Serial killers have always fascinated and horrified the public in equal measure. Behind many infamous crimes are strange coincidences, shocking mistakes by authorities, bizarre courtroom moments, and chilling details that sound almost unbelievable. From killers who befriended the very police hunting them to criminals who manipulated the justice system in disturbing ways, history is filled with dark stories that reveal just how unpredictable these cases can be.
This fourth collection continues exploring some of the most unsettling, unusual, and lesser-known facts about serial killers from around the world. Some involve famous murderers whose stories became infamous, while others highlight obscure cases that remain deeply disturbing to this day. Each fact offers another glimpse into the strange and often terrifying realities behind real-life criminal history.
Continue the series:
50 Dark Facts About Serial Killers – Part 1
50 More Dark Facts About Serial Killers – Part 2
50 More Dark Facts About Serial Killers – Part 3
1 Donald Harvey’s Cyanide Nose Exposure
A nurse named Donald Harvey killed 37 of his patients and was only caught because a medical examiner performing an autopsy on one victim had the rare genetic ability to smell cyanide. Harvey worked as a nurse’s aide in hospitals in Ohio and Kentucky between 1970 and 1987, quietly poisoning patients with chemicals such as cyanide and arsenic. In 1987, an autopsy on patient John Powell revealed the faint almond-like smell of cyanide, a telltale sign that alerted the examiner to poisoning. The discovery triggered a deeper investigation into deaths connected to Harvey’s hospital work. Authorities soon uncovered that Harvey was a serial killer responsible for at least 37 murders, ending a killing spree that had lasted nearly two decades.
2 Edmund Kemper Drinking With Detectives
Serial killer Edmund Kemper befriended the very police officers investigating his murders and regularly socialized with them at a Santa Cruz bar called the Jury Room. During the early 1970s, Kemper had already murdered several young women in California while presenting himself as a friendly regular at the bar. The officers who drank with him nicknamed him Big Ed and never suspected he was responsible for the killings they were trying to solve. In 1973, Kemper finally called police and confessed to the murders after killing his mother and her friend. When he first admitted the crimes, the officers initially believed he was joking.
3 Albert DeSalvo’s Accidental Texas Honor
In the 1970s, Texas state representative Tom Moore Jr. introduced a bill honoring Albert DeSalvo, the man widely believed to be the Boston Strangler. DeSalvo had confessed to murdering 13 women in Boston between 1962 and 1964. Moore intentionally drafted the resolution praising DeSalvo for his supposed work in “population control” to demonstrate how easily legislation could pass without scrutiny. Members of the Texas House of Representatives approved the resolution without noticing the name attached to it.
4 Jack the Ripper FBI Profile
In 1988, the FBI National Center for the Analysis of Violent Crime (NCAVC) created a psychological profile of Jack the Ripper to mark the 100th anniversary of the Whitechapel murders in London. The unidentified serial killer had murdered at least five women in the Whitechapel district in 1888. They concluded the serial killer was most likely a male between 28 and 36 years old. The analysis also suggested he may have worked as a butcher, mortician, or medical orderly, professions consistent with the anatomical knowledge shown in the murders.
5 John Wayne Gacy Ignored Warnings
In 1975, John Butkovich, a teenage employee of contractor John Wayne Gacy, suddenly vanished in Chicago, Illinois, after confronting his boss about unpaid wages. Butkovich’s parents immediately suspected something was wrong and repeatedly contacted local police to push for a deeper investigation. Over the following months, they called authorities more than 100 times, urging officers to look closely at Gacy. Police initially treated the case as a simple missing person situation and did not pursue Gacy aggressively. Years later, investigators exposed Gacy as a serial killer responsible for the murders of at least 33 young men and boys, including Butkovich.
6 Ted Bundy’s Ignored Girlfriend Warning
In 1974, Elizabeth Kloepfer, the girlfriend of Ted Bundy, called the Seattle Police Department after realizing her boyfriend matched the description of a suspect in several murders in the Pacific Northwest. Bundy had already been linked to attacks on young women near Seattle, Washington, where witnesses reported a man named Ted driving a Volkswagen Beetle. When Kloepfer phoned police with her concerns, an officer reportedly told her she would need to come to the station and file a formal report because they were too busy to discuss it over the phone. She hung up without completing the report. Bundy continued killing afterward and eventually became one of the most notorious serial killer cases in American history, confessing to 30 murders before his execution in 1989.
7 Zodiac Killer’s 51-Year Cipher
The Zodiac Killer mailed a series of cryptic messages to newspapers during his murder spree in Northern California between 1968 and 1969, taunting investigators and the public. One of those messages, known as the 340 cipher, remained unsolved for more than five decades despite intense study by professional codebreakers and investigators. In December 2020, three amateur cryptography enthusiasts, David Oranchak, Sam Blake, and Jarl Van Eycke, finally cracked the code using a combination of software tools and persistence. Their solution revealed a chilling message in which the serial killer mocked police and claimed he was not afraid of execution. Though it solved one of the most famous puzzles connected to the Zodiac serial killer, the killer’s true identity remains unknown.
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8 John Christie’s Wrongful Execution Case
In 1950, British authorities convicted Timothy Evans of murdering his wife Beryl Evans and their infant daughter Geraldine at 10 Rillington Place in London. Evans insisted that his downstairs neighbor, John Christie, was responsible for the killings, but the court rejected his claims. The British government hanged Evans in 1950. Three years later, police discovered multiple bodies hidden inside Christie’s home at the same address. Investigators exposed Christie as a serial killer responsible for at least eight murders, and he later admitted killing Evans’s wife.
9 Elizabeth Wettlaufer’s Pastor Confession Secret
Canadian serial killer nurse Elizabeth Wettlaufer privately confessed to her pastor that she had murdered four residents while working in nursing homes in Ontario, Canada. Wettlaufer committed the killings between 2007 and 2014, using injections of insulin to poison elderly patients under her care. When she revealed the crimes during a religious conversation, the pastor chose to honor his promise of confidentiality and did not report the confession to police. Because the admission remained secret, authorities remained unaware of the murders for years. She later murdered two more victims before eventually confessing to police in 2016.
10 Golden State Killer Meeting Victims
During the late 1970s, residents in Sacramento County, California, attended public meetings to discuss a wave of home invasions and assaults linked to the man later identified as Joseph James DeAngelo. At one meeting, a husband stood up and mocked the idea that the attacker wouldn’t dare to invade a home if a man was present. Unbeknownst to the crowd, the serial killer, later nicknamed the Golden State Killer, was reportedly present and listening. After the meeting, he secretly followed the couple home to learn where they lived. About six months later, he returned and attacked them.
RE: Fact #4 (Jack the Ripper FBI Profile) – This actually makes me think of an article from Wired a few years back that broke down how criminal profiling works; it was super fascinating. As for the Ripper specifically, what they believed back then seems pretty much right, but I also feel like it’s kind of beside the point now. We’re probably never going to find out who he actually was, unless someone invents a time machine. That’s because they had so little to go on before DNA testing and all the modern police tools. Plus, London at the time was a huge global hub where people from everywhere gathered, and he targeted folks in the lower classes who were involved in risky behaviors, making them really hard to trace.
RE: Fact #29 (David Parker Ray Survivor Ignored) – It’s one of those things that just makes you wonder how it kept going for so long, especially since he had so many people helping him and even let some heavily drugged victims go. How did none of his accomplices ever accidentally reveal anything? It’s terrifying that it happened, but it’s even scarier because it shows there might be similar incidents happening right now that we don’t even know about.
What’s even more chilling is knowing it’s almost certainly happening somewhere on Earth, to someone, right at this moment.
RE: Fact #20 (Charles Manson Pencil Court Attack) – My friend’s mom actually worked as the court artist for that trial. She keeps all the original sketches in a room at her place.
RE: Fact #48 (Mary Bell Child Killer Freed) – It seems like she’s been living over in the UK, had a daughter, and now even has a granddaughter. I think she also wrote a book about her younger years, probably with a ghost writer’s help.
RE: Fact #37 (Ahmad Suradji Spirit-Power Graves) – Serial killers always seem to have these super complicated beliefs that just aren’t necessary. Like, dude, you’re already committing crimes, there’s no need to throw geomancy into the mix.
RE: Fact #22 (Luis Garavito’s 193 Victims Record) –
So there are two monsters in this story
RE: Fact #16 (Ted Bundy’s Courtroom Wedding Trick) – Carol Ann Boon also later said she became pregnant with Bundy’s child. She supposedly paid off the guards so they could get some ‘private time.’ It apparently took her forever to believe he was a serial killer, and now she’s hiding out with their alleged daughter, somewhere totally unknown. She even changed her name and everything else.
When he finally came clean, she got super mad. She had totally bought into everything he said until that moment. He really was a smooth talker.
So, she’s actually my friend’s aunt. He mentioned that to me ages ago, back when we first met in middle school. But he said she wasn’t really close with their family anymore. I just did a fast search, and it seems like they got divorced in 1986, which is right about when my friend first told me about her.
You’d have to be pretty clueless to actually stick with someone who’s facing accusations of being a serial murderer, right?
Nah, more like totally delusional, to be honest. But Bundy had a way of charming tons of women, even when he was in jail. He’d get hundreds of letters from women literally throwing themselves at him, convinced he was innocent.
RE: Fact #23 (Myra Hindley’s Controversial Portrait Protest) – Myra Hindley is an intriguing choice for that art piece, though, because she became the prime example in the UK of why only telling kids to watch out for “strange men” or to find a woman for help was a terrible idea.
RE: Fact #3 (Albert DeSalvo’s Accidental Texas Honor) – Part of the problem is that the Texas Legislature only gets together for 140 days every two years. So, things tend to get pushed through super fast, without much review or careful checking. Texas is also probably the most decentralized state out there; many things that would be handled statewide in other places are actually managed by local groups in Texas. For example, the governor historically hasn’t had much power because a lot of the major statewide roles are voted on directly by the people instead of being picked by the governor.
During COVID, the governor basically passed the buck to county judges to decide on lockdowns. Then, if some blonde c*nt wanted her salon open, he’d just overrule them. After all that, he’d complain that nobody was taking his mask order seriously, but only because no one was actually enforcing it.
RE: Fact #34 (Nikko Jenkins Sued Nebraska State) – Someone really ought to be held responsible for letting this guy out of prison. He also definitely needed a lot of mental health help way before he ever killed anyone. Maybe that, along with taking him away from his parents for good at age 7 when he brought a loaded gun to school. Early action was clearly needed here, and this guy honestly should’ve never been set free.
So, his argument was that staying in solitary for a long time made his schizophrenia even worse. And they apparently released him even though he was saying he heard the voice of an ancient Egyptian snake god. Now, if he really does have schizophrenia, and isn’t just some d*rtbag trying to cause trouble from jail? Then this might actually be a situation where even a broken clock is right twice a day
<blockquote><p>After being declared competent to stand trial, the proceedings against Jenkins commenced. On his request, Jenkins was allowed to represent himself at trial under the guidance of advisory attorneys..</p></blockquote> If that IQ test was actually right, Jenkins counts as mentally disabled. I’m just really confused why someone who’s mentally disabled would even be allowed to represent themselves in court
He was actually trying really hard to be declared insane, so he might’ve messed with that test to make himself look worse. That’s also kind of why he filed that “lawsuit” they talked about. And he did have lawyers available, but he just kept refusing that right as much as they’d let him. I guess as long as he was considered competent to face trial, they couldn’t stop him from trying to represent himself.
The thing is, that’s not really how IQ scores work. Like, most countries in Sub-Saharan Africa have an average IQ of roughly 70, but that doesn’t mean the average person there is mentally disabled.
Wow, this person’s whole life just shows how every single authority figure completely dropped the ball.
RE: Fact #8 (John Christie’s Wrongful Execution Case) – I just couldn’t fit into the fact that Christie was actually the main witness for the prosecution during Evan’s court case.
This sounds like something straight out of Pennywise: ‘I took your wife, and now I’m coming for you!’ What a total horror show for that poor man. And it really drives home why the death penalty is just wrong.
Texas really seems to enjoy executing prisoners, so much so that if someone’s innocent, their governor at the time would cover it up. And that same person then became our Energy Secretary who completely fu*ked over Ukraine.
I checked out Christie’s Wikipedia page, and it says he went on to kill four more women after Evans was already hanged. Talk about a total failure of justice.
That’s exactly the issue with the death penalty, isn’t it? The risk that you might make a mistake.
RE: Fact #31 (Edmund Kemper Scared FBI Agent) – That guy was huge. He probably would’ve said the same thing even if there were two police officers there. They really should have shackled him to the table.
For sure, two officers wouldn’t stand a chance against Kemper in a cramped space if he decided to act. The guy was huge, like 6’9″ and 300 pounds. Even with their weapons, they’d be in serious trouble if he decided to hurt them.
This actually makes those slasher movie bad guys who easily kill people with just their hands seem more believable. Rob Zombie’s version of Michael Myers is really the only one who captured that kind of brute force accurately, purely through his size.
RE: Fact #4 (Jack the Ripper FBI Profile) – If I recall correctly, the police initially called the killer ‘Leather Apron, ‘ because that was a common garment for people in those jobs. But then, at some point, the police got a letter from someone who claimed to be the killer and signed off as ‘Jack the Ripper.’ The really striking thing about that letter was that the writer said they’d cut off a piece of the next victim’s ear as a memento, and sure enough, that’s exactly what happened the next time the killer attacked. So whether it was the real killer or just some prankster who got incredibly lucky, the name ‘Jack the Ripper’ ended up sticking.
Those letters were actually printed in the newspapers back then, so it wouldn’t shock me at all if the actual Ripper read one and decided to go through with cutting off that piece of ear. Or maybe the Ripper and the person who wrote the letter were even working together…
RE: Fact #39 (Hans Schmidt Killer Priest Scandal) – Hans B. Schmidt was a German Catholic priest who was a rapist, a convicted murderer, and is thought to have been a serial killer. He got the electric chair at Sing Sing Prison in New York for killing and dismembering a pregnant woman here in the U.S. … Starting in December 1912, Schmidt was also in a secret homosexual relationship with Ernest Muret, a dentist from New York City. They even ran a counterfeiting operation together. Schmidt later said he liked Muret more than Anna.
RE: Fact #14 (Ted Bundy’s Revenge Romance Scheme) – That guy was seriously manipulative. He actually acted as his own lawyer, and get this, during his trial in Florida, he asked a character witness to marry him right there. Because of some weird old state law, once she said ‘yes’ on the stand, their marriage was considered totally legal.
Yeah, even the judge gave him a compliment, saying he wished they could’ve practiced law together, even though he was about to sentence him to death. That’s wild.
He also ended up having a kid with her, who later changed her name once she was grown up. So, Ted Bundy probably has grandkids running around out there somewhere.
I’d say the most manipulative thing he ever did was definitely taking away people’s lives when they didn’t want to die.
My friend mentioned that for him, the hypocrisy was the absolute worst thing about Bill Cosby. But I just said I wasn’t so sure that was actually the *worst* part of it all.
RE: Fact #43 (Diogo Alves Preserved Killer Head) – This brings to mind Crank 2, specifically that scene at the end with the guy’s head in the fish tank. “Fu*k you chev chelios.”
RE: Fact #32 (Shige Sakakura Deadly Baby Farm) – Get this, just three decades later, another woman in Japan did pretty much the same awful thing, killing over 70 kids. And she only got four years in prison for it… unbelievable.
A lot of the most active serial killers ever have actually been women working as caregivers. Their jobs often meant no one really paid much attention to their victims, and they had believable reasons for any deaths. Take Amelia Dyer, for instance; she’s thought to have killed somewhere between 2 and 400 babies in England. She only got caught once she stopped starving them first and just started tossing the infants straight into the river.
No, that’s actually totally wrong. The majority of the most prolific serial killers are men.
Just reading about this, it’s honestly so heartbreaking thinking about those parents struggling in poverty, just desperate for their kids to have any kind of future. And for Miyuki and her husband to take their money and then just neglect those babies? That’s beyond awful. To cause all that suffering and then only get four years in jail, that’s just incredibly unfair.
It’s a bit of a spoiler to bring it up right now, but “the girl with the needle” is a really well-made and super haunting movie. It even got nominated for best foreign film at the Oscars this year.
RE: Fact #23 (Myra Hindley’s Controversial Portrait Protest) – It’s strange how she worries about the parents regarding her portrait, but not about telling them where their kids are buried. One of those children is still missing, so the parents never got to bury them properly.
RE: Fact #19 (Charles Manson Asked To Stay) – Nope, Charles. You really can’t stay here, dude. You need to get out there and find some friends, start a family, totally new beginnings. Or, you know, maybe savagely murder a pedophile’s wife or two.
RE: Fact #31 (Edmund Kemper Scared FBI Agent) – Did anyone really need to explain that to them? I mean, the dude was 6 foot 9, 300 pounds, and oh yeah, a known murderer. Seems pretty clear already.
Yeah, actually, they sort of did. The agents were interviewing serial killers, who were huge like human fridges, in a private room, one-on-one, with no weapons. It sounds like it took something significant for them to finally realize how dumb that setup was.
RE: Fact #5 (John Wayne Gacy Ignored Warnings) – Every time I read about these sorts of incidents, I just get more and more certain that the cops back in the 70s were totally clueless.
This section from the Wikipedia entry is a must-read:
Seriously, how did that even happen?
It’s awful, but that’s just how much people discriminated against gay individuals back then. It was a really sad reality.
RE: Fact #3 (Albert DeSalvo’s Accidental Texas Honor) –
That’s genuinely hilarious. When it comes to satire, this is basically the ‘A Modest Proposal’ version coming from state lawmakers.
Was there ever actually a time when America wasn’t just some incompetent boys’ club? It’s really bizarre how people get into these huge fights about whether the Constitution or the Bible is more important for the country. There’s just so much arguing between different groups. I truly believe everyone needs to realize that a lot of things could be better, and acknowledging our shortcomings is actually a sign of strength, not a weakness.
It honestly feels like back then, at least *stuff* got accomplished. But now, it seems like just *not* messing things up is considered a win. I mean, we used to send people to the moon, and now we can’t even get into Canada. There’s so much from this administration that it’s easy to just tune out and not care. But don’t forget, it was getting too comfortable that landed us in this situation.
There’s this saying in Texas that goes, if you didn’t have any crazy folks in the Texas Legislature, it wouldn’t actually be a true representative democracy. As Molly Ivins put it, ‘Carl Parker observes, if you took all the fools out of the Lege, it wouldn’t be a representative body anymore.’
RE: Fact #14 (Ted Bundy’s Revenge Romance Scheme) –
Damn, talk about dedication.
Guess she probably feels pretty lucky that his revenge turned out that way.
I actually kinda envy some serial killers for their sheer energy, motivation, and intense drive. Seriously, so many of them manage to keep up a perfectly normal front with their families, friends, and even kids, AND they have a whole other secret ‘hobby’ of torturing and hurting people. How do they even pull all that off? I can barely get myself out of bed some days. Lucky fu*ks.
Haha, yeah, totally get this. For a second, I actually thought about being petty enough to do something like that… but then my first thought was ‘Nah, it’s just too much trouble.’
RE: Fact #6 (Ted Bundy’s Ignored Girlfriend Warning) – When you actually check out the timeline, it’s just fu*king unbelievable that this guy wasn’t caught sooner. He was on the suspect list for so many years! He’d live in an area with a ton of murders, then he’d move, and the killings would just follow him. It’s wild how disconnected things were in the world not too long ago.
RE: Fact #15 (Richard Ramirez Captured By Mob) – Here’s a cool tidbit: I actually grew up in El Paso, Texas, and my old school counselor went to high school with Richard. The thing that really stuck with me from his personal stories about Richard was that he knew he was fu*king strange and had honestly never met anyone like him before.
Folks who spoke with him mentioned his eyes would just totally change in a flash if he got angry. They’d turn from normal to completely black, like a fu*king shark about to attack. And then there’s this one person who claims he actually hung out with him and even called him ‘Richy’. I’m not totally sure if that story is true, but it’s pretty fu*king hilarious. That guy also said Richard was weird.
RE: Fact #12 (William Burke’s Deadly Burking Method) – Burke was actually an Irishman, born in Tyrone, even though he lived and committed his crimes in Scotland. You can find his skeleton on display at the University of Edinburgh’s Anatomical Museum. And the little pocketbook made from his skin is over at the Surgeons’ Hall Museum, also in Edinburgh.
Man, seeing that pocket book is kinda disturbing, mostly because it just looks like a regular one. The whole Surgeons’ Hall Museum is pretty cool and fascinating, but also pretty creepy. Just so many old pickled body parts and super grim medical gadgets everywhere. Definitely not a place for anyone who gets grossed out easily.
There were so many pickled body bits that it honestly started to feel like a chore. By the end, I was just thinking, ‘yeah, yeah, another diseased… thing, cancerous tongue, pickled fetus, whatever, ugh, boring.’
Something else to mention, he actually started out as just a plain old body snatcher. That was because there was a real need for fresh dead bodies for doctors to practice autopsies and learn more about human anatomy. He eventually began killing people because it was simply easier for him and his partner, Hare. They’d rent a room to someone, get them totally drunk, kill them, and then take the body to the university. It’s pretty strongly hinted that the university professors knew Burke and Hare were murdering these people. Mainly because the police would often show up at their door, searching for someone who matched the exact description of the person Burke and Hare had just delivered.
Right, after a certain point, it’s just hard to believe those medical professors didn’t even a little bit wonder where all the new bodies were suddenly appearing from. Quick trivia: there’s actually a strip club in Edinburgh these days called Burke & Hare.
RE: Fact #7 (Zodiac Killer’s 51-Year Cipher) – So, one of the people who actually solved it had this YouTube show called ‘Let’s Crack Zodiac.’ When I first saw that title, I figured it was just a bit of playful arrogance. But then, in episode 5, they really did crack the Zodiac code!
It was really just a catchy name for a YouTube show that looked at Zodiac ciphers that had already been figured out, plus the methods for studying the ones still unsolved. Then, they just got super lucky and actually helped to solve one of the Zodiac’s ciphers.
Solving the Zodiac cipher sounds like the ultimate clickbait headline, but it genuinely turned out to be real.
RE: Fact #11 (Ted Bundy’s Courthouse Window Escape) – Nowadays, they still do similar things, but they put a shock belt on the person accused. And I’m talking about a really strong shock belt, not some silly thing you’d mess with at a party. It’s considered wrong for the jury to see the defendant in prison clothes or to make them think the person is locked up, because that causes prejudice. If they need the accused to wear leg restraints during the trial, they use soft cloth ones so they don’t clank like metal chains. They also drape fabric around the lawyer’s tables so the jury can’t see these restraints. Plus, the jury always steps out of the room before the defendant is brought in or taken out of the courtroom.
Man, where I’m from, even the judge isn’t supposed to see the defendant wearing restraints. Which seems a bit silly, because the transport officers are still around, and everyone knows the defendant is in custody anyway. But hey, I don’t make the rules.
That device is uncomfortable as fu*k, dude. Having those little prongs dig into your leg for hours, day after day, was probably the absolute worst part of my own trial. I don’t think I even had to wear any actual restraints in court, just this huge “fu*k you” contraption strapped to my leg.
Yeah, that really stinks. There should definitely be a comfier way to handle those sensors, especially since juries often notice little things that aren’t important, like how you’re moving. Having metal bits jabbing your ankle all day is definitely going to mess with that.
RE: Fact #24 (Richard Ramirez Prison Bride Leaves) – So, she was fine with the 13 adults, but a single child was where she drew the line? Like, “You killed 13 people? No big deal. Oh, wait, you also killed a 9-year-old? That’s too much.”
Dahmer, I think he was one of those gay serial killers, had this habit of drugging and raping guys at a bathhouse he frequented. Management kept getting mad at him for it. They finally couldn’t take it anymore and officially banned him after the twelfth or thirteenth complaint about someone being drugged and raped by him! It’s wild, like, “That’s it! We warned you about this eleven times already! You are banned now!”
And if thirteen guys actually came forward after getting drugged and raped, just imagine how many more didn’t say anything. He probably did that hundreds of times.
I mean, they’d also been hitched for thirteen years. That’s a good chunk of time to sit and think about whether tying the knot with a serial killer was truly a good plan.
RE: Fact #34 (Nikko Jenkins Sued Nebraska State) – I totally understand the actual reason they hand out multiple death sentences, but “4 consecutive death sentences” always cracks me up. I just picture one team of doctors declaring someone gone, and then another team immediately bringing them back to life.
So, there are a couple of reasons for this. First, each person harmed gets their own specific charge. Even though prosecutors could go for just one big sentence for all the crimes, they usually charge each offense separately. Part of that is to honor each victim, but it also helps as a backup plan if the case for some of the victims isn’t as strong. Second, it makes getting parole way tougher. If a killer manages to get one conviction thrown out on appeal, they still have all those other sentences to deal with.
RE: Fact #24 (Richard Ramirez Prison Bride Leaves) – It was already known he was a pedophile. This dude was a rapist and a killer. Fu*k that woman, she just wanted fame.
I watched that special about him on Netflix. I already knew about all the murders, but I had absolutely no idea he’d kidnapped and molested/raped so many kids. They didn’t even try to get convictions for those crimes; they just didn’t want to put the child victims through all that, especially since they already had him locked up for good with the murder charges.
RE: Fact #47 (Lisbon Ripper Reality Show Tip) – Just so you know, the father was cleared as a suspect in the Lisbon Ripper murders. He did look like a strong candidate initially, especially since he admitted to the killings to a journalist using a hidden camera. However, his story didn’t align with the actual details of the situation, and a palm print from the real killer didn’t match his.
So, did the son include that in his application to boost his odds of being picked for the program? Or did he genuinely believe his father was involved?
I’d lean towards the second option, considering his Dad actually confessed to the murders to a journalist with a hidden camera. That just makes you wonder even more, though.
RE: Fact #27 (Rodney Alcala Cross-Examined Himself) – I’m not trying to be rude or anything, but if he had answered that deep-voiced question himself, just in a normal voice, it would have been almost hilarious.
RE: Fact #21 (Charles Manson Corpse Wedding Plot) – I went to New Orleans last Halloween and checked out the Museum of Death. They had tons of letters back and forth between several serial killers and some girl. I don’t recall her name, but she wrote to so many serial killers and had these kind of flirty, sometimes sexual, relationships with them, all through letters she wrote by hand. No pictures of her were displayed, but a few of the inmates’ letters mentioned the sexy pictures she was sending. My boyfriend and I kept wondering if she was just a crazy b*tch who genuinely liked getting freaky with murderers, or if she was just pretending to collect stuff for the museum. We ended up thinking it was probably a little bit of both, honestly.
Back when I was in prison, a few different websites existed that other guys’ families had signed them up for. Folks could sign up to write letters to inmates, picking them from a profile. I never tried it, but some of my friends did. It was almost always a really overweight woman or a gay guy who replied, except for one pretty hot chick who wrote to one of my cellmates. Honestly, though, no one really cared how they looked; it was always about who could get them to send money for our prison accounts. I guess a few guys genuinely enjoyed it if they didn’t have family writing them, just for the chat. Most of the chats were pretty normal, but I think most of the women wrote because they either had family in jail and understood things, or they were just lonely. Just so you know, it was way simpler to get the gay guys to send cash, but we all made fun of the ones who wrote to them. My cellmate still got a couple hundred bucks in a few months doing it, though.
RE: Fact #2 (Edmund Kemper Drinking With Detectives) – I just found out today that even though this guy murdered his grandparents and was actually declared a criminally insane minor, the police department years later refused to hire him not because of his past, but because of his HEIGHT. Seriously, what the heck???
So, get this, his juvenile records were totally wiped clean because the psychologists back then genuinely believed he was rehabilitated. And it gets crazier: they apparently said if Kemper showed up in front of them right now, they’d never even guess he was capable of those kinds of crimes or had any mental health issues whatsoever. He was just so smart he managed to trick all those psychologists into thinking he was perfectly sane and would be a useful member of society once he got out.
What a bizarre system we’ve got, right? Someone gets a DWI and it follows them forever, but if you fu*king murder your grandparents, it’s like, ‘Oh, he seems fine now, let’s just erase that from his record!’ I mean, come on… maybe an asterisk or something? Anything at all?
RE: Fact #22 (Luis Garavito’s 193 Victims Record) – His sentence is just wild.
Wild, you’d think everyone could just agree this guy doesn’t belong in normal society and give him life in prison.
Don’t get your hopes up too high. The article also said: “Pirry also described Garavito’s conditions in prison and commented that due to good behaviour, he could have probably applied for early release within three years.”
Wait, what? It oughta work this way: He gets 1, 853 years and 9 days, they knock it down to 1, 835 years and 9 days, but since the max is 40, he only does 40.
RE: Fact #20 (Charles Manson Pencil Court Attack) –
Also, one of the defense lawyers just disappeared off the face of the planet during the trial, and later turned up dead.
This probably won’t get seen much, sadly, but this is one of the coolest stories I’ve wanted to share on factrepublic: I actually randomly ran into Vincent Bugliosi just a year after I finished ‘Helter Skelter.’ I’ve only met a few famous people, but because of when it happened, I was totally star-struck by him. That guy was like a living piece of history. ‘Helter Skelter’ is so incredibly gripping, everyone should really try to read it sometime. Vincent was the lawyer who prosecuted the Manson family, and then he wrote ‘Helter Skelter, ‘ which details the whole thing from Charles’s start to his time in prison. Oh, and I just found out he passed away in 2015 🙁
That’s pretty wild because I just saw another fact that said Manson listed “Scientology” as his religion when he first went to jail.
RE: Fact #10 (Golden State Killer Meeting Victims) – What’s really surprising is that the killer actually lived pretty much in the same neighborhood where he did some of those murders. I just can’t picture how many times he must have driven around, passing spots where he’d attacked people years ago, just remembering stuff.
Lots of serial killers kinda work in a “donut” shape around their home base. Not super close, but not too far either. But this person wasn’t just driven by an urge to kill; he seemed to take things personally, murdering people because of it, and likely went after women he’d seen in his everyday life.
I remember a TV show, maybe like Dateline, where they mapped out the attacks and then checked the house right at the center of all those points. Turns out, it was the serial killer’s home.
That’s kind of a well-known fact about serial killers. They almost always commit their crimes within a short drive of where they live. You don’t really see many traveling far to do their awful deeds.
Yeah, that’s probably because the ones smart enough to travel super far away usually don’t get caught.
So, are you suggesting the surprising bit is that he murdered people close to his home? Seriously, am I nuts, or is that like the absolute least shocking detail you could ever hear about a serial killer? “Urgent update! Killer operates within his local area. Tune in for more details later!”
RE: Fact #26 (Jeffrey Dahmer Victim Returned Home) – Even worse, if I recall right, Dahmer had drilled into the kid’s head and injected acid to melt his brain, which made the kid incredibly confused and unable to speak clearly.
He actually did this a few times. He started with hot water, and I’m not totally sure what he used in this particular instance, but I definitely remember this being one of the times he tried it.
I really didn’t need to read this today. Fu*k that. I wanted to stay ignorant of this, truly. What on earth is wrong with some people?
I initially thought the head drilling part happened later; I figured he was just drugged at this point. Turns out I was wrong. The hole was indeed already in his head. Just unbelievable.
RE: Fact #25 (Ted Bundy Returned Crime Scene) – This kind of info would have made that Netflix film about him a lot more compelling.
That idea, showing everything from his girlfriend’s point of view, seemed pretty cool. I really wanted to like that movie, but it just ended up being super boring. If they had thrown in some scenes of him actually doing the murders, or other wild stuff like this, it might have made it more engaging. I never thought I’d say it, but this movie could have used some more brutal killings.
RE: Fact #21 (Charles Manson Corpse Wedding Plot) – Is nobody gonna mention this dude’s nickname is Grey Wolf?
RE: Fact #35 (Peter Kürten Vampire Killer Brain) – This whole story just kicks off with this, right here:
Seriously, it just goes completely downhill after that. I’m not even kidding.
RE: Fact #44 (Jack Unterweger Reporter Killer Return) – From the Wikipedia article: “His work gained the attention of the Austrian literary elite, who took it as evidence that he had been rehabilitated.” I don’t see how he can be released early on the grounds of ‘seeming rehabilitated’.
RE: Fact #20 (Charles Manson Pencil Court Attack) – Charles Manson was a seriously weird dude. His answer when someone asked, “Who are you?” in that interview always gives me the chills.
RE: Fact #15 (Richard Ramirez Captured By Mob) – The whole story is way more intense, trust me. So he’s riding a bus, sees his photo in a newspaper, and then gets recognized once he steps off. After that, people were literally chasing his *a*ss everywhere he went in the city, trying to catch him. He ended up darting into a Hispanic neighborhood, and suddenly about 50 folks came out of their houses with weapons to give him a serious beating because they felt he made their community look bad by association.
RE: Fact #10 (Golden State Killer Meeting Victims) – Police departments, pay attention. Maybe you could put someone undercover at these public gatherings to badmouth the killer. “I’m Buck Craven, from 1105 Sycamore Court. Excuse me, sheriff, but I honestly don’t get what all this fuss is about. That pathetic loser could never sneak past my screen door at 1105 Sycamore Court without waking me up! Yeah, I usually have a few drinks and pop a Xanax or two before bed, and come to think of it, I hardly ever lock up. But that shrimp di*k could never surprise me or my gorgeous wife. Stand up, honey! Isn’t she a stunner, everyone? Sycamore Court is a calm, dimly lit area, and no house is more private than 1105 where we live. Still, even if that creep finds the key under the doormat, I’d wake up and stop him. It wouldn’t matter at all that I strongly oppose the second amendment and have never gotten any kind of home security system. Once more, my name is Buck Craven, at 1105 Sycamore Court, the blue house right after the empty lot, and I just want to stress one more time how little I think of the Black Forest serial killer.”
You could deliver this exact speech, but definitely don’t give away your address. Then, afterwards, just head over to someone you despise’s house and ask to use their bathroom.
Here’s a twist: imagine you go to the serial killer’s place, and he gets so confused he just ends up taking his own life. Problem solved.
RE: Fact #33 (Robert Maury Tipster Killer Rewards) – I just love how his defense team tried to say he was some good guy who just “happened” to find three dead bodies. Totally by chance, obviously.
RE: Fact #17 (Charles Manson Sold For Beer) – It’s such a bummer. He probably figured out his mom didn’t want him from a really young age. The damage from his life was just obvious. Every kid just wants love and to feel cared for, and when they don’t get that, sometimes it just creates a monster.
RE: Fact #43 (Diogo Alves Preserved Killer Head) – Seeing his face, so well-kept, made me realize that Renaissance portraits *actually were* completely realistic after all. Maybe it was more that people centuries ago just had those typically ‘Zuckerberg-ish’ flat, blank, browless expressions. And here I was, foolishly judging the artists! OR, could they have been studying severed heads in jars for face models back then?
RE: Fact #5 (John Wayne Gacy Ignored Warnings) –
Come on, why didn’t they at least contact the police one single time? This went on for “YEARS”!
It’s like they thought, ‘Oh, it’s just the neighbor doing his usual murdering again! Could you guys quiet down a bit, please?’
I recall a tale about Gacy’s next-door neighbor, who was perhaps putting out the trash really late. Gacy was out in his yard, covered in mud. The neighbor jokingly asked him, ‘What are you doing with that shovel this late? Digging a grave?’ Turns out, he actually was.
RE: Fact #50 (Richard Cottingham Rodney Alcala Coworkers) – There’s gotta be a movie out there where two killers just happen to run into each other and try to take each other out. Like, picture Jigsaw catching the Riddler or the Joker.
RE: Fact #32 (Shige Sakakura Deadly Baby Farm) – So, Shige, born in 1868, was a mechanic’s daughter. She married and then became a midwife in 1898. She’d take in kids born out of wedlock for 40-50 yen each, but then just started killing them. By May 1913, estimates said she and her crew had killed about 200 babies, especially a lot during the Russo-Japanese War when many soldiers died, leaving widows. They kept moving around the prefecture to avoid getting caught. Her operation finally got busted when she killed a geisha’s baby. That geisha used to visit her child regularly, so when she was suddenly blocked from seeing it, she got suspicious and called the police. Sakakura and her accomplices were arrested. Just ten days later, the whole thing hit the papers and became a huge national story.
RE: Fact #40 (Kim Sun-ja Cyanide Tea Survivor) – If you’re throwing up your guts, that usually means you should probably stop eating or drinking whatever it was that just made you do that.
RE: Fact #45 (Richard Kuklinski Missing Cement Barrel) – This fella was just totally full of sh*t. He said he was some major mafia hitman, but honestly, there’s hardly any proof for a lot of what he alleged. People have mentioned that he mostly fabricated his stories.
RE: Fact #24 (Richard Ramirez Prison Bride Leaves) – He was actually engaged to another person, a 23-year-old woman, when he passed away. It’s pretty strange how some women are just drawn to sh*t like this. The Gainesville Ripper case is another good example of that.
RE: Fact #5 (John Wayne Gacy Ignored Warnings) – I’ve really been diving deep into serial killer and true crime stories lately, and one thing that keeps coming up is how totally out of touch the cops were in the 70s. Like, parents would report their kids gone, with all their stuff still in the car, clearly something weird going on, and the police would just be like, ‘Oh, they probably just ran away.’ And remember the story about the naked, bloody kid, whose brain was partially cooked, who actually got away from Jeffrey Dahmer? The police caught him, then gave him right back to Dahmer… who then killed him. If you’re interested, you can find more about that under the ‘Dahmer Incident’ section.
The city only paid the family $850, 000? That’s nowhere near enough! And they actually *put him back on the job*? I used to have at least a little bit of respect for law enforcement as a whole, but it’s just vanished… I wonder why…
RE: Fact #31 (Edmund Kemper Scared FBI Agent) – Man, that was seriously one of the best parts of Mindhunter. I really wish that show was still around.
RE: Fact #15 (Richard Ramirez Captured By Mob) – Sen. Diane Feinstein nearly ruined the whole investigation when she let it slip that police were actually tracking him because of his super distinct Avia sneakers. The cops were absolutely *furious* at her, and naturally, he instantly swapped his shoes and just kept on murdering folks. I honestly can’t help but wonder how many more people died because of that massive fu*kup.
What’s even worse is that only one pair of those shoes in that particular size had ever been sold in California. Politicians really only look out for themselves, you know?
That self-centered ‘woman’ couldn’t even manage to retire, let alone keep her two-faced mouth quiet.
I’d pretty much say the same thing about old Mute Mitch McConnell. But I bet he’ll just stay in office until the day he dies. We seriously need term limits now.
RE: Fact #38 (Israel Keyes Buried Murder Kits) – Ultimately, it seems like he might have actually wanted to get caught. He kept using his victim’s debit card over and over until they finally arrested him. He definitely had to know what he was doing.
Most serial killers are totally aware that what they’re doing is wrong; they just don’t care at all. Psychopathy isn’t about being dumb or having some kind of mental problem; it’s usually the total opposite, but without the capacity to feel or really understand emotions. They have this messed-up system of drives and urges that’s pretty much the same as the urges people have for sex or food. Here’s a cool fact: in your daily life, you’re actually most likely to run into someone with psychopathic traits in jobs like surgeon or doctor, lawyer, pilot, or even a preacher. If you’re into this topic, there’s an excellent book called *The Wisdom of Psychopaths* that I totally recommend. Okay, I should probably clear something up because my last comment was, understandably, a bit confusing. Psychopathy isn’t actually a medical diagnosis on its own; it’s more like a general term for different diagnoses to help people grasp a set of behaviors more easily. Also, I’m absolutely not saying that all psychopaths or sociopaths are killers or dangerous. In fact, it’s quite the opposite. Plus, true psychopathy is super rare, and only a tiny fraction of those individuals would ever become dangerous. From what I’ve read, it’s much more common for someone to just have psychopathic traits, which can actually help them do well in really stressful professions. So no, your pastor, doctor, or lawyer isn’t secretly planning to murder you, and I’m sorry if I made it sound that way.
I think what he was trying to say is that the killer probably knew he’d eventually get caught because he kept using the victim’s credit card.
RE: Fact #18 (Charles Manson’s Brief Scientology Phase) – Remember that time he was bouncing on the couch during the Oprah show? Seriously, what a total nut job.
Kinda wild how there wasn’t a bigger fuss about Oprah having Charles Manson on her show.
I’ve actually seen that whole segment in context, and everyone acts like couch-jumping is the absolute craziest thing you could do. Watching it back, it just felt like a super high-energy, exciting, kind of quirky interview.
It was totally wild for its time, though. But some big public figures since then have really made us drop our expectations.
RE: Fact #41 (Thor Christiansen Survivor Recognized Him) – My absolute favorite story about a serial killer getting caught because he was just so bad at things is Dennis Rader, you know, the “BTK killer.” He had this thing where he’d constantly tease the police and try to get public attention by mailing anonymous letters to news channels. So, in 2004, even though it had been decades since his last murder, he decided to start sending letters again. Eventually, he actually asked the police if they’d be able to track him down if he sent them a floppy disk with his writings. The cops answered through a newspaper ad, pretty much saying, “Oh, no way, we totally couldn’t. It’s definitely super safe to send it right to us.” Then, of course, they used the metadata from one of the files on that floppy disk to trace it straight back to him.
My least favorite tale of police screw-ups involving a serial killer has to be the one about [officer John Balcerzak in the case of Jeffrey Dalmer.]”Warning not for those sensitive.” Every time I read about it, my blood just absolutely boils with anger.
How the fu*k did this dude ever get his job back, and then on top of that, get the chance to someday become the President of a police association? What the actual fu*k is wrong with America?!
Is that the one where the serial killer raped and tortured an Asian boy, and the police actually let the killer take the kid back, even though people nearby were protesting? And the boy was naked, bleeding from his rectum, and clearly terrified of the guy, plus his apartment seriously smelled like a dead body?
That whole situation is just one of the most confusing things ever. A lot of serial killers, maybe even all of them, have moments where they almost get caught. But I don’t know of any other case where a victim actually escaped and then law enforcement gave them right back to the killer. The police definitely shouldn’t be acting like the guy who picks up the hitchhiker at the end of the *Texas Chainsaw* remake.
Ted Bundy actually used his real name when he was luring victims. That made him the primary suspect, but then he ended up getting caught in a different state for things that had nothing to do with those cases.
So, the serial killer’s thought process was probably something like: “Man, I’m not getting any younger, and I really want to make a name for myself. How can I give myself up without actually giving myself up? I want everyone to know who the BTK killer really was!” And then the police were likely thinking: “Haha, yeah, we totally got him! What an idiot!”
RE: Fact #30 (Hadj Mesfewi Walled Alive Execution) – According to the wiki page, Mesfewi was first sentenced to be crucified on May 2, 1906, after his conviction. But there was a lot of international outrage, so his sentence got changed to beheading. However, people in Marrakesh really wanted him to suffer, so for four weeks, every single day, he was taken from his cell to the market square and lashed ten times with a thorny acacia rod. Finally, because his crimes were so terrible and as a warning to everyone, they decided Mesfewi would be walled up alive in the Marrakesh marketplace bazaar on June 11, 1906. His standing tomb was pretty small, just about 2 by 2 by 6 feet.
RE: Fact #47 (Lisbon Ripper Reality Show Tip) – Turns out the son didn’t get accepted for the show. But fun fact, Wikipedia says there was a contestant named Paulo on that season of Secret Story, and his secret was, ‘I killed a man.’
Next season, it’ll probably be ‘I killed TWO people.’ The producers are clearly desperate for viewers. They’re probably thinking, ‘Have we gone to far?’ Or even, ‘Three? Should it be three?’
The kind of secrets they had on there is absolutely wild: > I was kidnapped and exploited by a cult > I have a fetish for Teresa Guilherme > I see dead people > My wife/husband is in the House
Just so you know, Teresa Guilherme hosted Secret Story back then. I actually had to do a quick search for that information.
RE: Fact #47 (Lisbon Ripper Reality Show Tip) – I just learned that Portugal has a surprisingly short time limit for prosecuting murder cases. Apparently, it’s only 15 years.
Portugal was never really on my radar for a dream trip, but now I’m totally curious about it.
RE: Fact #9 (Elizabeth Wettlaufer’s Pastor Confession Secret) – The person mentioned in the fact actually told a bunch of people, but nobody really did anything. It’s not just the pastor involved here.
It’s kinda weird how everyone’s just focused on the pastor. You could say he had a stronger obligation to keep quiet about her confession. But what about those six or so other regular folks she told, like her ex and her NA sponsor? They didn’t say anything either.
I’m just guessing a bunch of people didn’t actually read the whole thing, haha. Because, to me, this woman obviously knew she had a fu*kin’ issue. It seemed like she kept trying to tell people about herself, and they either didn’t believe her or just didn’t want to. I’m also really not sure about the legal stuff here. I’m definitely no fu*kin’ lawyer or an expert in theology.
RE: Fact #36 (Sam Amirante Changed Missing Child Laws) – Can someone explain to me: What was the point of that 72-hour waiting period to begin with? Wouldn’t that just make it way tougher to actually find a missing child?
That was a much more innocent, and maybe naive, era. Most kids who went missing were just thought of as runaways, and the police didn’t want to use up their resources searching for kids they believed would just show back up in a few hours or days. If a person still hadn’t come home after 72 hours, then the situation was seen as probably more serious than just a runaway.
I went to a presentation given by an anti-trafficking expert, and he really pushed the idea that the whole “runaway” concept is mostly a myth. Kids might leave by themselves, sure, but they’re often tricked or caught because they’re so vulnerable.
RE: Fact #13 (Jeffrey Dahmer’s Prison Gym Killing) – Holy sh*t. And get this, he apparently got 16 years in solitary confinement after that whole thing went down.
Well, when someone murders two other inmates, it really does seem like maybe they shouldn’t be kept around other prisoners.
RE: Fact #11 (Ted Bundy’s Courthouse Window Escape) – That’s not the whole story. While he did represent himself, which let him show up in court without shackles, that’s not actually how he got away. Being his own lawyer gave him specific rights to prepare his defense. The key one was getting to look up legal precedents in the courthouse library. That’s when he actually jumped out a window and escaped, while he was supposed to be doing research, not during an ongoing court session.
I guess a courthouse library window is still a courthouse window. Also, it would be pretty tough to jump out of that window if you were wearing restraints. I didn’t actually read the fact, and I just figured, “Whoa! He ran to a window and leaped out right in front of everyone!”
Totally, otherwise it sounds like he said, “Okay, if the judge and jury would just glance over there, ” and then immediately darted the other way, right out the window.
RE: Fact #44 (Jack Unterweger Reporter Killer Return) – I’m curious how everyone who helped him get out feels, now that they’re basically accountable for these fatalities.
RE: Fact #27 (Rodney Alcala Cross-Examined Himself) – I think this was his third trial. He was already sentenced to death. I mean, you can’t really get more dead than that, so why bother spending money on a lawyer? And why not just mess around with the situation? He’s already a murderer, so he doesn’t care about the victims’ families anyway. Would you rather confuse a bunch of people and talk to yourself for five hours, having a strange kind of fun, or just sit alone in a jail cell, bored out of your mind? It’s a weird thing to do, but it kind of makes sense when you think about it.
RE: Fact #39 (Hans Schmidt Killer Priest Scandal) – Just so nobody gets confused, this isn’t John Bernard Feit. He was an 85-year-old former priest who was convicted of murdering a 25-year-old Texas schoolteacher and beauty queen. His conviction came over 57 years after Irene Garza vanished after going to Sacred Heart Catholic Church in McAllen for confession. Feit actually died in prison back in February of 2020.
RE: Fact #9 (Elizabeth Wettlaufer’s Pastor Confession Secret) – If you admit guilt to your attorney, I don’t think they typically report you either.
RE: Fact #32 (Shige Sakakura Deadly Baby Farm) – I’d never even heard of that specific term before. And seeing that blurb right at the top of the Wikipedia page about it “This article is about the practice of accepting custody of an infant or child in exchange for payment. For the systematic sale of human children, see [child harvesting].” just felt incredibly sad.
RE: Fact #33 (Robert Maury Tipster Killer Rewards) – Seriously, how many times did he imagine he could keep this up before someone finally said, “Hey, Bob, don’t you think it’s a bit odd that this guy seems connected to all these killings?”
RE: Fact #33 (Robert Maury Tipster Killer Rewards) – So, for all three times, it added up to around $2000, just in case anyone was curious.
It just seems like there are way easier ways to earn that kind of cash. But hey, who am I to criticize?
What an idiot! If we were talking half a million or something, okay, I could maybe get why someone would come forward. But giving up evidence against yourself in a murder case for under $2k each time? That’s insane.
My guess is he planned to kill them anyway and mostly just wanted the attention from the murders. The money was probably just a little extra, not the main reason. It’s like a fu*ked up version of getting a few cents for recycling your cans.
RE: Fact #1 (Donald Harvey’s Cyanide Nose Exposure) – Harvey totally fit the ‘angel of death’ profile, you know, those serial killers who work in healthcare and usually target patients. They’re some of the most dangerous, with super high victim counts, and often really hard to spot. Plus, a good chunk of people, like 20-40%, can’t even pick up the scent of cyanide.
Doesn’t it smell kinda like almonds? I remember doing that in chemistry class. So, am I, like… unique or something for being able to smell it?
RE: Fact #29 (David Parker Ray Survivor Ignored) –
You’d honestly think a slit throat would be enough to get even the most suspicious jerk of a husband or police officer to pay *some* attention. If even that didn’t do it, what on earth would a victim in that area have to go through to actually get help? I’m so glad she got away from people who lack such basic empathy or smarts, fu*k. The fact mentioned another woman in the article, Angelica Montana, who also got away and reported everything, but nobody followed up until events in 1999. How does something like this happen three separate times before anyone investigates properly?
I have a feeling her husband might have been kind of a bad person even before this happened. You don’t just freak out, accuse your wife of cheating, and then divorce her because she was missing for a couple of days. That’s definitely not a normal reaction. That doesn’t really explain the police reaction though, of course.
RE: Fact #43 (Diogo Alves Preserved Killer Head) – Is anyone else able to spot a top on this? I’m wondering if they need to refill it with formaldehyde occasionally.
RE: Fact #41 (Thor Christiansen Survivor Recognized Him) –
So, what set off the general public about this guy? He was blonde and young. He took lives, assaulted women, and fu*ked dead bodies. Plus, with a name like Thor, it was simple to call him a white supremacist. There’s no way he would’ve survived a year without special protection.
RE: Fact #46 (Boone Helm Jumped At Hanging) – It’s a bit unsettling to imagine how simple it might have been to be a serial killer a couple of centuries ago.
What’s even more frightening is realizing how easily someone innocent could be accused and put to death back then.
And it’s not like that’s completely impossible even now, right here in the old US of A. I’ve often thought about how hard it would actually be to set someone up for a crime. Like, is it just a matter of dropping their hair at the scene?
RE: Fact #49 (Nannie Doss Deadly Family Trail) – They really should have explained more about ‘her mother in law’ because, technically, she had a whole lot of those.
RE: Fact #2 (Edmund Kemper Drinking With Detectives) – It’s wild to think that a relatively small city like Santa Cruz actually had three different serial killers operating at the same time. That must have made it incredibly hard for the police to sort out which killer was responsible for each victim.
Man, the period from the mid-60s to about the mid-80s was absolutely packed with serial killers. It almost makes me believe that theory about lead exposure making people act crazy. I mean, it’s probably not the only reason, but still, damn.
Yeah, another theory floating around is that a ton of soldiers came back from WWII and Korea with PTSD, but without any mental health support. They ended up basically terrorizing their families, which then explains why their kids in the next generation turned out so fu*ked up.
RE: Fact #7 (Zodiac Killer’s 51-Year Cipher) – It really bothers me that the news outlets put out the solution to that first cipher, the one that a married couple cracked. If that information had never been in the newspaper, maybe the Zodiac killer would have just kept using the same type of code. That might have led to him getting caught, or at least revealing who he was.
RE: Fact #18 (Charles Manson’s Brief Scientology Phase) – Just picture a cult leader with schizophrenia, famous for murders, saying *you’re* too wild. Dang, some of you actually think he’s not guilty. I get that he might not have directly killed anyone, but he’s still on the hook for what his cult did. Plenty of powerful folks have caused deaths without ever touching a weapon.
RE: Fact #41 (Thor Christiansen Survivor Recognized Him) – Man, picture being at a pub and spotting the person who literally shot you in the fu*king head, just chilling there as if nothing happened.
RE: Fact #42 (Peter Woodcock Killed After Release) – This reminds me of an event from my local area. A woman took her infant son’s life, claiming it was because ‘satan told her’ or something similar. After some years, she got out of prison. They dropped her off at her brother’s place without telling him, and when he got home, she’d repeatedly stabbed his three-year-old boy. The agency that let her go ended up paying him a really big settlement. Later, this brother met my mother, and they had three more children who, thankfully, are much more alive than his first son.
Oh, fu*k. That sounds absolutely fu*king awful. I honestly can’t imagine getting over an experience like that.
And get this, the mother of the boy was so distraught that she faced 22 charges for dangerous driving back in 2005. Then, just a few months later, her other son died in a car crash involving an irresponsible driver. Not only did nobody bother to stop and help, but some dude even snapped a picture of the body and shared it online. I really wonder how she manages these days. >”We’re leaving on Friday. I’ve lost two sons here. We just need to get away. I’ll always come back to visit my sons’ graves, but we’ve had enough of Rockhampton. What’s the odds against this happening twice when I was just starting to adjust to my first son’s death and move on?”
Remember that bit Louis CK did about cellphones stopping kids from learning empathy? That’s what’s happening here. Nowadays, anyone can instantly just watch. A terrible event happens right in front of you? No big deal, whip out your fu*king phone and grab some pictures. No need to actually lend a hand. I don’t want to ever be like that. I hope if something awful is happening nearby, I’ll feel compelled to step in and do something. To assist another person. I hope I can always keep at least that small amount of bravery. My thoughts go out to that Rockhampton family.
RE: Fact #6 (Ted Bundy’s Ignored Girlfriend Warning) – This brings to mind that time Jeffrey Dahmer just strolled over to the police, right after one of his victims, naked and handcuffed, had found a patrol car out in the street. Dahmer simply told them, ‘Oops, sorry, my boyfriend and I just had a bit too much to drink and got into a fight.’ The officers just went along with it, let Dahmer take the guy back to his place, and then Dahmer killed him. If I remember correctly, those two officers eventually lost their jobs once everything came out.
My wife actually asked me yesterday why there seem to be more white serial killers than minority ones. I told her that if a black man had been involved in that Dahmer situation, his killing spree would’ve ended super fast.
Yeah, exactly. His victim broke free from his place and ended up in the street, naked, with obvious signs of injury all over. Dahmer came back to see him talking to the police, smoothly made up an excuse, and the officers just brushed it aside as some weird gay sh*t. :C
Oh, and don’t forget, a few women from the neighborhood actually tried to step in and say they felt like something was seriously wrong, but the police just blew them off.
RE: Fact #1 (Donald Harvey’s Cyanide Nose Exposure) – Seriously, it’s pretty messed up how some of his bosses thought he might be a killer, but they just let him go instead of telling the police.
RE: Fact #45 (Richard Kuklinski Missing Cement Barrel) – A 55-gallon barrel filled with concrete is more than 1, 100 pounds. Even if a body takes up some space and makes it slightly less dense, you’re still looking at a barrel weighing almost half a ton. Yeah, I’m calling BS on that story. It’s not simple to shift something that heavy.
I need to challenge your numbers a bit. I don’t believe a 55-gallon barrel of concrete *containing a body* would actually be that heavy. Sure, a completely full barrel would be around 1100 lbs. HOWEVER, a barrel with a 200 lb person inside would displace a good chunk of the volume that concrete could take up. I’m just estimating, but I’d guess the body uses up at least half the available room. So, the concrete would only account for 550 lbs. Then, adding the body’s weight, you’re looking at roughly 750 lbs. I’ve seen hand trucks that can handle up to 800 lbs. So, this might actually be possible. Even so, I still think the guy is talking a load of sh*t.
RE: Fact #36 (Sam Amirante Changed Missing Child Laws) – A huge number of people still don’t get that there’s no longer any waiting period to report someone missing, especially for kids. If you have a good reason to think someone was taken or is gone because of a health issue, just call the police right away.
I really think more people should know about this. Parents usually have a good sense of their own children and whether they’d ever just take off.
RE: Fact #36 (Sam Amirante Changed Missing Child Laws) – It’s really great when a lawyer spots an issue in the system and actually takes action to fix it.
It’s not really a surprise that so many awesome activists and politicians used to be lawyers. They probably see so much sh*t that it gives them all the experience they need to understand how the system operates and then fix it.
RE: Fact #45 (Richard Kuklinski Missing Cement Barrel) – Apparently, his own family despised him so much they supposedly planned to poison him multiple times. But he’d always share some of his meals with their dog, which made them hesitate.
Oh, seriously? I was under the impression they weren’t aware he was a hitman, but it seems like that guy was just full of sh*t. Who knows, I bet he actually did murder a fair number of folks.
They weren’t aware of him killing people, but he certainly had a long, documented history of abusing his wife and daughters at home.
It strikes me as deeply meaningful that someone would consider poisoning a family member but then back out because they might harm their dog as well. I’m truly glad they weren’t willing to endanger the animal. They weren’t completely evil.
Honestly, I’m a bit surprised they didn’t just shoot him and then help each other hide it. If his entire family claims he accidentally shot himself while cleaning a firearm, it would be pretty tough to press charges for that.
RE: Fact #14 (Ted Bundy’s Revenge Romance Scheme) – If you can’t deal with me when I’m feeling super lazy, then you definitely don’t deserve me when I’m in full psychotic killer mode.
RE: Fact #1 (Donald Harvey’s Cyanide Nose Exposure) – Cyanide seriously has such a unique scent! There are these millipedes, you know, the ones that carry cyanide, and they sometimes totally overrun areas in Victoria, Australia. If you squish a bunch, you’ll actually catch the smell. Sometimes there are hundreds of them crawling around the floor at night, so it’s practically impossible not to step on them.
Hold on. People actually live in spots where the floors are totally swarming with bugs at night? Doesn’t that just absolutely freak them out? I swear, Antarctica sounds way better than dealing with that.
Australia totally feels like it’s just there for humans to prove they’re better than nature. Like, no matter how much deadly sh*t Australia throws at people, folks still go and build towns and all sorts of things there. If that doesn’t show how incredibly tough humanity is, then I’m not sure what does.
Okay, so when I was living in the Dominican Republic, our place was up on a hill. One night, I woke up because something tiny kept bumping my face. I reached out, turned on the light, and it was this shiny black millipede. I looked up and the whole ceiling was just covered, literally writhing with them! They were coming in through the window, climbing up the wall. It was pouring outside, and they were trying to escape the flooding. They’re totally harmless, but that glistening, squirming tangle of worm-like bodies still fu*king haunts me. Like, on the fu*king ceiling, for fu*k’s sake!
<blockquote><p>This species was accidentally introduced into Australia where it has since become an invasive pest.</p></blockquote> Yeah, obviously.
Honestly, for once, why can’t Australia be the one sending out invasive species? Picture drop bears running wild in North America, or kangaroos just chilling and hopping around the Serengeti.
Whoa, so is it actually dangerous if you end up stepping on too many of those things? I really don’t know much about cyanide, besides it being the usual ‘swallow it and you’re dead’ kind of poison. Could the fumes cause problems? Or is there just barely any cyanide in the millipedes themselves?
RE: Fact #13 (Jeffrey Dahmer’s Prison Gym Killing) – That guy probably earned a ton of respect in jail for that. It really makes you wonder why Dahmer was even with the general prison population to begin with.
Correctional officers probably wished him dead, for real. This kind of thing happens all the time. I’m not sure how well-known the Geoghan case is beyond Massachusetts, but his killing inside prison kicked off a big investigation. I mean, it’s not like I feel super sorry for any of these dudes, but what happened still isn’t right.
RE: Fact #30 (Hadj Mesfewi Walled Alive Execution) – After he was walled up, the crowd cheered every time they could hear him screaming inside. Mesfewi’s screams were heard for two full days before he finally fell silent on the third day.
Back before smartphones were a thing, people just took whatever kind of entertainment they could find.
RE: Fact #7 (Zodiac Killer’s 51-Year Cipher) – Honestly, even now, I’m beginning to wonder if Zodiac just totally made up a bunch of sh*t and managed to trick everyone into believing it actually had some deep meaning.
Nah, I don’t really think he had that kind of creative mind. He just cared about feeling more significant than he actually was.
So he wasn’t smart enough to just fake his way into remaining hidden, but he was brilliant enough to create a completely impossible code?