In 1963, forensic psychologist John Macdonald published a paper theorizing that childhood acts of animal cruelty, starting fires and chronic bedwetting could predict who would become a serial killer. Eventually researchers debunked the theory, known as the Macdonald Triad, yet it remained part of serial killer mythology for years.
Today, other myths about serial murderers persist in the public mind.
Myth: Very Few Serial Killers Are Women
Marissa Harrison, a Penn State psychology professor and the author of Just as Deadly: The Psychology of Female Serial Killers, says one out of six serial killers is female, which seems to mirror general homicide trends. She also notes that a whopping 39 percent of women who kill worked in nursing or healthcare.
Female serial killers have been around for just as long as male ones. In the early 20th century, Belle Gunness poisoned and dismembered at least a dozen and possibly scores of victims at her Indiana farmhouse In the 1980s, Aileen Wuornos drew national attention for killing at least seven men on the highways of Florida.
[Stream Invisible Monsters: Serial Killers in America in the A&E app.]
Harrison tells A&E True Crime female serial killers may initially go unnoticed due to how they typically kill. “[When] somebody is dying via poison, you might not recognize that this was a murder at first,” she says.
Gender stereotypes may also play a role in these murderers escaping attention. “People don’t think that a woman is capable of doing this type of thing,” Harrison says.
Myth: Serial Killers Are Almost Always White
The words “serial killer” often evoke the image of white men like John Wayne Gacy, Ted Bundy or Jeffrey Dahmer. Mass media has long reinforced that white male archetype, both in its true-crime coverage as well as through popular culture characters like Norman Bates, Hannibal Lecter and Dexter.
Yet just as not all serial killers are male, not all are white.
In 2008, the FBI updated its definition of serial killing to: “The unlawful killing of two or more victims by the same offender(s) in separate events.” Under this definition, contract murderers and some perpetrators of gang violence are also considered serial killers.
According to the U.S. Department of Justice’s National Gang Center’s most recent national gang survey, law enforcement agencies have reported that 46 percent of gang members around the country are Hispanic/Latino, 35 percent are African American, 11.5 percent are white and 7 percent fall into other races and ethnicities.
In the seventh edition of Serial Murderers and Their Victims, Eric Hickey, who teaches forensic psychology at Walden University, writes, “Based upon the FBI definition of a serial killer, between 2004 and 2014, controlling for race and gender, 50% of all male serial killers in the United States were African American.”
Enzo Yaksic, founder of the Atypical Homicide Research Group and author of Killer Data: Modern Perspectives on Serial Murder, tells A&E True Crime via email, “African Americans are certainly overrepresented among the serial murder offender population. It is not that there are more African American serial murderers today, but rather a wider acknowledgment that they exist, which led to an artificial increase in their numbers over the years.”
Hickey also writes, “The rise in African American serial killers is also directly related to how the FBI now defines serial murder.”
However, Black female serial killers, specifically, are extremely rare.
Serial murderers of other races are also infamous across the world.
In the 1990s, Ángel Maturino Reséndiz, the Railroad Killer, murdered people near railroad tracks across the U.S. From 1984 to ’85, Richard Ramirez, the Night Stalker, killed people in California. China has seen “Monster Killer” Yang Xinhai, who took more than 60 lives in the early 2000s. In the 1980s, Charles Ng, who was born in Hong Kong, killed multiple people in California along with a partner, Leonard Lake.
Myth: A Profile Is Necessary to Catch a Serial Killer
When police suspect a serial killer may be at work, they sometimes ask criminal investigative analysts (also known as criminal profilers) to develop a profile of the murderer. However, Peter Valentin, a professor at the University of New Haven and a retired Connecticut state police detective, tells A&E True Crime the profile may be of limited use to an investigation.
“If we’re looking for a white male between 20 and 40, who has a secondary education, what do I do with that information? It’s so nonspecific…it doesn’t really help.”
“Ultimately, I need to establish their guilt through physical evidence,” Valentin adds. “The more unusual the connection between your victim and your offender, the more you need physical evidence or other documentation.”
Profiling can even send investigators in the wrong direction.
While on the hunt for the elusive “Unabomber,” the FBI believed their target was a young white man who was college-aged, possibly a blue-collar worker who was adept with tools. Theodore Kaczynski, who was in his 30s when the Unabomber first struck in 1978, and who enrolled at Harvard at 16, was initially dismissed as a suspect. According to the New York Times, “For years, agents dreaded the endless assignment [of searching for the bomber]. Computer searches turned up little because agents focused on men 10 years younger than Kaczynski.
In 1984, Gary Ridgway, the Green River Killer, sent an anonymous letter to the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. At the time, a profiler from the FBI declared the letter writer “has no connection with the Green River homicides.”
Myth: All Serial Murderers Engage in Rituals and Escalate Their Crimes
Fictional serial killers are often portrayed in books, TV shows and movies as leaving behind a signature each time they kill. Their kills are typically shown as progressing in severity.
Reality doesn’t fit this pattern.
“The notion that offenders leave unique signatures at every scene is not supported by the data,” writes Louis Schlesinger, a psychology professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, in his co-authored 2010 paper, “Ritual and Signature in Serial Sexual Homicide.” “Although almost all the offenders in our sample engaged in some form of ritualistic behavior, they rarely engaged in exactly the same behavior at every murder.”
Schlesinger tells A&E True Crime, “We found in our research 70 percent of serial sexual murderers experiment at a crime scene. They do something different with one victim that they didn’t do with the other victims in their series.”
According to Schlesinger, one third of the time a killer will stage a different attack on an early victim, one third of the time it will be a middle victim and one third of the time the killer’s varying form of attack will be on a victim at the end of their series of murders.
Myth: There Is a ‘Typical’ Serial Killer
Schlesinger says, “The type of serial killer that we know most about and that most research is done on is the serial sexual murderer…where the murder itself is sexually motivated.”
Yet there are many other kinds of serial murderers. Medical personnel have killed patients in their care. Other serial killers have been motivated by money or for political reasons.
“There’s a world of difference between a serial sexual murderer like the Boston Strangler [Albert DeSalvo] versus a contract killer doing it for money,” Schlesinger says.
“Serial murder typologies are in desperate need of a serious review by modern serial murder researchers to bring them more in line with the reality of who these offenders are today and how they operate in the modern age,” Yaksic says.
Myth: Serial Killers Are Criminal Geniuses
Schlesinger says, “The American public wants their serial killers to be evil geniuses, with IQs of 160 that speak five languages, including Aramaic, that are connoisseurs of fine wine. Nothing could be further from the truth.”
“The Green River Killer [Gary Ridgway]…his IQ was 81,” Schlesinger adds. “Even the ones [who] went to college—which is rare, like BTK [Dennis Rader] or Ted Bundy—they didn’t use their intelligence in any significant way that I could determine.”
“The majority of serial murderers are not exceptional or unique, but rather run-of-the-mill hometown losers,” Yaksic says. “They are not infallible charming killing machines who are experts in remaining one step ahead of law enforcement.”
Mwaka 1963, mwanasaikolojia John Macdonald alitoa utafiti wa kugundua kwamba watoto wanaotumia wanyama vibaya, kuwasha moto na kunyunyizia kitandani mara nyingi, wanaweza kutabiri ni nani atakayekuwa muuaji wa mfululizo. "Hata hivyo, kwa miaka mingi, watu wengi wamekuwa wakidai kwamba kuna ""Macdonald Triad"" - hadithi ya mauaji ya mfululizo." Leo, hadithi nyingine kuhusu wauaji wa mfululizo zinaendelea kuwaziwa na watu wengi. "Marissa Harrison, profesa wa saikolojia wa Chuo Kikuu cha Penn State na mwandishi wa ""Just as Deadly: The Psychology of Female Serial Killers"" anasema kwamba mmoja kati ya wauaji sita wa mfululizo ni mwanamke, ambayo inaonekana kutafakari mwelekeo wa jumla wa mauaji." Kwa mujibu wa ripoti hiyo, asilimia 39 ya wanawake wanaouawa wanafanya kazi katika huduma za afya. Wauaji wa mfululizo wa wanawake wamekuwapo kwa muda mrefu kama wale wa kiume. Belle Gunness aliua watu kadhaa katika shamba lake la Indiana, Marekani, mwaka 1980 na kuua watu saba katika barabara kuu za Florida. [Stream Invisible Monsters: Serial Killers in America katika programu ya A&E.] Harrison anasema A&E True Crime wanawake wauaji wa mfululizo wanaweza mwanzoni kwenda bila kuonekana kutokana na jinsi wanavyoua kawaida. "Wakati mtu anakufa kutokana na sumu, huenda usitambue kwamba hii ilikuwa mauaji mwanzoni", anasema. Huenda pia mitazamo ya kijinsia ikawa na matokeo katika kuepuka kuangaliwa kwa wauaji hao. "Watu hawafikiri kwamba mwanamke anaweza kufanya jambo kama hili", Harrison anasema. Hadithi: Wauaji wa mfululizo ni karibu daima nyeupe Maneno <unk>muaji wa mfululizo<unk> mara nyingi huamsha picha ya wanaume weupe kama John Wayne Gacy, Ted Bundy au Jeffrey Dahmer. "Mashabiki wengi wa habari wamekuwa wakionyesha ""mwanamume mweupe"" kwa muda mrefu, kwa njia ya habari za uhalifu wa kweli na pia kupitia wahusika wa utamaduni maarufu kama Norman Bates, Hannibal Lecter na Dexter." Hata hivyo, kama vile wauaji wote wa mfululizo si wanaume, hivyo pia si watu wote weupe. "Kama ilivyoelezwa katika ufafanuzi wa FBI wa mauaji ya mfululizo, ""mauaji ya haramu ya watu wawili au zaidi na mhalifu mmoja katika matukio tofauti"" ni ""mauaji ya mfululizo"" na ""mauaji ya mfululizo"" ni ""mauaji ya mfululizo.""" Kulingana na uchunguzi wa hivi karibuni wa Shirika la Usalama la Marekani, shirika la National Gang Center, asilimia 46 ya washiriki wa magenge nchini humo ni wa asili ya Hispania, asilimia 35 ni wa asili ya Afrika, asilimia 11.5 ni wazungu na asilimia 7 ni wa jamii nyingine. "Kutokana na ufafanuzi wa FBI wa ""muaji wa mfululizo,"" kati ya 2004 na 2014, 50% ya wauaji wote wa kiume nchini Marekani walikuwa Waafrika-Wamarekani, ""Enzo Yaksic, mwanzilishi wa Atypical Homicide Research Group na mwandishi wa Killer Data: Modern Perspectives on Serial Murder, anaelezea A&E True Crime kupitia barua pepe." "Hakuna shaka kwamba kuna wauaji wengi wa mfululizo wa Kiafrika-Amerika leo, lakini ni utambuzi mkubwa kwamba wapo, ambao umesababisha ongezeko la bandia la idadi yao kwa miaka mingi. ""Hickey pia anaandika, ""Kuongezeka kwa wauaji wa mfululizo wa Kiafrika-Amerika pia kuna uhusiano wa moja kwa moja na jinsi FBI sasa inafafanua mauaji ya mfululizo." Wauaji wa mfululizo wa jamii nyingine pia wana sifa mbaya ulimwenguni pote. "Mwisho wa miaka ya 1990, Angel Maturino Resendiz, ""Mwuaji wa Reli,"" aliua watu karibu na reli kote Marekani, na kutoka 1984 hadi 1985, Richard Ramirez, ""Mwuaji wa Usiku,"" aliua watu huko California." "Mtu aliyejulikana kama ""Monster Killer"" Yang Xinhai aliua watu zaidi ya 60 nchini China mwaka wa 2000." Charles Ng, ambaye alizaliwa Hong Kong, aliua watu kadhaa huko California pamoja na mshirika wake Leonard Lake. "Mfano: ""Uchunguzi wa mauaji ya kikatili"" ni mbinu ya kugundua mauaji ya kikatili, na wakati mwingine polisi huomba wachambuzi wa uchunguzi wa jinai (wanaojulikana pia kama profilers za jinai) kuunda maelezo ya mauaji." Peter Valentin, profesa katika Chuo Kikuu cha New Haven na mtafiti wa polisi wa jimbo la Connecticut, anasema kwamba maelezo hayo yanaweza kuwa na matumizi madogo kwa uchunguzi. """Kama tunatafuta mtu mweupe mwenye umri wa miaka 20 hadi 40 ambaye ana elimu ya sekondari, nifanye nini na habari hiyo?" Ni hivyo nonspecific... ni kweli haina kusaidia. <unk> <unk> Mwishowe, mimi haja ya kuanzisha hatia yao kwa njia ya ushahidi wa kimwili, <unk> Valentin anaongeza. "Kama uhusiano kati ya mhasiriwa na mhalifu wako ni wa ajabu zaidi, ndivyo unavyohitaji ushahidi wa kimwili au nyaraka nyingine. "" "" Profiling inaweza hata kuwapeleka wachunguzi katika mwelekeo mbaya." Wakati wa kuwinda Unabomber, FBI ilidhani lengo lao lilikuwa kijana mweupe ambaye alikuwa na umri wa chuo kikuu, labda mfanyakazi wa bluu-collar ambaye alikuwa na ustadi na zana. Theodore Kaczynski, ambaye alikuwa na umri wa miaka 30 wakati Unabomber ilipopiga kwa mara ya kwanza mnamo 1978, na ambaye alijiandikisha katika Chuo Kikuu cha Harvard akiwa na umri wa miaka 16, awali aliachiliwa kama mtuhumiwa. Kulingana na gazeti la New York Times, <unk>Kwa miaka mingi, maofisa walihofu mgawo usio na mwisho [wa kumtafuta mshambuliaji]. "Kutumia kompyuta, polisi walipata ""watu wadogo"" ambao walikuwa na umri mdogo kuliko Kaczynski." Gary Ridgway, mwuaji wa Green River, aliandika barua kwa Seattle Post-Intelligencer. "Mwanzoni mwa mwaka wa 2001, FBI ilitangaza kwamba mwandishi wa barua hiyo ""hakuwa na uhusiano wowote na mauaji ya Green River"" na kwamba ""wauaji wote wa mfululizo hufanya ibada na kupanua uhalifu wao"" na ""wauaji wa mfululizo wa uwongo mara nyingi huonyeshwa katika vitabu, vipindi vya televisheni na filamu kama kuacha saini kila mara wanapouua.""" Kwa kawaida mauaji yao huonekana kuwa yenye kasi zaidi. Ukweli haufanani na utaratibu huu. "Kama vile ilivyotangazwa na Louis Schlesinger, profesa wa saikolojia katika Chuo cha John Jay cha Haki ya Uhalifu, ""Hata ingawa karibu wahalifu wote katika sampuli yetu walifanya tabia fulani ya kidesturi, walishiriki katika tabia sawa katika mauaji yote.""" "Kulingana na Schlesinger, ""Katika theluthi moja ya wakati muuaji atafanya shambulio tofauti kwa mhasiriwa wa mapema, theluthi moja ya wakati itakuwa mhasiriwa wa kati na theluthi moja ya wakati muuaji wa aina tofauti ya shambulio atakuwa juu ya mhasiriwa mwishoni mwa mfululizo wao wa mauaji.""" "Kama vile Schlesinger alivyosema, ""Kuna aina ya muuaji wa mfululizo ambayo tunajua zaidi na ambayo utafiti mwingi umefanywa ni muuaji wa mfululizo wa kingono... ambapo mauaji yenyewe yana nia ya kingono.""" Wafanyakazi wa kitiba wamewaua wagonjwa waliowatunza. Wauaji wengine wa mfululizo wamechochewa na pesa au sababu za kisiasa. "Kuna tofauti kubwa sana kati ya muuaji wa ngono wa mfululizo kama vile Boston Strangler [Albert DeSalvo] na muuaji wa kukodisha anayefanya hivyo kwa ajili ya pesa", Schlesinger anasema. "Mifano ya mauaji ya mfululizo inahitaji sana ukaguzi mkubwa na watafiti wa kisasa wa mauaji ya mfululizo ili kuileta zaidi kulingana na ukweli wa ni nani wahalifu hawa leo na jinsi wanavyofanya kazi katika enzi ya kisasa, ""Yaksic anasema." "Mfano wa Schlesinger ni ""Serial Killers Are Criminal Geniuses"" ambao ni wauaji wa kawaida wa kibinadamu wenye IQ ya 160 na wanazungumza lugha tano, ikiwa ni pamoja na Kiaramu." "Hakuna kitu kinaweza kuwa mbali zaidi na ukweli: ""The Green River Killer"" (Gary Ridgway) alikuwa na IQ ya 81." "Hata wale waliokwenda chuo kikuu, ambayo ni nadra, kama BTK [Dennis Rader] au Ted Bundy, hawakuitumia akili yao kwa njia yoyote muhimu ambayo ningeweza kuamua. "" Wengi wa wauaji wa mfululizo si wa kipekee au wa kipekee, lakini badala ya washindwa wa kawaida wa mji wa nyumbani, "Yaksic anasema. "Hawa si mashine za kuua zenye kuvutia ambazo ni wataalamu wa kubaki hatua moja mbele ya utekelezaji wa sheria".