/r/serialkillers

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Information and news about serial killers.

Welcome to r/SerialKillers. If you're new to the sub, please read this post.
  1. Rules
  2. Posts must be about serial killers or the subject of serial murder.
  3. Treat Users with Respect.
  4. No glorification. Please do not glorify serial killers or otherwise encourage violence.
  5. No backseat moderation. Use the report system
  6. No Self-promotion / Merchandise Links / Murderabilia. If you genuinely believe the users of this sub would be interested, you are welcome to message the mods and we'll review your request.
  7. Link Posts. All link / image posts require a submission comment to start the discussion. Images must be high quality. No memes. See full rules for more info.
  8. No Reposts. Please search before posting. We accept that they are a fact of life, but please make an attempt to avoid them.. Serial reposters (three or more items) can be banned.
  1. Definitions:
  2. Current FBI definition of a serial killer: Two or more separate incidents by the same offender.
  3. Mass murderers kill two or more people in one incident in one location.
  4. Spree killers kill two or more in one incident in two or more locations without a cooling-off period.
  5. Posts about figures that don't match the definition (Charles Manson, Jim Jones, hitmen, gangsters, mobsters, soldiers etc.) will be removed.
  1. Related subs:
  2. /r/RedditCrimeCommunity
  3. /r/TrueCrime
  4. /r/TrueCrimeDiscussion
  5. /r/CrimeScene
  6. /r/MysteryMedia
  7. /r/gratefuldoe
  8. /r/EARONS
  9. /r/morbidquestions
  10. /r/Crime_documentaries
  11. /r/ZodiacKiller
  12. /r/Creepy
  13. /r/MorbidReality
  14. /r/UnresolvedMysteries
  15. /r/CreepyEncounters
  16. /r/CrimeMugshots
  17. /r/forensics
  18. /r/classichorror
  19. /r/HorrorReviewed
  20. /r/LISKiller
  21. /r/masskillers
  22. /r/Jessicamshannon
  23. /r/RedheadMurders
  1. Recommended Podcasts:
  2. Unresolved
  3. The Serial Killer Podcast
  4. Last Podcast on the Left
  5. Thinking Sideways
  6. Generation Why
  7. Sword and Scale
  8. True Murder
  9. My Favorite Murder
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(Special thanks to /u/boschandvrij)


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/r/serialkillers

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1

Douglas Batista confessed that he killed at least 8 children between 1992 and 2003, according to which he got excited watching them drown

Douglas's victims were: his stepdaughter Vanessa, 12 years old: Baptista's stepdaughter, disappeared on October 21, 1992. Body was never found

Fabiana Silva dos Santos, 9 years old: disappeared on February 11, 1994. Body was never found

Sabrina, 10 years old, disappeared on June 26, 1994. Kidnapped while going to school and Leandro (Sabrina's cousin), 9 years old: disappeared on the same day along with Sabrina

Luana Elias Inácio, 9 years old, was killed on March 21, 1996 and her body was found in a river in the city of Praia Grande two days later

Priscila Elias Inácio (Luana's sister), 8 years old: died on October 20, 1997. Body found in an inlet of the sea in São Vicente;

Nathaly Ribeiro, 5 years old: killed on December 29, 2003 with Najila, body located in the Mambu river, in Itanhaém, there was Douglas's semen in her, Najila de Jesus, 5 years old, was killed on 29 at the same time, body located in the Mambu river, in Itanhaém.

Modus operandi: he knew the victims and then he took them in his truck for a walk or for sweets he then tied them up, the police confirmed rape in one of the victims (the others due to the state of the body it was not possible to establish) and played they were always alive in a river, mangrove or sea and then he watched them die.

Trauma: This was due to a trauma in which he was thrown into a swimming pool and almost drowned as a child. He said he had no remorse, and that he threw them in alive because it gave pleasure to see them drown.

Possible additional victims: there were two hiatuses in 11 years, one in 1993 and another in 1998 and 2002. During this period he was out of the city, living in Porto Alegre in the early 90s and in cities in the interior during the 5-year period without deaths.

Prison: he was arrested after witnesses identified his truck in the double murder at Christmas, and his DNA hit Nathaly's body with semen. He was then imprisoned for more than 10 years, until he was released to be released due to the 10 years without trial, later in 2013 he was sentenced to 18 for one of the crimes but was not located until December 2015, he was later convicted again for one of the double homicides and his current sentence is 30 years.

https://www1.folha.uol.com.br/fsp/cotidian/ff1903200415.htm

https://www.gazetasp.com.br/policia/maniaco-de-sao-vicente-douglas-baptista-serial-killer/1147231/

0 Comments
2025/01/31
21:00 UTC

17

What old school serial killers are still alive besides Gary Ridgway?

I’m absolutely floored that Ridgway is still alive!!!

What other old school serial killers are still alive?

55 Comments
2025/01/31
19:58 UTC

13

Were there any serial killers that could be considered successful in life?

It seems like most serial killers were average at best or losers.

Were there any successful people that became serial killers?

Any high earning medical professionals or attorneys or anybody worth a damn that became serial killers?

36 Comments
2025/01/31
18:52 UTC

9

Has any serial killer ever described what life is like after killing repeatedly?

I once read an article stating that serial killers live in constant paranoia throughout their criminal lives, never finding peace of mind. I would like to ask if this is true—has any serial killer ever described the feeling?

3 Comments
2025/01/31
15:11 UTC

2

Was Israel Keyes smarter than Gary Ridgway?

I’ve heard some say that Keyes was a genius and some say that he was a dumbass just like other serial killers like Ridgway and BTK.

What’s the truth?!

Using Samantha’s debit card was some stupid shit I would expect some dumbass like Gary Ridgway to do.

Is Keyes on the same intelligence level as Gary Ridgway?

36 Comments
2025/01/31
13:48 UTC

0

Zodiac=Monster of Florence?

Tell me your theories about Zodiac, Monster of Florence and if you think it about Zodiac=Monster of Florence

1 Comment
2025/01/30
17:23 UTC

0

Why did Israel Keyes allegedly murder that elderly couple inside their home?

What did he have to gain from doing that?

When he murdered Samantha he did it for sexual reasons.

I’m going to assume he didn’t rape that elderly couple even though I guess it’s possible since he was a sick fuck to say the least.

Why did he murder that elderly couple for no reason?

50 Comments
2025/01/27
06:30 UTC

48

Do serial killers work up strong enough emotions to kill strangers? Do they have or induce in themselves strong feelings about strangers? How, or how do they do it?

I have read sometimes the stranger victim substitutes for someone in their life they actually do have strong feelings about. Or maybe they don't have strong emotions about the stranger, they just want to kill the easiest victim. In some cases the victims definitely aren't strangers, they do know them to some degree or at least maybe have spent some hours with them before they victimize them.

32 Comments
2025/01/26
16:08 UTC

177

Cases where killers let their victims go?

David Parker and Cindy Handy captured some local girl. This was at the time, when he captured girls for years, was the head of his satanic church, started killing victims and made snuff films. She was raped, whipped and (lightly) tortured for several days. Somehow the girl persuaded Ray to let her go. After talking with Cindy he agreed and she was let free. He told her that the whole thing would never happen because he liked her and she was "so sweet". Mind you that it was after Ray made his famous tape when he said that begging is useless. He didn't drug her and didn't use his famous memory snatcher technics. Girl immedietely went to the police but the police officer didn't believe her.

30 Comments
2025/01/25
12:13 UTC

46

Serial killers who participated in historical atrocities?

Discussion of people labelled "serial killers" in popular culture and on this sub is almost exclusively confined to cases in which individuals killed for personal, psychological reasons rather than ideological, financial, or professional ones. Some would quibble over this constituting an exclusive definition, but it doesn't really matter, clearly most people view these types of killers as being distinct from the likes of contract killers, war criminals and terrorists, and I tend to agree.

But I wonder are there any noteworthy cases of serial killers who did both? Individuals who killed for personal psychological reasons, totally on their own initiative, who then ended up committing a separate set of murders for some sort of larger cause?

I know that William Bonin served in the US military during the Vietnam war, and later described his experiences there as forming the basis for his cynical worldview. However, there's little of any specific information regarding the nature of his service and no evidence he ever committed anything constituting a war crime.

Richard Kuklinski, who was proven to have committed 5 murders of his own volition, claimed to have been a hitman for the mafia, but these claims have been largely debunked and if he did do any contract killings, no solid evidence to support this has ever emerged.

I distinctly remember an anecdote of a former serial killer serving in the notorious Nazi "Dirlewanger Brigade" during WW2, but I can't find anything about this online.

Any specific cases that stand out?

18 Comments
2025/01/25
05:55 UTC

49

Psychology of Israel Keyes

Hi all,

I’ve recently been listening to True Crime Bullsh** as well as reading some books on the serial killer Israel Keyes. I’ve always been interested in true crime and particularly the psychology of serial killers. Serial killers terrify me but I think learning how they came to be gives me some peace in feeling like we can prevent others from turning to that in the future. I hope that makes sense.

Does anyone know of any podcasts or books that delve into more of the psychological aspects of Keyes with specifics into his childhood? I find his case so complex because while I feel like he was a psychopath and a monster I do think he was capable of loving his daughter and his family. I believe he was born a psychopath but things from his childhood pushed him towards becoming a serial killer. I also think he struggled with what he was throughout his life even though he didn’t have any regrets/remorse for what he did.

I hope this doesn’t sound like I’m sympathizing with Keyes because he made a choice to become a serial killer and did some of the most horrific things I’ve ever seen but I think I do sympathize with him as a child growing up as a psychopath and not having anyone to relate to beside the serial killers in the books he’d read.

I’d love to hear others take on this and if you have any resources for podcasts or books that addresses the psychology of Israel Keyes.

The books I’ve read are American Predator and Devil in the darkness.

35 Comments
2025/01/23
17:47 UTC

2

Conscious

I don’t know if this is the right sub reddit for this. Do you think that most serial killers do what they do because they are missing their consciousness. You can’t really tell who has a conscious or not due to lack of information on how you have or don’t have one. Most serial killers committing acts like this is mostly blamed on them having a “bad” childhood but in some cases they also have a good upbringing so that leads to the ones that had a bad childhood they could’ve developed anxiety and been scared to commit any of these crimes but if you don’t have a conscious you wouldn’t care about what other peoples opinions on what’s right or not some killers don’t care about being caught . (And yes i know anxiety is different for people) and other killers also leave clues meaning that they DONT care as much and those are the ones that are mostly doing the most messed up things.(every killing is bad tho) what do you guys think am i dumb

12 Comments
2025/01/23
06:44 UTC

44

David Brooks' role in the Houston mass murders (Corll/Henley)

I have been finding references for a number of years to the fact that Brooks has been pitching Henley the idea of the murder of girls. For the most part, however, the sources seemed unverified to me. But in Katherine Ramsland's recent book, co-authored with Ullman, it is mentioned in Henley's words: “David wanted girls; I couldn't do that” (p. 145), and in Tracy Ullman's article there is mention of this phrase: “whereas Brooks fully intended on continuing serial murder and had discussed specific female victims with Henley he wanted to pursue”. In this regard, I would like to start a general discussion about Brooks' role in HMM case, as well as the possibility that he may have been working alone. Overall, I find it extremely disturbing that this information only came to light after Brooks' death. I would also note that Henley's statements about Brooks are very reminiscent of Wayne's words from his first confession (“Dean told me about a Warehouse that he had over on Hiram Clarke where he had killed some boys and buried them after he had sex with them”), which hints that this talk about “specific female victims” may have been more than just talk.

Does anyone have any additional information or thoughts on this?

5 Comments
2025/01/19
15:02 UTC

162

BTK first murders

51 years ago on January 15, 1974 BTK killed first four victims: Joseph, Julie, Joey and Josephine. May their souls rest in peace.

Joseph and Julie Otero, along with two of their children, Josephine and Joseph II, were murdered by Dennis Rader, known as the "BTK" (Bind, Torture, Kill) killer, on January 15, 1974, in their home in Wichita, Kansas. Rader, who was a serial killer active from 1974 to 1991, targeted the Otero family in what became his first known killings. He entered their home by cutting the phone line and used a gun to control the family, telling them he was a wanted criminal needing food, money, and a car. He then bound and strangled Joseph Otero, Julie Otero, and their son Joseph II. Josephine was taken to the basement where she was hanged from a pipe. Rader admitted to deriving sexual gratification from these acts, particularly from Josephine's murder. The surviving Otero children, Charlie, Carmen, and Danny, came home from school to discover the tragedy. Rader was eventually caught in 2005 after resuming communication with the police, leading to his conviction on ten counts of first-degree murder, including the Otero family's murder.

20 Comments
2025/01/16
03:00 UTC

39

Best deduction or clever moments?

Hello,

I'm curious what people's favorite moments of real investigations are. For example, some great ones for me are:

In the Russell Williams interrogation, they bluffed a confession by claiming that his tire tracks were found, and that tire track forensics is as good as fingerprinting (lie). In reality, the tire tracks had numerous other potential matches and likely would not hold up in court. Then they proceed with asking for his shoeprints and make the same claim, about shoeprints. Using this 'hard evidence' they get a confession.

Or in the Ratcliffe murders, the main suspect was convicted because of (from wikipedia): he had had an opportunity to take the maul, that he had money after the murders but not before, that he had returned to his room just after the killer had fled the second crime scene, and that he had had bloody and torn shirts [and also a set of bloody footprints led to a witness who gives a matching description].

Or Albert Fish sending a letter with an envelope that has a watermark, and an employee from the watermarked company says they left some of those at a hotel room he rented out. From here they found that albert fish also rented out that room, leading to his interrogation and capture.

I'm interested in more 'deduction' type moments or just generally cool things I guess.

Thanks

21 Comments
2025/01/14
20:29 UTC

63

Rodney Alcala

Rodney, "Rod" Alcala is suspected to have more then the 7 murders (I believe that's the amount) he was convicted of. What do you all think?

I assume he has more based on pictures found in Washington and the earrings. No one allows someone (male, older) to take their earrings off that they don't know.

Also, it might just be me but I feel like he evaded capture for awhile without being caught. I saw an interview about a person who got raped by him* and she never reported it ( others probably didn't report it as well though)so maybe that's why.

*; however, I don't have any evidence to support the claim and because of that I must approach it with skepticism, please look up her story if interested because it is quite the interesting story.

45 Comments
2025/01/13
19:57 UTC

391

Serial killers urges in prison

I very rarely if ever have heard of a serial killer that continues to kill in prison. Does their compulsion to kill go away or do the constraints of prison temper them somehow? You would think there’d be more stories of attempts to murder at the very least

150 Comments
2025/01/07
15:02 UTC

27

Did HH Holmes use booby traps?

I'm playing The Pictures Anthology: The Devil In Me and just got to the part with the trap door with the spikes. Anyway this one covers HH Holmes and this is my first The Dark Pictures Anthology story play and I would imagine they might just be doing inspired by real events with some exaggeration. Anyway I thought HH Holmes would just gas your hotel and kill you that way but this whole using a trap door is something I don't think I've heard of when researching HH Holmes.

20 Comments
2025/01/07
14:44 UTC

79

Rarely Referred to as Serial Killers.

I’m reading a book I picked up in a local charity shop. Published in 1973, Burke & Hare: The True Story of the BodySnatchers by Hugh Douglas is a serious, but not academically dry, historical account of the infamous duo of resurrectionists who were at large in my hometown of Edinburgh in the early 19th Century.

To my shame, I had assumed they were grave-robbers, plundering the newly dug graves of Greyfriars Kirkyard in order to sell the relatively fresh corpses to the local medical community, particularly the celebrated physician and lecturer Dr Robert Knox.

This is a myth. William Burke and William Hare were straight-up murderers, their victims being plucked from the flotsam and jetsam of the local Old Town underclass, most of them piss-poor and usually chronic alcoholics who would not be missed. In 1828 they killed 16 people, inclusive of a deaf-mute young boy, for this purpose yet their diabolical legacy in popular culture is that of grave-robbers (their first ‘body’ was removed from a grave but according to the records the rest were not - one was almost served up on a - metaphorical -plate by a local policemen).

Also, in a recent newspaper article I read about a ‘real-life Hannibal Lecter’ type killer being held in an underground, ‘specially built’ glass cage at Wakefield Prison, England by the name of Robert Maudsley. A seriously disturbed yet apparently highly intelligent man who has killed 4 people, 3 whilst in custody.

It got me to thinking if there are any others who slip under the serial-killer categorisation having killed 3 or more victims. This would appear to be as knowledgable a community as it gets so hopefully it can unearth some more little known possibilities.

(I’m not including mass killers, likes of school-shooters, bombers, spree-killers and/or terrorists; Klebold and Harris, McVey, Kaczynski, Breivik et-al).

24 Comments
2025/01/07
01:57 UTC

352

Why don’t serial killers dispose of bodies better?

I understand, some get off to having a corpse, some are necrophilists (I apologize if I spelled that word wrong), some love the idea of killing someone and treasuring it. However, why don’t they COMPLETELY dispose of the body?

I don’t want to go into detail, but I’ve thought of so many ways serial killers could have disposed of bodies, ways they would NEVER get caught. I was very into true crime growing up, so I know how things go.

I just wonder, why do they care so much about the bodies? It’s a rotting corpse that has maggots fill inside, that will ruin your home. Why do they kill if they are too unintelligent to dispose of a body? I get psychosis and everything, but my point still stands, even the serial killers with very high IQ’s did it horribly.

259 Comments
2025/01/05
00:32 UTC

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