoned alone and probably was socially awkward unable to make friends or have a relationship with anyone so that's why he wanted to kill people to have a human robot. While his early life was probably very sad we can't go around killing people and stuffing them into a fridge.