Jack the Ripper
"Ripper Strikes Again" Newspaper Badge

This is a Metal Enamel Badge thats show a man in a black top hat. Jack himself? 
Reading a newspaper with the headline "Ripper Strikes Again"

The back has 2 pins to hold it securely

Dimensions  - 32mm x 30mm

In Excellent Condition

A Must for all Horror Fans.
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The Jack The Ripper 1888 logo

However, there were 11 murders in the series of crimes that were officially known as "The Whitechapel Murders."
Tuesday , Apr 16 , 2024 Site Author and Publisher Richard Jones Our Jack The Ripper TV Channel
A photograph of the White Hart Pub on Whitechapel High StreetWELCOME TO
JACK THE RIPPER - 1888
UNCOVER THE FULL STORY
The Whitechapel Murders Online History Resource
Looking into Mitre Square at the Catherine Eddowes murder site.
VOTE FOR JACK THE RIPPER
Cast Your Vote For Your Favoured Suspect
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TRY OUR QUIZZES
Test Your Knowledge Of Jack The Ripper
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INTRODUCTIONPart 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4
A view of Christchurch, Spitalfields by night.THE AUTUMN OF TERROR
ByRichard Jones
An Introduction To The Whitechapel Murders
JACK THE RIPPER 1888
The Jack the Ripper murders occurred in the East End of London in 1888 and, although the Whitechapel Murderer was only a threat to a very small section of the community in a relatively small part of London, the crimes had a huge impact on society as a whole.

Indeed, by focusing the attention of the press and the public at large on the streets and people of one of London's poorest and most crime-ridden quarters, Jack the Ripper, whoever he may have been, managed to expose the sordid underbelly of Victorian society and, in so doing, he helped create an awareness amongst the wealthier citizens of London of the appalling social conditions that had been allowed to develope, largely unchecked, right on the doorstep of the City of London, the wealthiest square mile on earth.

ABOUT THIS WEBSITE
On this website you can study all aspects of the Jack the Ripper murders and of Victorian crime in general, as well as learning about the history of the area in which the crimes occurred.

You can also study what the police were doing to try to catch the murderer and read about the public reactions to the crimes.

You can also cast your vote for the person that you think is the likeliest suspect.

Peruse Original Victorian Photos Relating To The Crimes, The Crime Scenes And The Victims.
The backyard of number 29 Hanbury Street.
Explore The Murder Sites As They Were Then And As They Are Now With Exclusive Online Videos.
Whitechapel High Street in 1890.
Witness History As It Happened With The Victorian Newspaper Cuttings Library.
An illustration showing Police Constable Watkins finding the body of Catherine Eddowes in Mitre Square.
Study The Police Investigation Into The Infamous Murder Spree.
A sketch of the corner in Mitre Square where the body of Catherine Eddowes was found.
Consider The Evidence, Both For And Against, The Many Suspects.
An illustration showing victim Elizabeth Stride with her suspected murderer.
Follow The Events As They Unfolded In 1888 With Our Timeline.
People in the kitchen of a Victorian common lodging house in Spitalfields.
Join The Conversation
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The Blog
For thought-provoking articles about the case and about the history of the East End of London we maintain a regularly updated blog about all things Jack the Ripper.

The blog covers many fascinating aspects of the case together with expert analysis on those aspects.

We feature the latest finds concerning the Whitechapel murders as well as various related topics on the area and on the history of London in general.

Most Recent Blogs
A newsboy in a cap holding a newspaper
April 11th, 2024
Those London Murders, 1888.
A newsboy in a cap holding a newspaper.
April 8th, 2024
An English Clergyman Arrested.
A newsboy in a cap holding a newspaper.
April 4th, 2024
Viewing The Body Of Mary Kelly.
A newsboy in a cap holding a newspaper.
March 29th, 2024
The Trafalgar Square Question
WATCH THE JACK THE RIPPER DOCUMENTARY

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The Victims Of Jack The Ripper
This documentary provides a full introduction to and a synopsis of the Whitechapel murders, which took place between April, 1888 and February, 1891.

With the aid of contemporary illustrations and photographs, the viewer is transported back to the autumn of terror to learn about the lives of the victims, see the locations where the Jack the Ripper murders occurred, and visit the cemeteries where the victims are buried.

The video makes for an excellent introduction to the case.

JACK THE RIPPER VICTIMS
HOW MANY VICTIMS WERE THERE?
One of the problems with ascertaining the exact number of victims that Jack the Ripper had is the fact that he was never caught, so it is difficult to ascertain an exact number of victims. The generic Whitechapel Murders file - the official name for the police investigation into the crimes - contains eleven victims, and it is generally believed that five of these were the work as the killer now known as "Jack the Ripper."

However, it should be stressed that the idea of there being a so-called "canonical five" victims is by no means certain. Indeed, many experts will tell you that there may have been as few as four victims or as many as eight victims of the ripper.

The list below is broken down into the "canonical five" Jack the Ripper victims; the generic Whitechapel murders victims, and other murders and attacks that took place in the area at the time which may, or may not, have been the work of Jack the Ripper.

The Canonical Five Victims
A newspaper illustration showing Police Constable Neil finding the body of Mary Nichols.
August 31st, 1888
Mary Nichols, Murdered In Buck's Row, Whitechapel.
A sketch showing the finding the body of Annie Chapman in the backyard of 29 Hanbury Street.
September 8th, 1888
Annie Chapman, Murdered In Hanbury Street, Spitalfields.
A newspaper sketch showing the finding of the body of Elizabeth Stride.
September 30th, 1888
Elizabeth Stride Murdered In Berner Street, Whitechapel.
A newspaper sketch showing PC Watkins finding the body of Catherine Eddowes in Mitre Square.
September 30th, 1888
Catherine Eddowes, Murdered In Mitre Square, City Of London.
Sketches of Miller's Court and Mary Kelly from the Illustrated Police News.
November 9th, 1888
Mary Kelly, Murdered In Dorset Street, Spitalfields.
Other Whitechapel Murders
A newspaper sketch showing Emma Smith being followed a a group of youths.
April 3rd, 1888
Emma Smith, Attacked, She Later Dies Of Her Injuries.
A newspaper sketch showing the discovery of the body of Martha Tabram.
August 7th, 1888
Martha Tabram, Murdered In George Yard, Whitechapel.
A newspaper illustration showing Rose Mylett in her coffin.
December 19th, 1888
Rose Mylett, Murdered In Clarke's Yard, Poplar.
A sketch showing the discovery of the body of Alice McKenzie.
July 17th, 1889
Alice McKenzie, Murdered In Castle Court, Whitechapel.
Newspaper sketches showing the finding of the Pinchin Street torso.
September 10th, 1889
Woman's Torso Found Under A Railway Arch In Pinchin Street.
A sketch showing the location of the murder of Frances Coles.
February 13th, 1891
Frances Coles, Murdered In Swallow Gardens, Whitechapel.
Other Attacks
A photograph of White's Row as it was at the time of the attack.
February 25th, 1888
Annie Milwood, Stabbed In White's Row, Spitalfields.
A newspaper sketch showing the attack on Ada Wilson.
March 28th, 1888
Ada Wilson, Attacked In Maidman Street, Mile End.
A newspaper sketch showing Annie Farmer just after the attack on her.
November 21st, 1888
Annie Farmer, Attacked In George Street, Whitechapel.
Read More
THE POLICE INVESTIGATION
The Punch Cartoon showing a blindfolded policeman being taunted by criminals.
Catch Me When You Can!
THE POLICE HUNT FOR JACK THE RIPPER
The Whitechapel murders were the focus of a huge criminal investigation that saw the Victorian police pit their wits against a lone assassin who was perpetrating his crimes in one of 19th century London's most densely populated and crime ridden quarters. As a result of official reports and the efforts of journalists to keep abreast of the progress (or, perhaps, more accurately, lack of progress) that the police investigation was making, we are able watch that investigation unfolding.

We can analyze the methods that the police used to try and track the killer and compare them with the methods that the police would use today. We can also ask - and hopefully answer - the question why didn't the police catch Jack the Ripper?

The Victorian police faced numerous problems as they raced against time to catch the killer before he could kill again.

A major one was the labyrinth-like layout of the area where the murders were occurring, made up as it was of lots of tiny passageways and alleyways, few of which were lit by night.

And, of course, the detectives hunting the killer were hampered by the fact that criminology and forensics were very much in their infancy.

Read More
THE JACK THE RIPPER SUSPECTS
The cartoon Nemesis of Neglect showing a shrouded phantom holding a knife with the word crime on its forehead.
Who Was Jack The Ripper?
AN EVER GROWING LIST
Despite the fact that no-one was ever brought to justice or charged with the crimes, there have, over the years, been more than a hundred named suspects who may or may not have been Jack the Ripper.

Some of those suspects are fascinating, whilst others are down right ridiculous.

Aaron Kosminski, Thomas Cutbush and Montague John Druitt are suspects that fall into the first category, whilst Prince Albert Edward Victor, the Freemasons and Lewis Carroll belong firmly in the latter category.

Yet, one thing is certain. No matter how unlikely the names of those that appear on the ever expanding list of suspects might be, the on going challenge of "nailing" the ripper has helped keep this series of crimes at the forefront of criminal and social history for over 125 years.

Read More
THE JACK THE RIPPER LETTERS
The Dear Boss Jack the Ripper letter.
Yours Truly Jack The Ripper
LETTERS FROM HELL
Another intriguing aspect of the case is the number of letters that were sent to the authorities that either purported to come from the killer or else offered suggestions on how the perpetrator of the atrocities might be brought to justice.

The most famous of all these letters, and the one that gave the murderer the name that has ensured the longevity of his legend, was the missive sent to the Central News Office in late September 1888.

This was the infamous Dear Boss Letter, that bore the chilling, though accurate, signature - Jack the Ripper.

Press coverage of this letter led to a veritable avalanche of similar correspondence that resulted in the police investigation almost being brought to melt down.

Yet, the likelihood is that the person responsible for the murders was not the same person who sent this letter. Indeed, it was believed by police officers at the time, and the majority of modern day experts are unanimously in agreement, that the letter was in fact the work of a journalist.

Read More
EAST END HISTORY
The window of 13 Miller's Court, inside which Mary Kelly was murdered.
Victorian Whitechapel And Spitalfields
A WINDOW ONTO THE PAST
The Jack the Ripper murders also serve as a reminder of a not too distant past when a whole section of London society fought a daily battle against poverty and starvation.

As such they provide us with a window through which we can look back on a bygone age when the eyes of the world were focused on the daily lives and struggles of the East Enders who were most affected by the crimes.

Thanks to newspaper reportage on the case, coupled with the records and musings of philanthropists and reformers who wished to bring the plight of the East End's poor to the attention of the wider Victorian society, we have an unrivalled opportunity to, literally, peer into the very streets where the Whitechapel Murders occurred at the time they were occurring and to observe the impact the killings had on those who dwelt in the area.

We can, quite literally, become spectators to events as they occurred and watch the mood in the streets change from mild unease to outright panic, as the ferocity of the murders increases and it becomes apparent that the police can do nothing to stop the unknown perpetrator.

Read More
THE PRESS
Some of the newspaper headlines about the Whitechapel murders.

INTERNATIONAL NEWSPAPER COVERAGE
One of the more intriguing aspects of the Jack the Ripper murders is the amount of worldwide newspaper coverage that they generated. Journalists converged on the streets of the East End to report on the murders, and were often appalled by the diabolical living conditions.

An illustration from a newspaper showing a Jack the Ripper suspect attacking a woman.

INQUESTS AND INTERVIEWS
Pages and pages were given over to reporting on the inquests into the deaths of the victims; local residents were interviewed at length; police officers were followed, and sometimes even bribed, as reporters endeavoured to secure that all too elusive exclusive that might help sell more newspapers.

A press illustration showing a blindfolded policeman.

PRESS CRITICISM
The authorities were subjected to a constant barrage of press criticism, both for the inability of the police to bring the killer to justice, and the appalling social conditions that they had allowed to develop unchecked right on the doorstep of the City of London, the wealthiest square mile on earth.

The Jack the Ripper signature on the Dear Boss letter.

A JOURNALIST'S INVENTION
Plus, most importantly, and as mentioned earlier, the name Jack the Ripper was most probably the invention of a journalist.

Read More
SOCIAL HISTORY
A phantom figure rows a boat on the River Thames.

THE VICTORIAN SOCIAL CONDITIONS
The Whitechapel murders certainly played a part in helping to highlight the social conditions in certain parts of the East End of London, where a vast underclass had been fighting a daily battle for survival with many of the inhabitants being forced to dwell in appalling living conditions.

A group of Victorian women picking oakum.

THE PLIGHT OF THE POOR
For many years, philanthropists and the socially concerned had been warning of the consequences that might ensue should something not be done to alleviate the hardships that were endured by the huge underclass that dwelt in the slums of Whitechapel and Spitalfields.

A group of Victorian children, with bare feet, look in a shop window.

BRED IN THE SLUMS
When the Jack the Ripper atrocities began to focus the attention of society at large on the living conditions of the people in the area where the crimes were occurring, many came to see the murderer as an inevitable outgrowth of the crime, vice and squalor that were all endemic in the district.

The Punch cartoon, The Nemesis of neglect, showing a hollow-eyed shrouded figure with a large knife.

THE PHYSICAL EMBODIMENT
Indeed, Jack the Ripper became the physical embodiment of widely held fears and prejudices about the East End of London.

Read More
THE EAST END TODAY
A photograph of the White Hart Pub on Whitechapel High Street.

ALMOST UNRECOGNISABLE
The East End of London today is almost unrecognisable from the East End of Jack the Ripper. Houses that in 1888 were infamous slum dwellings are now sought after residences that can sell for millions of pounds. What were once notorious back street boozers are now pricey gastro pubs.

An old East London house with a gaslamp over its front door.

TIME CAPSULES
Although the murders sites themselves have long since vanished, there are numerous streets and buildings that have survived and are still much as they were in the late 19th century. Many streets are true time-capsules, whilst some of the dark, cobbled alleyways can still feel menacing by night!.

The houses in Fournier Street as they are today.

OLD HOUSES AND PUBS
Streets such as Fournier Street, Princelet Street and Wilkes Street still possess a Victorian ambience that time and progress have not dispelled; whilst pubs such as the Ten Bells and the Hoop and Grapes would still be recognisable to a 19th century East Ender should they drop in for a pint.

Tour guide John Bennett gives a Jack the Ripper tour.

JACK THE RIPPER TOUR
You can, if you wish, explore these places on one of our popular tours that explore the streets of Jack the Ripper's London.

Read More
An image of a wall with frames on it.
RECORDS OFFICES
Locations At Which Records On The Jack The Ripper Case Are Kept.
Exhibits at the London Hospital Museum.
MUSEUMS AND EXHIBITIONS
Visit Museums And Exhibitions Associated With The Case.
Mitre Square in 2011.
TOUR THE MURDER SITES
Enjoy Our Online Video Tour Of The Murder Sites.
A female student reading a book by a bookcase.
ARE YOU STUDYING JACK THE RIPPER?
Ask Any Questions You May Have If You Are Studying The Case.
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BOOKS ON JACK THE RIPPER
A Recommended Reading List Of Books On The Case.
An old-fashioned typewriter.

Whitechapel murders

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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
A phantom brandishing a knife floats through a slum street
The "Nemesis of Neglect", an image of social destitution manifested as Jack the Ripper, stalks Whitechapel in a Punch cartoon of 1888 by John Tenniel
The Whitechapel murders were committed in or near the impoverished Whitechapel district in the East End of London between 3 April 1888 and 13 February 1891. At various points some or all of these eleven unsolved murders of women have been ascribed to the notorious unidentified serial killer known as Jack the Ripper.

Most, if not all, of the eleven victims—Emma Elizabeth Smith, Martha Tabram, Mary Ann "Polly" Nichols, Annie Chapman, Elizabeth Stride, Catherine Eddowes, Mary Jane Kelly, Rose Mylett, Alice McKenzie, Frances Coles, and an unidentified woman—were engaged in prostitution. Smith was sexually assaulted and robbed by a gang. Tabram was stabbed 39 times. Nichols, Chapman, Stride, Eddowes, Kelly, McKenzie and Coles had their throats cut. Eddowes and Stride were murdered on the same night, within approximately an hour and less than a mile apart; their murders are known as the "double event", after a phrase in a postcard sent to the press by an individual claiming to be the Ripper. The bodies of Nichols, Chapman, Eddowes and Kelly had abdominal mutilations. Mylett was strangled. The body of the unidentified woman was dismembered, but the exact cause of her death is unclear.

The Metropolitan Police, City of London Police, and private organisations such as the Whitechapel Vigilance Committee were actively involved in the search for the perpetrator or perpetrators. Despite extensive enquiries and several arrests, the culprit or culprits evaded capture, and the murders were never solved. The Whitechapel murders drew attention to the poor living conditions in the East End slums, which were subsequently improved. The enduring mystery of who committed the crimes has captured public imagination to the present day.

Background

Dorset Street, Spitalfields, seen here in 1902
In the late Victorian era, Whitechapel was considered to be the most notorious criminal rookery in London. The area around Flower and Dean Street was described as "perhaps the foulest and most dangerous street in the whole metropolis";[1] Dorset Street was called "the worst street in London".[2] Assistant Police Commissioner Robert Anderson recommended Whitechapel to "those who take an interest in the dangerous classes" as one of London's prime criminal "show places".[3] Robbery, violence and alcohol dependency were commonplace. The district was characterised by extreme poverty, sub-standard housing, poor sanitation, homelessness, drunkenness and endemic prostitution.[4] These factors were focused in the institution of the 233 common lodging-houses within Whitechapel, in which approximately 8,500 people resided on a nightly basis.[5]

The common lodging-houses in and around Whitechapel provided cheap communal lodgings for the desperate, the destitute and the transient, among whom the Whitechapel murder victims were numbered.[6] The nightly price of a single bed was 4d (equivalent to £1.98 in 2021)[7] and the cost of sleeping upon a "lean-to" rope stretched across the bedrooms was 2d for adults or children.[8]

All the identified victims of the Whitechapel murders lived within the heart of the rookery in Spitalfields, including three in George Street (later named Lolesworth Street), two in Dorset Street, two in Flower and Dean Street and one in Thrawl Street.[9]

Police work and criminal prosecutions at the time relied heavily on confessions, witness testimony, and apprehending perpetrators in the act of committing an offence or in the possession of obvious physical evidence that clearly linked them to a crime. Forensic techniques, such as fingerprint analysis, were not in use,[10] and blood typing had not been invented.[11] Policing in London was—and still is—divided between two forces: the Metropolitan Police with jurisdiction over most of the urban area, and the City of London Police with jurisdiction over about a square mile (2.9 km2) of the city centre. The Home Secretary, a senior minister of the British government, controlled the Metropolitan Police, whereas the City Police were responsible to the Corporation of London. Beat constables walked regular, timed routes.[12]

Eleven deaths in or near Whitechapel between 1888 and 1891 were gathered into a single file, referred to in the police docket as the Whitechapel murders.[13][14] Much of the original material has been stolen, lost, or destroyed.[13]

Victims and investigation
Emma Elizabeth Smith
Main article: Emma Elizabeth Smith
Map of about a dozen interconnecting London streets
Map of the Spitalfields rookery, where the victims lived. Emma Elizabeth Smith was attacked near the junction of Osborn Street and Brick Lane (red circle). She lived in a common lodging-house at 18 George Street (later named Lolesworth Street), one block west of where she was attacked.[15]
On Tuesday 3 April 1888, following the Easter Monday bank holiday, 45-year-old prostitute Emma Elizabeth Smith was assaulted and robbed at the junction of Osborn Street and Brick Lane, Whitechapel, in the early hours of the morning. Although injured, she survived the attack and managed to walk back to her lodging house at 18 George Street, Spitalfields. She told the deputy keeper, Mary Russell, that she had been attacked by two or three men, one of them a teenager. Russell took Smith to the London Hospital, where a medical examination revealed that a blunt object had been inserted into her vagina, rupturing her peritoneum. She developed peritonitis and died at 9:00 a.m. the following day.[16]

The inquest was conducted on 7 April by the coroner for East Middlesex, Wynne Edwin Baxter, who also conducted inquests on six of the later victims.[17] The local inspector of the Metropolitan Police, Edmund Reid of H Division Whitechapel, investigated the attack but the culprits were never caught.[18] Walter Dew, a detective constable stationed with H Division, later wrote that he believed Smith to be the first victim of Jack the Ripper,[19] but his colleagues suspected her murder was the work of a criminal gang.[20] Smith claimed that she was attacked by two or three men, but either refused to or could not describe them beyond stating one was a teenager.[21] East End prostitutes were often managed by gangs, and Smith could have been attacked by her pimps as a punishment for disobeying them, or as an act of intimidation.[22] She may not have identified her attackers because she feared reprisal. Her murder is considered unlikely to be connected with the later killings.[13][23]

Martha Tabram
Main article: Martha Tabram
Mortuary photograph of Tabram: a well-fed middle-aged woman
Martha Tabram, 39, lived in a lodging-house at 19 George Street.[24]
On Tuesday 7 August, following a Monday bank holiday, prostitute Martha Tabram was murdered at about 2:30 am. Her body was found at George Yard Buildings, George Yard, Whitechapel, shortly before 5:00 a.m. She had been stabbed 39 times about her neck, torso and genitals with a short blade. With one possible exception, all her wounds had been inflicted by a right-handed individual.[25]

On the basis of statements from a fellow prostitute, and PC Thomas Barrett who was patrolling nearby, Inspector Reid put soldiers at the Tower of London and Wellington Barracks on an identification parade, but without positive results.[26] Police did not connect Tabram's murder with the earlier murder of Emma Smith, but they did connect her death with later murders.[27]

Most experts do not connect Tabram's murder with the others attributed to the Ripper, because she had been repeatedly stabbed, whereas later victims typically suffered slash wounds and abdominal mutilations. However, a connection cannot be ruled out.[28]

Mary Ann Nichols
Main article: Mary Ann Nichols
Mortuary photograph of Nichols: a middle-aged woman with short, mousey hair and a prominent, narrow nose
Mary Ann Nichols, 43, lived in a lodging-house at 18 Thrawl Street.[29]
On Friday 31 August, Mary Ann Nichols was murdered in Buck's Row (since renamed Durward Street), a back street in Whitechapel. Her body was discovered by cart driver Charles Cross at 3:45 am on the ground in front of a gated stable entrance. Her throat had been slit twice from left to right and her abdomen was mutilated by a deep jagged wound. Several shallower incisions across the abdomen, and three or four similar cuts on the right side were caused by the same knife used violently and downwards.[30] As the murder occurred in the territory of the J or Bethnal Green Division of the Metropolitan Police, it was at first investigated by the local detectives. On the same day, James Monro resigned as the head of the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) over differences with Chief Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police Sir Charles Warren.[31]

Sketch of a whiskered Inspector Abberline
Inspector Frederick Abberline led the police investigation.
Initial investigations into the murder had little success, although elements of the press linked it to the two previous murders and suggested the killing might have been perpetrated by a gang, as in the case of Smith.[32] The Star newspaper suggested instead that a single killer was responsible and other newspapers took up their storyline.[33][34] Suspicions of a serial killer at large in London led to the secondment of Detective Inspectors Frederick Abberline, Henry Moore and Walter Andrews from the Central Office at Scotland Yard.[35] On the available evidence, Coroner Baxter concluded that Nichols was murdered at just after 3 am where she was found. In his summing up, he dismissed the possibility that her murder was connected with those of Smith and Tabram, as the lethal weapons were different in those cases, and neither of the earlier cases involved a slash to the throat.[36] However, by the time the inquest into Nichols's death had concluded, a fourth woman had been murdered, and Baxter noted "The similarity of the injuries in the two cases is considerable."[37]

Annie Chapman
Main article: Annie Chapman
Mortuary photograph of Chapman: a middle-aged woman with short, curly hair
Annie Chapman, 47, lived in a lodging-house at 35 Dorset Street.[38]
The mutilated body of the fourth woman, Annie Chapman, was discovered at about 6:00 am on Saturday 8 September on the ground near a doorway in the back yard of 29 Hanbury Street, Spitalfields. Chapman had left her lodgings at 2 am on the day she was murdered, with the intention of getting money from a client to pay her rent.[39] Her throat was cut from left to right. She had been disembowelled, and her intestines had been thrown out of her abdomen over each of her shoulders. The morgue examination revealed that part of her uterus was missing. The pathologist, George Bagster Phillips, was of the opinion that the murderer must have possessed anatomical knowledge to have sliced out the reproductive organs in a single movement with a blade about 6–8 inches (15–20 cm) long.[40] However, the idea that the murderer possessed surgical skill was dismissed by other experts.[41] As the bodies were not examined extensively at the scene, it has also been suggested that the organs were actually removed by mortuary staff, who took advantage of bodies that had already been opened to extract organs that they could sell as surgical specimens.[42]

On 10 September, the police arrested a notorious local called John Pizer, dubbed "Leather Apron", who had a reputation for terrorising local prostitutes. His alibis for the two most recent murders were corroborated, and he was released without charge.[43] At the inquest one of the witnesses, Mrs Elizabeth Long, testified that she had seen Chapman talking to a man at about 5:30 am just beyond the back yard of 29 Hanbury Street, where Chapman was later found. Baxter inferred that the man Mrs Long had seen was the murderer. Mrs Long described him as over forty, a little taller than Chapman, of dark complexion, and of foreign, "shabby-genteel" appearance.[44] He was wearing a brown deer-stalker hat and a dark overcoat.[44] Another witness, carpenter Albert Cadosch, had entered the neighbouring yard at 27 Hanbury Street at about the same time, and heard voices in the yard followed by the sound of something or someone falling against the fence.[45]

Lusk has a moustache and wears a bowler hat, topcoat, and leather gloves. He holds a cane in the right hand, and a cigar in the left.
George Lusk, President of the Whitechapel Vigilance Committee
In his memoirs, Walter Dew recorded that the killings caused widespread panic in London.[46] A mob attacked the Commercial Road police station, suspecting that the murderer was being held there.[47] Samuel Montagu, the Member of Parliament for Whitechapel, offered a reward of £100 (roughly £12,000 as of 2024) after rumours that the attacks were Jewish ritual killings led to anti-Semitic demonstrations.[48] Local residents founded the Whitechapel Vigilance Committee under the chairmanship of George Lusk and offered a reward for the apprehension of the killer—something the Metropolitan Police (under instruction from the Home Office) refused to do because such a move could lead to false or misleading information.[49] The Committee employed two private detectives to investigate the case.[50]

Robert Anderson was appointed head of the CID on 1 September, but he went on sick leave to Switzerland on the 7th. Superintendent Thomas Arnold, who was in charge of H (Whitechapel) Division, went on leave on 2 September.[51] Anderson's absence left overall direction of the enquiries confused, and led Chief Commissioner Sir Charles Warren to appoint Chief Inspector Donald Swanson to co-ordinate the investigation from Scotland Yard.[52] A German hairdresser named Charles Ludwig was taken into custody on 18 September on suspicion of the murders, but he was released less than two weeks later when a double murder demonstrated that the real culprit was still at large.[48][53]

Double event: Elizabeth Stride and Catherine Eddowes
Main articles: Elizabeth Stride and Catherine Eddowes
Mortuary photograph of Stride: a woman with angular features and a wide mouth
Elizabeth Stride, 44, lived in a lodging-house at 32 Flower and Dean Street.[54]
On Sunday 30 September, the body of prostitute Elizabeth Stride was discovered at about 1 am in Dutfield's Yard, inside the gateway of 40 Berner Street (since renamed Henriques Street), Whitechapel. She was lying in a pool of blood with her throat cut from left to right. She had been killed just minutes before, and her body was otherwise unmutilated. It is possible that the murderer was disturbed before he could commit any mutilation of the body by someone entering the yard, perhaps Louis Diemschutz, who discovered the body.[55] However, some commentators on the case conclude that Stride's murder was unconnected to the others[56] on the basis that the body was unmutilated, that it was the only murder to occur south of Whitechapel Road,[57] and that the blade used might have been shorter and of a different design.[55] Most experts, however, consider the similarities in the case distinctive enough to connect Stride's murder with at least two of the earlier ones, as well as that of Catherine Eddowes on the same night.[58]

Mortuary photograph of Eddowes. Her lower face is severely mutilated
Catherine Eddowes, 46, lived with partner John Kelly in a lodging-house at 55 Flower and Dean Street.[59]
At 1:45 am, Catherine Eddowes's mutilated body was found by PC Edward Watkins at the south-west corner of Mitre Square, in the City of London, about 12 minutes walk from Berner Street.[60] She had been killed less than 10 minutes earlier by a slash to the throat from left to right with a sharp, pointed knife at least 6 inches (15 cm) long.[61] Her face and abdomen were mutilated, and her intestines were drawn out over the right shoulder with a detached length between her torso and left arm. Her left kidney and most of her uterus were removed. The Eddowes inquest was opened on 4 October by Samuel F. Langham, coroner for the City of London.[62] The examining pathologist, Dr Frederick Gordon Brown, believed the perpetrator "had considerable knowledge of the position of the organs" and from the position of the wounds on the body he could tell that the murderer had knelt to the right of the body, and worked alone.[63] However, the first doctor at the scene, local surgeon Dr George William Sequeira, disputed that the killer possessed anatomical skill or sought particular organs.[64] His view was shared by City medical officer William Sedgwick Saunders, who was also present at the autopsy.[65] Because of this murder's location, the City of London Police under Detective Inspector James McWilliam were brought into the enquiry.[66]

At 3 am, a blood-stained fragment of Eddowes's apron was found lying in the passage of the doorway leading to 108 to 119 Goulston Street, Whitechapel, about a third of a mile (500 m) from the murder scene. There was chalk writing on the wall of the doorway, which read either "The Juwes are the men that will not be blamed for nothing"[67][68] or "The Juwes are not the men who will be blamed for nothing."[69] At 5 am, Commissioner Warren attended the scene and ordered the words erased for fear that they would spark anti-Semitic riots.[70] Goulston Street was on a direct route from Mitre Square to Flower and Dean Street, where both Stride and Eddowes lived.[71]

The Middlesex coroner, Wynne Baxter, believed that Stride had been attacked with a swift, sudden action.[72] She was still holding a packet of cachous (breath-freshening sweets) in her left hand when she was discovered,[73] indicating that she had not had time to defend herself.[74] A grocer, Matthew Packer, implied to private detectives employed by the Whitechapel Vigilance Committee that he had sold some grapes to Stride and the murderer; however, he had told police that he had shut his shop without seeing anything suspicious.[75] At the inquest, the pathologists stated emphatically that Stride had not held, swallowed or consumed grapes.[76] They described her stomach contents as "cheese, potatoes and farinaceous powder [flour or milled grain]".[77] Nevertheless, Packer's story appeared in the press.[78] Packer's description of the man did not match the statements by other witnesses who may have seen Stride with a man shortly before her murder, but all but two of the descriptions differed.[79] Joseph Lawende passed through Mitre Square with two other men shortly before Eddowes was murdered there, and may have seen her with a man of about 30 years old, who was shabbily dressed, wore a peaked cap, and had a fair moustache.[80] Chief Inspector Swanson noted that Lawende's description was a near match to another provided by one of the witnesses who may have seen Stride with her murderer.[81] However, Lawende stated that he would not be able to identify the man again, and the two other men with Lawende were unable to give descriptions.[82]

Criticism of the Metropolitan Police and the Home Secretary, Henry Matthews, continued to mount as little progress was made with the investigation.[83] The City Police and the Lord Mayor of London offered a reward of £500 (roughly £59,000 as of 2024) for information leading to the capture of the villain.[84] The use of bloodhounds to track the killer in the event of another attack was considered and a trial was held in London but the idea was abandoned because the trail of scents was confused in the busy city, the dogs were inexperienced in an urban environment, and the owner Edwin Brough of Wyndyate near Scarborough (now Scalby Manor) was concerned that the dogs would be poisoned by criminals if their role in crime detection became known.[85]

On 27 September, the Central News Agency received a letter, dubbed the "Dear Boss" letter, in which the writer, who signed himself "Jack the Ripper", claimed to have committed the murders.[86] On 1 October, a postcard, dubbed the "Saucy Jacky" postcard, and also signed "Jack the Ripper", was received by the agency. It claimed responsibility for the most recent murders on 30 September, and described the murders of the two women as the "double event", a designation which has endured.[87]

On Tuesday 2 October, an unidentified female torso was found in the basement of New Scotland Yard, which was under construction. It was linked to the Whitechapel murders by the press, but it was not included in the Whitechapel murders file, and any connection between the two is now considered unlikely.[88] The case became known as the Whitehall Mystery.[88] On the same day, the psychic Robert James Lees visited Scotland Yard and offered to track down the murderer using paranormal powers; the police turned him away and "called [him] a fool and a lunatic".[89]

The head of the CID, Anderson, eventually returned from leave on 6 October and took charge of the investigation for Scotland Yard. On 16 October, George Lusk of the Whitechapel Vigilance Committee received another letter, known as the "From Hell" letter, claiming to be from the killer. The handwriting and style were unlike that of the "Dear Boss" letter and "Saucy Jacky" postcard. The letter arrived with a small box containing half of a human kidney preserved in alcohol. The letter's writer claimed that he had extracted it from the body of Eddowes and that he had "fried and ate" the missing half.[90] Opinion on whether the kidney and the letter were genuine was and is divided.[91] By the end of October, the police had interviewed more than 2,000 people, investigated "upwards of 300", and detained 80.[92]

Mary Jane Kelly
Main article: Mary Jane Kelly
Kelly's eviscerated body lying on a bed. Her face is mutilated.
The body of Mary Jane Kelly, 25, photographed at the scene of her murder
On Friday 9 November, prostitute Mary Jane Kelly was murdered in the single room where she lived at 13 Miller's Court, behind 26 Dorset Street, Spitalfields.[93] One of the earlier victims, Chapman, had lived in Dorset Street, and another, Eddowes, was reported to have occasionally slept rough there.[94] Kelly's severely mutilated body was discovered shortly after 10:45 am lying on the bed. The first doctor at the scene, Dr George Bagster Phillips, believed that Kelly was killed by a slash to the throat.[95] After her death, her abdominal cavity was sliced open and all her viscera removed and spread around the room. Her breasts had been cut off, her face mutilated beyond recognition, and her thighs partially cut through to the bone, with some of the muscles removed.[96] Unlike the other victims, she was undressed and wore only a light chemise. Her clothes were folded neatly on a chair, with the exception of some found burnt in the grate. Abberline thought the clothes had been burned by the murderer to provide light, as the room was otherwise only dimly lit by a single candle.[97] Kelly's murder was the most savage, probably because the murderer had more time to commit his atrocities in a private room rather than in the street.[98] Her state of undress and folded clothes have led to suggestions that she undressed herself before lying down on the bed, which would indicate that she was killed by someone she knew, by someone she believed to be a client, or when she was asleep or intoxicated.[99]

The coroner for North East Middlesex, Dr Roderick Macdonald, MP,[100] presided over the inquest into Kelly's death at Shoreditch Town Hall on 12 November.[101] Amid scenes of great emotion, an "enormous crowd" of mourners attended Mary Kelly's funeral on 19 November.[102] The streets became gridlocked and the cortège struggled to travel from Shoreditch mortuary to the Roman Catholic Cemetery at Leytonstone, where she was laid to rest.[102]

On 8 November, Charles Warren resigned as Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police after the Home Secretary informed him that he could not make public statements without Home Office approval.[103] James Monro, who had resigned a few months earlier over differences with Warren, was appointed as his replacement in December.[104] On 10 November, the police surgeon Thomas Bond wrote to Robert Anderson, head of the London CID, detailing the similarities between the five murders of Nichols, Chapman, Stride, Eddowes and Kelly, "no doubt committed by the same hand".[105] On the same day, the Cabinet resolved to offer a pardon to any accomplice who came forward with information that led to the conviction of the actual murderer.[106] The Metropolitan Police Commissioner reported that the Whitechapel murderer remained unidentified despite 143 extra plain-clothes policemen deployed in Whitechapel in November and December.[107]

Rose Mylett
On Thursday 20 December 1888, a patrolling constable found the strangled body of 26-year-old prostitute Rose Mylett in Clarke's Yard, off Poplar High Street.[108] Mylett (born Catherine Milett and known as Drunken Lizzie Davis[109] and Fair Alice Downey[110]) had lodged at 18 George Street, as had Emma Smith.[111]

Four doctors who examined Mylett's body thought she had been murdered, but Robert Anderson thought she had accidentally hanged herself on the collar of her dress while in a drunken stupor.[112] At Anderson's request Dr Bond examined Mylett's body, and he agreed with Anderson.[113] Commissioner Monro also suspected it was a suicide or natural death as there were no signs of a struggle.[114] The coroner, Wynne Baxter, told the inquest jury that "there is no evidence to show that death was the result of violence".[115] Nevertheless, the jury returned a verdict of "wilful murder against some person or persons unknown" and the case was added to the Whitechapel file.[116]

Alice McKenzie
Mortuary photograph of McKenzie: a middle-aged woman with thick lips
Alice McKenzie, 40, lived in a lodging-house at 52 Gun Street.[117]
Alice McKenzie was possibly a prostitute,[118] and was murdered at about 12:40 am on Wednesday 17 July 1889 in Castle Alley, Whitechapel. Like most of the previous murders, her left carotid artery was severed from left to right and there were wounds on her abdomen. However, her wounds were not as deep as in previous murders, and a shorter blade was used. Commissioner Monro[119] and one of the pathologists examining the body, Bond, believed this to be a Ripper murder, though another of the pathologists, Phillips, and Robert Anderson disagreed,[120] as did Inspector Abberline.[121] Later writers are also divided, and either suggest that McKenzie was a Ripper victim,[122] or that the unknown murderer tried to make it look like a Ripper killing to deflect suspicion from himself.[123] At the inquest, Coroner Baxter acknowledged both possibilities, and concluded: "There is great similarity between this and the other class of cases, which have happened in this neighbourhood, and if the same person has not committed this crime, it is clearly an imitation of the other cases."[124]

Pinchin Street torso

Contemporary illustration of the discovery of the Pinchin Street torso
A woman's torso was found at 5:15 a.m. on Tuesday 10 September 1889 under a railway arch in Pinchin Street, Whitechapel.[125] Extensive bruising about the victim's back, hip, and arm indicated that she had been severely beaten shortly before her death, which had occurred approximately one day prior to the discovery of her torso. The victim's abdomen was also extensively mutilated in a manner reminiscent of the Ripper, although her genitals had not been wounded.[126] The dismembered sections of the body are believed to have been transported to the railway arch, hidden under an old chemise.[127] The age of the victim was estimated at 30–40 years.[128] Despite a search of the area, no other sections of her body were ever found, and neither the victim nor the culprit were ever identified.[126]

Chief Inspector Swanson and Commissioner Monro noted that the presence of blood within the torso indicated that death was not from haemorrhage or cutting of the throat.[129] The pathologists, however, noted that the general bloodlessness of the tissues and vessels indicated that haemorrhage was the cause of death.[130] Newspaper speculation that the body belonged to Lydia Hart, who had disappeared, was refuted after she was found recovering in hospital after "a bit of a spree".[131] Another claim that the victim was a missing girl called Emily Barker was also refuted, as the torso was from an older and taller woman.[131]

Swanson did not consider this a Ripper case, and instead suggested a link to the Thames Torso Murders in Rainham and Chelsea, as well as the "Whitehall Mystery".[132] Monro agreed with Swanson's assessment.[133] These three murders and the Pinchin Street case are suggested to be the work of a serial killer, nicknamed the "Torso killer", who could either be the same person as "Jack the Ripper" or a separate killer of uncertain connection.[134] Links between these and three further murders—the "Battersea Mystery" of 1873 and 1874, in which two women were found dismembered, and the 1884 "Tottenham Court Road Mystery"—have also been postulated.[135][136] Experts on the murders—colloquially known as "Ripperologists"—such as Stewart Evans, Keith Skinner, Martin Fido, and Donald Rumbelow, discount any connection between the torso and Ripper killings on the basis of their different modi operandi.[137]

Monro was replaced as Commissioner by Sir Edward Bradford on 21 June 1890, after a disagreement with the Home Secretary Henry Matthews over police pensions.[138]

Frances Coles
Mortuary photograph of Frances Coles
Frances Coles lived in a lodging-house in White's Row.[139]
The last of the murders in the Whitechapel file was committed on Friday 13 February 1891 when prostitute Frances Coles was murdered under a railway arch in Swallow Gardens, Whitechapel. Her body was found at 2:15 am, only moments after the attack, by PC Ernest Thompson, who later stated that he heard retreating footsteps in the distance.[140] As contemporary police practices dictated, Thompson remained at the scene.[141]

Coles was lying beneath a passageway under a railway arch between Chamber Street and Royal Mint Street. She was still alive, but died before medical help could arrive.[142] Minor wounds on the back of her head suggest that she was thrown violently to the ground before her throat was cut at least twice, from left to right and then back again.[143] Otherwise there were no mutilations to the body, leading some to believe Thompson had disturbed her assailant.[144] Superintendent Arnold and Inspector Reid arrived soon afterwards from the nearby Leman Street police station, and Chief Inspectors Donald Swanson and Henry Moore, who had been involved in the previous murder investigations, arrived by 5 am.[145]

A man named James Sadler, who had earlier been seen with Coles, was arrested by the police and charged with her murder. A high-profile investigation by Swanson and Moore into Sadler's past history and his whereabouts at the time of the previous Whitechapel murders indicates that the police may have suspected him to be the Ripper.[146] However, Sadler was released on 3 March for lack of evidence.[146]

Legacy

February 1889 National Police Gazette illustration referencing the Whitechapel murders
The murderer or murderers were never identified and the cases remain unsolved. Sensational reportage and the mystery surrounding the identity of the killer or killers fed the development of the character "Jack the Ripper", who was blamed for all or most of the murders.[48] Hundreds of books and articles discuss the Whitechapel murders, and they feature in novels, short stories, comic books, television shows, and films of multiple genres.[147]

The poor of the East End had long been ignored by affluent society, but the nature of the Whitechapel murders and of the victims' impoverished lifestyles drew national attention to their living conditions.[148] The murders galvanised public opinion against the overcrowded, unsanitary slums of the East End, and led to demands for reform.[149][150] On 24 September 1888, George Bernard Shaw commented sarcastically on the media's sudden concern with social justice in a letter to The Star newspaper:[151]

Whilst we conventional Social Democrats were wasting our time on education, agitation and organisation, some independent genius has taken the matter in hand, and by simply murdering and disembowelling ... women, converted the proprietary press to an inept sort of communism.

Acts of Parliament, such as the Housing of the Working Classes Act 1890 and the Public Health Amendment Act 1890, set minimum standards for accommodation in an effort to transform degenerated urban areas.[152] The worst of the slums were demolished in the two decades following the Whitechapel murders.[153]

Abberline retired in 1892 and Matthews lost his position as Home Secretary in the 1892 general election. Arnold retired the following year, and Swanson and Anderson retired after 1900. No document in the Whitechapel murders file dates after 1896.[154]

See also
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References
Citations
 Greenwood, James (1883), In Strange Company, London, p. 158, quoted in Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, pp. 21, 45
 Daily Mail, 16 July 1901, quoted in Werner (ed.), pp. 62, 179
 Pall Mall Gazette, 4 November 1889, quoted in Evans and Rumbelow, p. 225 and Evans and Skinner (2000), p. 516
 "Jack the Ripper: Why Does a Serial Killer Who Disembowelled Women Deserve a Museum?". The Telegraph. 30 July 2015. Archived from the original on 8 March 2021. Retrieved 9 October 2022.
 Honeycombe, The Murders of the Black Museum: 1870–1970, p. 54
 Werner (ed.), pp. 42–44, 118–122, 141–170
 Rumbelow, Complete Jack The Ripper p. 14
 Rumbelow, Jack the Ripper: The Complete Casebook p. 30
 White, Jerry (2007), London in the Nineteenth Century, London: Jonathan Cape, ISBN 978-0-224-06272-5, pp. 323–332
 Marriott, p. 207
 Lloyd, pp. 51–52
 Evans and Rumbelow, p. 14
 "The Enduring Mystery of Jack the Ripper" Archived 4 February 2010 at the Wayback Machine, Metropolitan Police, retrieved 1 May 2009
 Cook, pp. 33–34; Evans and Skinner (2000), p. 3
 Evans and Rumbelow, p. 47; Evans and Skinner (2000), p. 4; Fido, p. 15; Rumbelow, p. 30
 Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, pp. 27–29; Cook, pp. 34–35; Evans and Rumbelow, pp. 47–50; Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 4–7
 Whitehead and Rivett, p. 18
 Evans and Rumbelow, pp. 47–50
 Dew, Walter (1938), I Caught Crippen, London: Blackie and Son, p. 92, quoted in Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, p. 29
 Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, p. 29
 Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, p. 28; Evans and Skinner, The Ultimate Jack the Ripper Sourcebook, pp. 4–7
 Marriott, pp. 5–7
 Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, pp. 29–31; Evans and Rumbelow, pp. 47–50; Marriott, pp. 5–7
 Evans and Skinner (2000), p. 11; Whitehead and Rivett, p. 19
 Evans and Rumbelow, pp. 51–52
 Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, pp. 51–53; Evans and Rumbelow, pp. 51–55; Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 8–18; Marriott, pp. 9–14
 In an interview reported in the Pall Mall Gazette, 24 March 1903, Inspector Frederick Abberline referred to "George-yard, Whitechapel-road, where the first murder was committed" (quoted in Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, p. 56). Walter Dew wrote in his memoirs, that "there can be no doubt that the August Bank Holiday murder ... was the handiwork of the Ripper" (I Caught Crippen, p. 97, quoted in Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, p. 56). In his memoirs, Assistant Commissioner Robert Anderson said the second murder occurred on 31 August (quoted in Evans and Skinner (2000), p. 632).
 Evans and Rumbelow, p. 515; Marriott, p. 13
 Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, pp. 85–85; Evans and Rumbelow, p. 61; Evans and Skinner (2000), p. 24
 Evans and Rumbelow, pp. 60–61; Evans and Skinner (2000), p. 35; Rumbelow, pp. 24–27
 Evans and Rumbelow, p. 64
 Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, p. 98; Cook, pp. 25–28; Evans and Rumbelow, pp. 62–63
 Cook, pp. 25–28; Woods and Baddeley, pp. 21–22
 "Another Terrible Murder in Whitechapel". The Waterford News. 9 November 1888. Retrieved 22 August 2021.
 Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 676, 678
 Marriott, pp. 21–22
 Marriott, pp. 22–23
 Evans and Rumbelow, pp. 66–73; Whitehead and Rivett, pp. 33–34
 Evans and Rumbelow, pp. 66–70
 Cook, p. 221; Evans and Rumbelow, pp. 71–72; Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 67–68, 87; Marriott, pp. 26–29; Rumbelow, p. 42
 Fido, p. 35; Marriott, pp. 77–79
 Marriott, pp. 77–79
 Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, p. 157; Cook, pp. 65–66; Evans and Skinner (2000), p. 29; Marriott, pp. 59–75; Rumbelow, pp. 49–50
 Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, p. 153; Cook, p. 163; Evans and Skinner (2000), p. 98; Marriott, pp. 59–75
 Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, p. 153; Evans and Skinner (2000), p. 100; Marriott, pp. 59–75
 Connell, pp. 15–16; Cook, p. 90
 Connell, pp. 19–21; Rumbelow, pp. 67–68
 Davenport-Hines
 Evans and Rumbelow, pp. 159–160; Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 111–119, 265–290
 Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, p. 186
 Evans and Rumbelow, p. 65
 Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, p. 205; Evans and Rumbelow, pp. 84–85
 Evans and Rumbelow, p. 86
 Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, pp. 46, 168–170; Evans and Rumbelow, pp. 96–98; Rumbelow, pp. 69–70
 Cook, p. 157; Woods and Baddeley, p. 86
 See for example Stewart, William (1939), Jack the Ripper: A New Theory, Quality Press, quoted in Evans and Skinner (2000), p. 418
 Marriott, pp. 81–125
 e.g. Melville Macnaghten quoted by Cook, p. 151; Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 584–587 and Rumbelow, p. 140; Thomas Bond (British physician) quoted in Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 360–362 and Rumbelow, pp. 145–147
 Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, pp. 46, 189; Evans and Rumbelow, pp. 114–116; Marriott, p. 81
 Inquest testimony of surveyor Frederick William Foster, quoted in Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 201–202; Marriott, p. 138
 Examining pathologist Dr Frederick Gordon Brown quoted in Fido, pp. 70–73 and Marriott, pp. 130–131
 Marriott, pp. 132–144; Whitehead and Rivett, p. 68
 Examining pathologist Dr Frederick Gordon Brown quoted in Evans and Rumbelow, p. 128; Evans and Skinner (2000), p. 207; and Marriott, pp. 132–133, 141–143
 Sequeira's inquest testimony quoted in Evans and Rumbelow, p. 128; Evans and Skinner (2000), p. 208; and Marriott, p. 144
 Saunders's inquest testimony quoted in Evans and Skinner (2000), p. 208
 Cook, pp. 45–47; Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 178–181
 Constable Alfred Long's inquest testimony, quoted in Marriott, pp. 148–149 and Rumbelow, p. 61
 Letter from Charles Warren to Godfrey Lushington, Permanent Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, 6 November 1888, HO 144/221/A49301C, quoted in Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 183–184
 Detective Constable Daniel Halse's inquest testimony, 11 October 1888, quoted in Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 214–215 and Marriott, pp. 150–151
 Letter from Charles Warren to the Home Office Undersecretary of State, 6 November 1888, quoted in Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, p. 197; Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 183–184 and Marriott, p. 159
 Inquest testimony of surveyor Frederick William Foster, quoted in Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 201–202
 Rumbelow, p. 76
 Testimony of Dr Blackwell, the first surgeon at the scene, quoted by Evans and Skinner (2000), p. 163 and Rumbelow, p. 71
 Evans and Skinner (2000), p. 175; Rumbelow, p. 76
 Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, pp. 186–187; Cook, pp. 166–167; Evans and Rumbelow, pp. 106–108; Rumbelow, p. 76
 Begg, pp. 186–187; Cook, p. 167; Evans and Skinner (2000), p. 164; Rumbelow, p. 76
 Evans and Rumbelow, p. 104; Evans and Skinner (2000), p. 158; Rumbelow, p. 72
 Evans and Rumbelow, pp. 106–108; Rumbelow, p. 76
 Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, pp. 176–184
 Reported in The Times, 2 October 1888
 Inspector Donald Swanson's report to the Home Office, 19 October 1888, HO 144/221/A49301C, quoted in Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, p. 193
 Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, pp. 193–194; Chief Inspector Swanson's report, 6 November 1888, HO 144/221/A49301C, quoted in Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 24–25; Fido, pp. 45, 77
 Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, pp. 201–203; Fido, pp. 80–81
 Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, p. 202; Evans and Rumbelow, p. 141; Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 179, 225; Fido, p. 77
 Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 291–299; Fido, p. 134
 Cook, pp. 76–77; Woods and Baddeley, pp. 48–49
 Evans and Skinner (2001), p. 30; Rumbelow, p. 118
 Evans and Rumblelow, pp. 142–144; Evans and Skinner (2000), p. 239
 Lees's diary quoted in Woods and Baddeley, p. 66
 Quoted in Evans and Rumbelow, p. 167; Evans and Skinner (2001), p. 63; Chief Inspector Swanson's report, 6 November 1888, HO 144/221/A49301C, quoted in Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 185–188 and Rumbelow, p. 118
 Cook, pp. 144–149; Evans and Skinner (2001), pp. 54–71; Fido, pp. 78–80; Rumbelow, p. 121
 Inspector Donald Swanson's report to the Home Office, 19 October 1888, HO 144/221/A49301C, quoted in Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, p. 205; Evans and Rumbelow, p. 113; Evans and Skinner (2000), p. 125
 Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, p. 231; Evans and Rumbelow, p. 177
 Daily Telegraph, 10 November 1888, quoted in Evans and Skinner (2000), p. 339
 Dr Phillips's inquest testimony, 12 November 1888, quoted in Marriott, p. 176
 Police surgeon Thomas Bond's report, MEPO 3/3153 ff. 10–18, quoted in Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, pp. 242–243; Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 345–347 and Marriott, pp. 170–171
 Inspector Abberline's inquest testimony, 12 November 1888, quoted in Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 375–376 and Marriott, p. 177
 Daily Telegraph, 10 November 1888, quoted in Evans and Skinner (2000), p. 338; Marriott, p. 179; Whitehead and Rivett, p. 86
 Marriott, pp. 167–180
 Marriott, p. 172
 Evans and Rumbelow, pp. 175, 189; Fido, p. 95; Rumbelow, pp. 94 ff.
 East London Advertiser, 21 November 1888, quoted in Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, p. 247
 Evans and Rumbelow, p. 174; Telegram from Prime Minister Lord Salisbury to Queen Victoria, 11 November 1888, Royal Archives VIC/A67/20, quoted in Evans and Skinner (2000), p. 357; Fido, p. 137; Whitehead and Rivett, p. 90
 Evans and Rumbelow, p. 196
 Letter from Thomas Bond to Robert Anderson, 10 November 1888, HO 144/221/A49301C, quoted in Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 360–362 and Rumbelow, pp. 145–147
 Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 347–349
 Letter to the Home Office of 18 July 1889 and Commissioner's Report for 1888, quoted in Evans and Rumbelow, p. 204
 Evans and Rumbelow, pp. 245–246; Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 422–447
 Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Facts, p. 314
 Ryder, Stephen P. "Rose Mylett (1862-1888) a.k.a. Catherine Millett or Mellett, 'Drunken Lizzie' Davis, 'Fair Alice' Downey". Casebook: Jack the Ripper. Retrieved 5 June 2021.
 Daily Chronicle, 26 December 1888, quoted in Beadle, William (2009), Jack the Ripper: Unmasked, London: John Blake, ISBN 978-1-84454-688-6, p. 209
 Robert Anderson to James Monro, 11 January 1889, MEPO 3/143 ff. E–J, quoted in Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 434–436
 Evans and Skinner (2000), p. 433; Fido, pp. 102–103
 Report by James Monro, 23 December 1888, HO 144/221/A49301H ff. 7–14, quoted in Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 423–425
 Quoted in Evans and Skinner (2000), p. 433
 Evans and Rumbelow, pp. 245–246
 Evans and Rumbelow, pp. 205–209; Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 448–468
 Rumbelow, p. 129
 Evans and Rumbelow, pp. 207–208; Evans and Skinner (2001), p. 137
 Evans and Rumbelow, pp. 208–209; Marriott, pp. 182–183
 Interview in Cassell's Saturday Journal, 28 May 1892, quoted in Evans and Rumbelow, p. 225
 Marriott, p. 195
 Evans and Rumbelow, p. 209
 Coroner Baxter's summing up, 14 August 1888, quoted in Marriott, p. 193
 Eddleston, p. 129
 Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Facts, p. 316
 Evans and Rumbelow, p. 210; Evans and Skinner, The Ultimate Jack the Ripper Sourcebook, pp. 480–515
 Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 489–510
 Report to the Home Office by Swanson, 10 September 1889, MEPO 3/140 ff. 136–40, quoted in Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 480–482; Report to the Home Office by Monro, 11 September 1889, HO 144/221/A49301K ff. 1–8, quoted in Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 492–494
 Report of Dr Charles A. Hebbert, 16 September 1889, MEPO 3/140 ff. 146–7, quoted in Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 496–497; inquest testimony of George Bagster Phillips, 24 September 1889, quoted in Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 509–510
 Evans and Rumbelow, p. 213
 Report to the Home Office by Swanson, 10 September 1889, MEPO 3/140 ff. 136–40, quoted in Evans and Rumbelow, pp. 210–213 and Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 480–482
 Report to the Home Office by Monro, 11 September 1889, HO 144/221/A49301K ff. 1–8, quoted in Evans and Rumbelow, p. 213 and Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 492–494
 Gordon, R. Michael (2002), The Thames Torso Murders of Victorian London, McFarland & Company, ISBN 978-0-7864-1348-5
 Spicer, Gerard. "The Thames Torso Murders of 1887–89". Casebook: Jack the Ripper. Retrieved 21 August 2015.
 Trow, M.J. (2011). The Thames Torso Murders. Barnsley, UK: Wharncliffe Books. ISBN 978-1-84884-430-8. the Thames torso murderer has gripped readers and historians ever since he committed his crimes in the 1870s and 1880s
 Evans and Skinner (2000), p. 480; Fido, p. 104; Rumbelow, p. 132
 Evans and Rumbelow, p. 217
 Fido, p. 113; Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 551–557
 Ryder, Stephen P. "Frances Coles a.k.a. Frances Coleman, Frances Hawkins, 'Carroty Nell'". Casebook: Jack the Ripper. Retrieved 17 July 2021.
 Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, p. 317
 Cook, pp. 53–55; Evans and Rumbelow, pp. 218–219; Evans and Skinner (2000), p. 551
 Examining pathologist Dr Phillips, and Dr F. J. Oxley, first doctor at the scene, quoted in Marriott, p. 198
 Cook, p. 237; Marriott, p. 198
 Fido, pp. 104–105
 Evans and Rumbelow, pp. 220–222; Evans and Skinner (2000), pp. 551–568
 Jenkins, John Philip. "Jack the Ripper". Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved 12 May 2020.
 Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, pp. 1–2
 Cook, pp. 139–141; Werner (ed.), pp. 236–237
 "The Whitechapel Murders". Western Mail. 17 November 1888. Retrieved 11 May 2020.
 Ryder, Stephen P. (editor) (2006), Public Reactions to Jack the Ripper: Letters to the Editor August – December 1888, Chestertown, MD: Inklings Press, ISBN 0-9759129-7-6; Begg, Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History, pp. 1–2; Woods and Baddeley, pp. 144–145
 Werner (ed.), pp. 236–237
 Werner (ed.), pp. 177–179; See also: "The Fossan (Keate and Tonge) estate", Survey of London: volume 27: Spitalfields and Mile End New Town (1957), pp. 245–251, retrieved 18 January 2010
 Evans and Rumbelow, p. 223; Evans and Skinner (2000), p. 655
Bibliography
Begg, Paul (2003). Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History. London: Pearson Education. ISBN 0-582-50631-X
Begg, Paul (2006). Jack the Ripper: The Facts. Anova Books. ISBN 1-86105-687-7
Connell, Nicholas (2005). Walter Dew: The Man Who Caught Crippen. Stroud, Gloucestershire: The History Press. ISBN 978-0-7509-3803-7
Cook, Andrew (2009). Jack the Ripper. Stroud, Gloucestershire: Amberley Publishing. ISBN 978-1-84868-327-3
Davenport-Hines, Richard (2004). "Jack the Ripper (fl. 1888)", Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press. Subscription required for online version.
Evans, Stewart P.; Rumbelow, Donald (2006). Jack the Ripper: Scotland Yard Investigates. Stroud, Gloucestershire: Sutton Publishing. ISBN 0-7509-4228-2
Evans, Stewart P.; Skinner, Keith (2000). The Ultimate Jack the Ripper Sourcebook: An Illustrated Encyclopedia. London: Constable and Robinson. ISBN 1-84119-225-2
Evans, Stewart P.; Skinner, Keith (2001). Jack the Ripper: Letters from Hell. Stroud, Gloucestershire: Sutton Publishing. ISBN 0-7509-2549-3
Fido, Martin (1987). The Crimes, Death and Detection of Jack the Ripper. Vermont: Trafalgar Square. ISBN 978-0-297-79136-2
Gordon, R. Michael (2000). Alias Jack the Ripper: Beyond the Usual Whitechapel Suspects. North Carolina: McFarland Publishing. ISBN 978-0-786-40898-6
Lloyd, Georgina (1986). One Was Not Enough: True Stories of Multiple Murderers. Toronto: Bantam Books. ISBN 978-0-553-17605-6
Marriott, Trevor (2005). Jack the Ripper: The 21st Century Investigation. London: John Blake. ISBN 1-84454-103-7
Rumbelow, Donald (2004). The Complete Jack the Ripper: Fully Revised and Updated. London: Penguin Books. ISBN 0-14-017395-1
Waddell, Bill (1993). The Black Museum: New Scotland Yard. London: Little, Brown and Company. ISBN 978-0-316-90332-5
Werner, Alex (editor) (2008). Jack the Ripper and the East End. London: Chatto & Windus. ISBN 978-0-7011-8247-2
Whitehead, Mark; Rivett, Miriam (2006). Jack the Ripper. Harpenden, Hertfordshire: Pocket Essentials. ISBN 978-1-904048-69-5
Whittington-Egan, Richard (2013). Jack the Ripper: The Definitive Casebook. Stroud: Amberley Publishing. ISBN 978-1-445-61768-8
Woods, Paul; Baddeley, Gavin (2009). Saucy Jack: The Elusive Ripper. Hersham, Surrey: Ian Allan Publishing. ISBN 978-0-7110-3410-5
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Murder

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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
For other uses, see Murder (disambiguation).
"Murderer" redirects here. For other uses, see Murderer (disambiguation).
"Double murder" redirects here. For the film, see Double Murder.
Jereboam O. Beauchamp killing Solomon P. Sharp, an example of a murder.
Criminal law
Elements

    Actus reus Mens rea Causation Concurrence

Scope of criminal liability

    Accessory Accomplice Complicity Corporate Principal Vicarious

Severity of offense

    Felony (or Indictable offense) Infraction (also called violation) Misdemeanor (or Summary offense)

Inchoate offenses

    Attempt Conspiracy Incitement Solicitation

Offense against the person

    Assassination Assault Battery Child abuse Criminal negligence Defamation Domestic violence False imprisonment Frameup Harassment Home invasion Homicide Human trafficking Intimidation Kidnapping Menacing Manslaughter (corporate) Mayhem Murder
        felony Negligent homicide Robbery Stalking Torture

Sexual offenses

    Adultery Bigamy Child sexual abuse Cybersex trafficking Fornication Homosexuality Incest Indecent exposure Masturbation Obscenity Prostitution Rape Sex trafficking Sexual assault Sexual slavery Voyeurism

Crimes against property

    Arson Arms trafficking Blackmail Bribery Burglary Embezzlement Extortion False pretenses Forgery Fraud Gambling Intellectual property violation Larceny Looting Payola Pickpocketing Possessing stolen property Robbery Smuggling Tax evasion Theft Trespass to land Vandalism, Mischief

Crimes against justice

    Compounding Malfeasance in office Miscarriage of justice Misprision Obstruction Perjury Perverting the course of justice

Crimes against the public

    Apostasy Begging Censorship violation Dueling Genocide Hostage-taking Illegal consumption (such as prohibition of drugs, alcohol, and smoking) Miscegenation Piracy Regicide Terrorism Usurpation War crimes

Crimes against animals

    Cruelty to animals Poaching Wildlife smuggling Bestiality

Crimes against the state

    Lèse-majesté Treason Espionage Secession Sedition Subversion

Defenses to liability

    Actual innocence Automatism Consent Defense of property Diminished responsibility Duress Entrapment Ignorantia juris non excusat Infancy Insanity Justification Mistake (of law) Necessity Provocation Self-defense

Other common-law areas

    Contracts Defenses Evidence Property Torts Wills, trusts and estates

Portals

    Law

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Homicide
Murder

Note: Varies by jurisdiction

    Assassination Child murder Consensual homicide Contract killing Crime of passion Depraved-heart murder Felony murder rule Foeticide Honor killing Human cannibalism
        Child cannibalism Human sacrifice
        Child sacrifice Internet homicide Lonely hearts killer Lust murder Lynching Mass murder Mass shooting Mass stabbing Misdemeanor murder Murder for body parts Murder–suicide Poisoning Proxy murder Pseudocommando Serial killer
        Angel of mercy Spree killer Thrill killing Torture murder Vehicle-ramming attack Wrongful execution
        Judicial murder

Manslaughter

    In English law Voluntary manslaughter Negligent homicide Vehicular homicide

Non-criminal homicide

Note: Varies by jurisdiction

    War Assisted suicide Capital punishment Euthanasia Foeticide Justifiable homicide "License to kill"

Family

    Avunculicide/Nepoticide Familicide Mariticide Uxoricide Prolicide
        Filicide Infanticide Neonaticide Siblicide
        Fratricide Sororicide Parricide
        Matricide Patricide Senicide

Other

    Crucifixion Deicide Democide Friendly fire Gendercide
        Femicide Androcide Genocide Omnicide Regicide Stoning Tyrannicide War crime

    vte

Murder is the unlawful killing of another human without justification or valid excuse committed with the necessary intention as defined by the law in a specific jurisdiction.[1][2][3] This state of mind may, depending upon the jurisdiction, distinguish murder from other forms of unlawful homicide, such as manslaughter. Manslaughter is killing committed in the absence of malice,[note 1] such as in the case of voluntary manslaughter brought about by reasonable provocation, or diminished capacity. Involuntary manslaughter, where it is recognized, is a killing that lacks all but the most attenuated guilty intent, recklessness.

Most societies consider murder to be an extremely serious crime, and thus believe that a person convicted of murder should receive harsh punishments for the purposes of retribution, deterrence, rehabilitation, or incapacitation. In most countries, a person convicted of murder generally receives a long-term prison sentence, a life sentence, or capital punishment.[4]
Etymology

The modern English word "murder" descends from the Proto-Indo-European *mŕ̥-trom which meant "killing", a noun derived from *mer- "to die".[5]

Proto-Germanic, in fact, had two nouns derived from this word, later merging into the modern English noun: *murþrą "death, killing, murder" (directly from Proto-Indo-European*mŕ̥-trom), whence Old English morðor "secret or unlawful killing of a person, murder; mortal sin, crime; punishment, torment, misery";[6] and *murþrijô "murderer; homicide" (from the verb *murþrijaną "to murder"), giving Old English myrþra "homicide, murder; murderer". There was a third word for "murder" in Proto-Germanic, continuing Proto-Indo-European *mr̥tós "dead" (compare Latin mors), giving Proto-Germanic *murþą "death, killing, murder" and Old English morþ "death, crime, murder" (compare German Mord).

The -d- first attested in Middle English mordre, mourdre, murder, murdre could have been influenced by Old French murdre, itself derived from the Germanic noun via Frankish *murþra (compare Old High German murdreo, murdiro), though the same sound development can be seen with burden (from burthen). The alternative murther (attested up to the 19th century) springs directly from the Old English forms. Middle English mordre is a verb from Anglo-Saxon myrðrian from Proto-Germanic *murþrijaną, or, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, from the noun.[7]
Use of the term

In many countries, out of concern for being accused of defamation,[8] journalists are generally careful not to identify a suspect as a murderer until the suspect is convicted of murder in a court of law. After arrest, for example, journalists may instead write that the person was "arrested on suspicion of murder",[9] or, after a prosecutor files charges, as an "accused murderer".[10]

Opponents of abortion consider abortion a form of murder.[11][12] In some countries, a fetus is a legal person who can be murdered, and killing a pregnant woman is considered a double homicide.[13][14]
Definition

The eighteenth-century English jurist William Blackstone (citing Edward Coke), in his Commentaries on the Laws of England set out the common law definition of murder, which by this definition occurs

    when a person, of sound memory and discretion, unlawfully kills any reasonable creature in being and under the king's peace, with malice aforethought, either express or implied.[15]

At common law, murder was normally punishable by death.[16]

The elements of common law murder are:

    unlawful
    killing
    through criminal act or omission
    of a human
    by another human
    intentional killing
    with malice aforethought.[17]
    Unlawful – This distinguishes murder from killings that are done within the boundaries of law, such as capital punishment, justified self-defense, or the killing of enemy combatants by lawful combatants as well as causing collateral damage to non-combatants during a war.[18]
    Killing – At common law life ended with cardiopulmonary arrest[17] – the total and irreversible cessation of blood circulation and respiration.[17] With advances in medical technology courts have adopted irreversible cessation of all brain function as marking the end of life.[17]
    Criminal act or omission – Killing can be committed by an act or an omission.[19]
    Of a human – This element presents the issue of when life begins. At common law, a fetus was not a human being.[20] Life began when the fetus passed through the vagina and took its first breath.[17]
    By another human – In early common law, suicide was considered murder.[17] The requirement that the person killed be someone other than the perpetrator excluded suicide from the definition of murder.
    With malice aforethought – Originally malice aforethought carried its everyday meaning – a deliberate and premeditated (prior intent) killing of another motivated by ill will. Murder necessarily required that an appreciable time pass between the formation and execution of the intent to kill. The courts broadened the scope of murder by eliminating the requirement of actual premeditation and deliberation as well as true malice. All that was required for malice aforethought to exist is that the perpetrator act with one of the four states of mind that constitutes "malice".

In contrast with manslaughter, murder requires the mental element known as malice aforethought. Mitigating factors that weigh against a finding of intent to kill, such as "loss of control" or "diminished responsibility", may result in the reduction of a murder charge to voluntary manslaughter.[16]

The four states of mind recognised as constituting "malice" are:[21]

    Intent to kill,
    Intent to inflict grievous bodily harm short of death,
    Reckless indifference to an unjustifiably high risk to human life (sometimes described as an "abandoned and malignant heart"), or
    Intent to commit a dangerous felony (the "felony murder" doctrine).

Under state of mind (i), intent to kill, the deadly weapon rule applies. Thus, if the defendant intentionally uses a deadly weapon or instrument against the victim, such use authorises a permissive inference of intent to kill. Examples of deadly weapons and instruments include but are not limited to guns, knives, deadly toxins or chemicals or gases and even vehicles when intentionally used to harm one or more victims.

Under state of mind (iii), an "abandoned and malignant heart", the killing must result from the defendant's conduct involving a reckless indifference to human life and a conscious disregard of an unreasonable risk of death or serious bodily injury. In Australian jurisdictions, the unreasonable risk must amount to a foreseen probability of death (or grievous bodily harm in most states), as opposed to possibility.[22]

Under state of mind (iv), the felony-murder doctrine, the felony committed must be an inherently dangerous felony, such as burglary, arson, rape, robbery or kidnapping. Importantly, the underlying felony cannot be a lesser included offense such as assault, otherwise all criminal homicides would be murder as all are felonies.

In Spanish criminal law,[23] asesinato (literally 'assassination'): takes place when any of these requirements concur: Treachery (the use of means to avoid risk for the aggressor or to ensure that the crime goes unpunished), price or reward (financial gain) or viciousness (deliberately increasing the pain of the victim). After the last reform of the Spanish Criminal Code, in force since July 1, 2015, another circumstance that turns homicide (homicidio) into assassination is the desire to facilitate the commission of another crime or to prevent it from being discovered.[24]

As with most legal terms, the precise definition of murder varies between jurisdictions and is usually codified in some form of legislation. Even when the legal distinction between murder and manslaughter is clear, it is not unknown for a jury to find a murder defendant guilty of the lesser offense. The jury might sympathize with the defendant (e.g. in a crime of passion, or in the case of a bullied victim who kills their tormentor), and the jury may wish to protect the defendant from a sentence of life imprisonment or execution.
Degrees
"Murder in the second degree" and "Premeditated murder" redirect here. For the album, see Murder in the Second Degree. For the film, see Premeditated Murder.

Some jurisdictions divide murder by degrees. The distinction between first- and second-degree murder exists, for example, in Canadian murder law and U.S. murder law. Some US states maintain the offense of capital murder.

The most common division is between first- and second-degree murder. Generally, second-degree murder is common law murder, and first-degree is an aggravated form. The aggravating factors of first-degree murder depend on the jurisdiction, but may include a specific intent to kill, premeditation, or deliberation. In some, murders committed by acts such as strangulation, poisoning, or lying in wait are also treated as first-degree murder.[25] A few states in the U.S. further distinguish third-degree murder, but they differ significantly in which kinds of murders they classify as second-degree versus third-degree. For example, Minnesota defines third-degree murder as depraved-heart murder, whereas Florida defines third-degree murder as felony murder (except when the underlying felony is specifically listed in the definition of first-degree murder).[26][27]

Some jurisdictions also distinguish premeditated murder. This is the crime of wrongfully and intentionally causing the death of another human being (also known as murder) after rationally considering the timing or method of doing so, in order to either increase the likelihood of success, or to evade detection or apprehension.[28] State laws in the United States vary as to definitions of "premeditation". In some states, premeditation may be construed as taking place mere seconds before the murder. Premeditated murder is one of the most serious forms of homicide, and is punished more severely than manslaughter or other types of homicide, often with a life sentence without the possibility of parole, or in some countries, the death penalty. In the U.S., federal law (18 U.S.C. § 1111(a)) criminalizes premeditated murder, felony murder and second-degree murder committed under situations where federal jurisdiction applies.[29] In Canada, the criminal code classifies murder as either first- or second-degree. The former type of murder is often called premeditated murder, although premeditation is not the only way murder can be classified as first-degree. In the Netherlands, the traditional strict distinction between premeditated intentional killing (classed as murder, moord) and non-premeditated intentional killing (manslaughter, doodslag) is maintained; when differentiating between murder and manslaughter, the only relevant factor is the existence or not of premeditation (rather than the existence or not of mitigating or aggravated factors). Manslaughter (non-premeditated intentional killing) with aggravating factors is punished more severely, but it is not classified as murder, because murder is an offense which always requires premeditation.[30]
Common law

According to Blackstone, English common law identified murder as a public wrong.[31] According to common law, murder is considered to be malum in se, that is, an act which is evil within itself. An act such as murder is wrong or evil by its very nature, and it is the very nature of the act which does not require any specific detailing or definition in the law to consider murder a crime.[32]

Some jurisdictions still take a common law view of murder. In such jurisdictions, what is considered to be murder is defined by precedent case law or previous decisions of the courts of law. However, although the common law is by nature flexible and adaptable, in the interests both of certainty and of securing convictions, most common law jurisdictions have codified their criminal law and now have statutory definitions of murder.
Exclusions
General

Although laws vary by country, there are circumstances of exclusion that are common in many legal systems.

    The killing of enemy combatants who have not surrendered, when committed by lawful combatants in accordance with lawful orders in war, is generally not considered murder. Illicit killings within a war may constitute murder or homicidal war crimes; see Laws of war.
    Self-defense: acting in self-defense or in defense of another person is generally accepted as legal justification for killing a person in situations that would otherwise have been murder. However, a self-defense killing might be considered manslaughter if the killer established control of the situation before the killing took place, such as imperfect self-defense. In the case of self-defense, it is called a "justifiable homicide".[33]
    Unlawful killings without malice or intent are considered manslaughter.
    In many common law countries, provocation is a partial defense to a charge of murder which acts by converting what would otherwise have been murder into manslaughter (this is voluntary manslaughter, which is more severe than involuntary manslaughter).
    Accidental killings are considered homicides. Depending on the circumstances, these may or may not be considered criminal offenses; they are often considered manslaughter.
    Suicide does not constitute murder in most societies. Assisting a suicide, however, may be considered murder in some circumstances.

Specific to certain countries

    Capital punishment: some countries practice the death penalty. Capital punishment may be ordered by a legitimate court of law as the result of a conviction in a criminal trial with due process for a serious crime. All member states of the Council of Europe are prohibited from using the death penalty.
    Euthanasia, doctor-assisted suicide: the administration of lethal drugs by a doctor to a terminally ill patient, if the intention is solely to alleviate pain, in many jurisdictions it is seen as a special case (see the doctrine of double effect and the case of Dr John Bodkin Adams).[34]
    Killing to prevent the theft of one's property may be legal under certain circumstances, depending on the jurisdiction.[35][36] In 2013, a jury in south Texas acquitted a man who killed a sex worker who attempted to run away with his money.[37]
    Killing an intruder who is found by an owner to be in the owner's home (having entered unlawfully): legal in most US states (see Castle doctrine).[38]
    Killing to prevent specific forms of aggravated rape or sexual assault – killing of attacker by the potential victim or by witnesses to the scene; legal in parts of the US and in various other countries.[39]
    In some countries, the killing for what are considered reasons connected to family honor, usually involving killing due to sexual, religious or caste reasons (known as honor killing), committed frequently by a husband, father or male relative of the victim, is not considered murder; it may not be considered a criminal act or it may be considered a criminal offense other than murder.[40][41] International law, including the Istanbul Convention (the first legally binding convention against domestic violence and violence against women) prohibits these types of killings (see Article 42 – Unacceptable justifications for crimes, including crimes committed in the name of so-called honor).[42]
    In the United States, in most states and in federal jurisdiction, a killing by a police officer is excluded from prosecution if the officer reasonably believes they are being threatened with deadly force by the victim. This may include such actions by the victim as reaching into a glove compartment or pocket for license and registration, if the officer reasonably believes that the victim might be reaching for a gun.[43]

Victim

All jurisdictions require that the victim be a natural person; that is, a human being who was still alive before being murdered. In other words, under the law one cannot murder a corpse, a corporation, a non-human animal, or any other non-human organism such as a plant or bacterium.

California's murder statute, penal code section 187, expressly mentioned a fetus as being capable of being killed, and was interpreted by the Supreme Court of California in 1994 as not requiring any proof of the viability of the fetus as a prerequisite to a murder conviction.[44] This holding has two implications. Firstly, a defendant in California can be convicted of murder for killing a fetus which the mother herself could have terminated without committing a crime.[44] And secondly, as stated by Justice Stanley Mosk in his dissent, because women carrying nonviable fetuses may not be visibly pregnant, it may be possible for a defendant to be convicted of intentionally murdering a person they did not know existed.[44]
Mitigating circumstances

Some countries allow conditions that "affect the balance of the mind" to be regarded as mitigating circumstances. This means that a person may be found guilty of "manslaughter" on the basis of "diminished responsibility" rather than being found guilty of murder, if it can be proved that the killer was suffering from a condition that affected their judgment at the time. Depression, post-traumatic stress disorder and medication side-effects are examples of conditions that may be taken into account when assessing responsibility.
Insanity
Main articles: Insanity defense and M'Naghten rules

Mental disorder may apply to a wide range of disorders including psychosis caused by schizophrenia and dementia, and excuse the person from the need to undergo the stress of a trial as to liability. Usually, sociopathy and other personality disorders are not legally considered insanity. In some jurisdictions, following the pre-trial hearing to determine the extent of the disorder, the defense of "not guilty by reason of insanity" may be used to get a not guilty verdict.[45] This defense has two elements:

    That the defendant had a serious mental illness, disease, or defect
    That the defendant's mental condition, at the time of the killing, rendered the perpetrator unable to determine right from wrong, or that what they were doing was wrong

Aaron Alexis holding a shotgun during his rampage

Under New York law, for example:

    § 40.15 Mental disease or defect. In any prosecution for an offense, it is an affirmative defence that when the defendant engaged in the proscribed conduct, he lacked criminal responsibility by reason of mental disease or defect. Such lack of criminal responsibility means that at the time of such conduct, as a result of mental disease or defect, he lacked substantial capacity to know or appreciate either: 1. The nature and consequences of such conduct; or 2. That such conduct was wrong.
    — N.Y. Penal Law, § 40.15[46]

Under the French Penal Code:

    Article 122-1

        A person is not criminally liable who, when the act was committed, was suffering from a psychological or neuropsychological disorder which destroyed his discernment or his ability to control his actions.
        A person who, at the time he acted, was suffering from a psychological or neuropsychological disorder which reduced his discernment or impeded his ability to control his actions, remains punishable; however, the court shall take this into account when it decides the penalty and determines its regime.
        — Penal Code §122-1 found at Legifrance web site

Those who successfully argue a defense based on a mental disorder are usually referred to mandatory clinical treatment until they are certified safe to be released back into the community, rather than prison.[47]
Postpartum depression

Postpartum depression (also known as post-natal depression) is recognized in some countries as a mitigating factor in cases of infanticide. According to Susan Friedman, "Two dozen nations have infanticide laws that decrease the penalty for mothers who kill their children of up to one year of age. The United States does not have such a law, but mentally ill mothers may plead not guilty by reason of insanity."[48] In the law of the Republic of Ireland, infanticide was made a separate crime from murder in 1949, applicable for the mother of a baby under one year old where "the balance of her mind was disturbed by reason of her not having fully recovered from the effect of giving birth to the child or by reason of the effect of lactation consequent upon the birth of the child".[49] Since independence, death sentences for murder in such cases had always been commuted;[50] the new act was intended "to eliminate all the terrible ritual of the black cap and the solemn words of the judge pronouncing sentence of death in those cases ... where it is clear to the Court and to everybody, except perhaps the unfortunate accused, that the sentence will never be carried out."[51] In Russia, murder of a newborn child by the mother has been a separate crime since 1996.[52]
Unintentional

For a killing to be considered murder in nine out of fifty states in the US, there normally needs to be an element of intent. A defendant may argue that they took precautions not to kill, that the death could not have been anticipated, or was unavoidable. As a general rule, manslaughter[53] constitutes reckless killing, but manslaughter also includes criminally negligent (i.e. grossly negligent) homicide.[54] Unintentional killing that results from an involuntary action generally cannot constitute murder.[55] After examining the evidence, a judge or jury (depending on the jurisdiction) would determine whether the killing was intentional or unintentional.
Diminished capacity

In jurisdictions using the Uniform Penal Code, such as California, diminished capacity may be a defense. For example, Dan White used this defense[56] to obtain a manslaughter conviction, instead of murder, in the assassination of Mayor George Moscone and Supervisor Harvey Milk. Afterward, California amended its penal code to provide "As a matter of public policy there shall be no defense of diminished capacity, diminished responsibility, or irresistible impulse in a criminal action...."[57]
Aggravating circumstances

Murder with specified aggravating circumstances is often punished more harshly. Depending on the jurisdiction, such circumstances may include:

    Premeditation
    Poisoning
    Lying in wait
    Murder of a child
    Murder committed during sexual assault
    Murder committed during kidnapping[58]
    Multiple murders committed within one criminal transaction or in different transactions as part of one broader scheme
    Murder of a police officer,[59][60] judge, firefighter or witness to a crime[61]
    Murder of a pregnant woman[62]
    Crime committed for pay or other reward, such as contract killing[63]
    Exceptional brutality or cruelty, torture murder
    Murder committed by an offender previously convicted of murder
    Methods which are dangerous to the public[64] e.g. explosion, arson, shooting in a crowd etc.[65]
    Murder for a political cause[59][66]
    Murder committed in order to conceal another crime or facilitate its commission.[67]
    Murder committed in order to obtain material gain, for example to obtain an inheritance[68]
    Hate crimes, which occur when a perpetrator targets a victim because of their perceived membership in a certain social group.
    Treachery (e.g. Heimtücke in German law)

In the United States and Canada, these murders are referred to as first-degree or aggravated murders.[69] Under English criminal law, murder always carries a mandatory life sentence, but is not classified into degrees. Penalties for murder committed under aggravating circumstances are often higher under English law than the 15-year minimum non-parole period that otherwise serves as a starting point for a murder committed by an adult.
Felony murder rule
Main article: Felony murder rule

A legal doctrine in some common law jurisdictions broadens the crime of murder: when an offender kills in the commission of a dangerous crime, (regardless of intent), he or she is guilty of murder. The felony murder rule is often justified by its supporters as a means of preventing dangerous felonies,[70] but the case of Ryan Holle[71] shows it can be used very widely.

The felony-murder reflects the versari in re illicita: the offender is objectively responsible for the event of the unintentional crime;[72] in fact the figure of the civil law systems corresponding to felony murder is the preterintentional homicide (art. 222-7 French penal code,[73][74][75] art. 584 Italian penal code,[76] art. 227 German penal code[77] etc.). Felony murder contrasts with the principle of guilt, for which in England it was, at least formally, abolished in 1957, in Canada it was quashed by the Supreme Court, while in the USA it continues to survive.[78][79][80]
Year-and-a-day rule
Main article: Year and a day rule

In some common law jurisdictions, a defendant accused of murder is not guilty if the victim survives for longer than one year and one day after the attack.[81] This reflects the likelihood that if the victim dies, other factors will have contributed to the cause of death, breaking the chain of causation; and also means that the responsible person does not have a charge of murder "hanging over their head indefinitely".[82] Subject to any statute of limitations, the accused could still be charged with an offense reflecting the seriousness of the initial assault.

With advances in modern medicine, most countries have abandoned a fixed time period and test causation on the facts of the case. This is known as "delayed death" and cases where this was applied or was attempted to be applied go back to at least 1966.[83]

In England and Wales, the "year-and-a-day rule" was abolished by the Law Reform (Year and a Day Rule) Act 1996. However, if death occurs three years or more after the original attack then prosecution can take place only with the attorney-general's approval.

In the United States, many jurisdictions have abolished the rule as well.[84][85] Abolition of the rule has been accomplished by enactment of statutory criminal codes, which had the effect of displacing the common-law definitions of crimes and corresponding defenses. In 2001 the Supreme Court of the United States held that retroactive application of a state supreme court decision abolishing the year-and-a-day rule did not violate the Ex Post Facto Clause of Article I of the United States Constitution.[86]

The potential effect of fully abolishing the rule can be seen in the case of 74-year-old William Barnes, charged with the murder of a Philadelphia police officer Walter T. Barclay Jr., who he had shot nearly 41 years previously. Barnes had served 16 years in prison for attempting to murder Barkley, but when the policeman died on August 19, 2007, this was alleged to be from complications of the wounds suffered from the shooting – and Barnes was charged with his murder. He was acquitted on May 24, 2010.[87]
Contributing factors

According to Peter Morrall, the motivations for murder fit into the following 4 categories:[88]

    Lust: The murderer seeks to kill rivals to obtain objects of their sexual desire
    Love: The murderer seeks to "mercy kill" a loved one with a major deformity or an incurable illness.
    Loathing: The murderer seeks to kill a loathed person (such as an abusive parent) or members of a loathed group or culture.
    Loot: The murderer seeks some form of financial gain.

Morall takes a biological view of offending when he insists the risk factors that may increase the chance that somebody will commit a murder include:[88]

    Testosterone, the primary male sex hormone, is correlated with competitive and assertive behaviour.
    Reduction in serotonin increases likelihood of impulsive hostile behaviour.
    Alteration in the breakdown of glucose appears to affect mood and behaviour.
    Hyperglycemia and Hypoglycemia can both lead to aggression.
    Consumption of alcohol can lead to reduced self control.
    Environmental pollutants circulating in the body are linked to heightened aggression.
    Malnutrition from eating too much junk food can provoke aggressive behaviour and even murder.

Certain personality disorders are associated with an increased homicide rate, most notably narcissistic, anti-social, and histrionic personality disorders and those associated with psychopathology.[89]

Several studies have shown that there is a correlation between murder rates and poverty.[90][91][92][93] A 2000 study showed that regions of the state of São Paulo in Brazil with lower income also had higher rates of murder.[93]
Religious attitudes
Abrahamic context
A group of Thugs strangling a traveller on a highway in the early 19th century

In the Abrahamic religions, the first ever murder was committed by Cain against his brother Abel out of jealousy.[94] In the past, certain types of homicide were lawful and justified. Georg Oesterdiekhoff wrote:

    Evans-Pritchard says about the Nuer from Sudan: "Homicide is not forbidden, and Nuer do not think it wrong to kill a man in fair fight. On the contrary, a man who slays another in combat is admired for his courage and skill." (Evans-Pritchard 1956: 195) This statement is true for most African tribes, for pre-modern Europeans, for Indigenous Australians, and for Native Americans, according to ethnographic reports from all over the world. ... Homicides rise to incredible numbers among headhunter cultures such as the Papua. When a boy is born, the father has to kill a man. He needs a name for his child and can receive it only by a man, he himself has murdered. When a man wants to marry, he must kill a man. When a man dies, his family again has to kill a man.[95]

In many such societies the redress was not via a legal system, but by blood revenge, although there might also be a form of payment that could be made instead—such as the weregild which in early Germanic society could be paid to the victim's family in lieu of their right of revenge.

One of the oldest-known prohibitions against murder appears in the Sumerian Code of Ur-Nammu written sometime between 2100 and 2050 BC. The code states, "If a man commits a murder, that man must be killed."
Judaism and Christianity

The prohibition against murder is one of the Ten Commandments given by God to Moses in Exodus 20:2–17 and Deuteronomy 5:6–21, which are part of the scripture for both Jews and Christians.
In Islam

In Islam according to the Qur'an, one of the greatest sins is to kill a human being who has committed no fault.[96]

"Do not take a ˹human˺ life—made sacred by Allah—except with ˹legal˺ right." [Quran 17:33]

"That is why We ordained for the Children of Israel that whoever takes a life—unless as a punishment for murder or mischief in the land—it will be as if they killed all of humanity; and whoever saves a life, it will be as if they saved all of humanity." [Quran 5:32]

"˹They are˺ those who do not invoke any other god besides Allah, nor take a ˹human˺ life—made sacred by Allah—except with ˹legal˺ right,1 nor commit fornication. And whoever does ˹any of˺ this will face the penalty." [Quran 25:68]
Historical attitudes

The term assassin derives from Hashshashin,[97] a militant Ismaili Shi'ite sect, active from the 8th to 14th centuries. This mystic secret society killed members of the Abbasid, Fatimid, Seljuq and Crusader elite for political and religious reasons.[98] The Thuggee cult that plagued India was devoted to Kali, the goddess of death and destruction.[99][100] According to some estimates the Thuggees murdered 1 million people between 1740 and 1840.[101] The Aztecs believed that without regular offerings of blood the sun god Huitzilopochtli would withdraw his support for them and destroy the world as they knew it.[102] According to Ross Hassig, author of Aztec Warfare, "between 10,000 and 80,400 persons" were sacrificed in the 1487 re-consecration of the Great Pyramid of Tenochtitlan.[103][104] Japanese samurai had the right to strike with their sword at anyone of a lower class who compromised their honour.[105]
Slavery

Southern slave codes did make willful killing of a slave illegal in most cases.[106] For example, the 1860 Mississippi case of Oliver v. State charged the defendant with murdering his own slave.[107] In 1811, the wealthy white planter Arthur Hodge was hanged for murdering several of his slaves on his plantation in the Virgin Islands.[108]
Honor killings in Corsica

In Corsica, vendetta was a social code that required Corsicans to kill anyone who wronged their family honor. Between 1821 and 1852, no fewer than 4,300 murders were perpetrated in Corsica.[109]
Incidence
See also: List of countries by intentional homicide rate
International murder rate per 100,000 inhabitants, 2011
  0–1
  1–2
  2–5
  5–10
  10–20
  >20

The World Health Organization reported in October 2002 that a person is murdered every 60 seconds.[110] An estimated 520,000 people were murdered in 2000 around the globe. Another study estimated the worldwide murder rate at 456,300 in 2010 with a 35% increase since 1990.[111] Two-fifths of them were young people between the ages of 10 and 29 who were killed by other young people.[112] Because murder is the least likely crime to go unreported, statistics of murder are seen as a bellwether of overall crime rates.[113]
Historical variation
Intentional homicide rate per 100,000 inhabitants, 2009

According to scholar Pieter Spierenburg homicide rates per 100,000 in Europe have fallen over the centuries, from 35 per 100,000 in medieval times, to 20 in 1500 AD, 5 in 1700, to below two per 100,000 in 1900.[114]

In the United States, murder rates have been higher and have fluctuated. They fell below 2 per 100,000 by 1900, rose during the first half of the century, dropped in the years following World War II, and bottomed out at 4.0 in 1957 before rising again.[115] The rate stayed in 9 to 10 range most of the period from 1972 to 1994, before falling to 5 in present times.[114] The increase since 1957 would have been even greater if not for the significant improvements in medical techniques and emergency response times, which mean that more and more attempted homicide victims survive. According to one estimate, if the lethality levels of criminal assaults of 1964 still applied in 1993, the country would have seen the murder rate of around 26 per 100,000, almost triple the actually observed rate of 9.5 per 100,000.[116]
The historical homicide rate in Stockholm since 1400 AD. The murder rate was very high in the Middle Ages. The rate has declined greatly: from 45/100,000 to a low of 0.6 in the 1950s. The last decades have seen the homicide rate rise slowly.

A similar, but less pronounced pattern has been seen in major European countries as well. The murder rate in the United Kingdom fell to 1 per 100,000 by the beginning of the 20th century and as low as 0.62 per 100,000 in 1960, and was at 1.28 per 100,000 as of 2009. The murder rate in France (excluding Corsica) bottomed out after World War II at less than 0.4 per 100,000, quadrupling to 1.6 per 100,000 since then.[117]

The specific factors driving these dynamics in murder rates are complex and not universally agreed upon. Much of the raise in the U.S. murder rate during the first half of the 20th century is generally thought to be attributed to gang violence associated with Prohibition. Since most murders are committed by young males, the near simultaneous low in the murder rates of major developed countries circa 1960 can be attributed to low birth rates during the Great Depression and World War II. Causes of further moves are more controversial. Some of the more exotic factors claimed to affect murder rates include the availability of abortion[118] and the likelihood of chronic exposure to lead during childhood (due to the use of leaded paint in houses and tetraethyllead as a gasoline additive in internal combustion engines).[119]
Rates by country

Murder rates vary greatly among countries and societies around the world. In the Western world, murder rates in most countries have declined significantly during the 20th century and are now between 1 and 4 cases per 100,000 people per year. Latin America and the Caribbean, the region with the highest murder rate in the world,[120] experienced more than 2.5 million murders between 2000 and 2017.[121]
UNODC: Per 100,000 population (2011)

Murder rates in jurisdictions such as Japan, Singapore, Hong Kong, Iceland, Switzerland, Italy, Spain and Germany are among the lowest in the world, around 0.3–1 cases per 100,000 people per year; the rate of the United States is among the highest of developed countries, around 4.5 in 2014,[122] with rates in larger cities sometimes over 40 per 100,000.[123] The top ten highest murder rates are in Honduras (91.6 per 100,000), El Salvador, Ivory Coast, Venezuela, Belize, Jamaica, U.S. Virgin Islands, Guatemala, Saint Kitts and Nevis and Zambia. (UNODC, 2011 – full table here).

The following absolute murder counts per-country are not comparable because they are not adjusted by each country's total population. Nonetheless, they are included here for reference, with 2010 used as the base year (they may or may not include justifiable homicide, depending on the jurisdiction). There were 52,260 murders in Brazil, consecutively elevating the record set in 2009.[124] Over half a million people were shot to death in Brazil between 1979 and 2003.[125] 33,335 murder cases were registered across India,[126] approximately 17,000 murders in Colombia (the murder rate was 38 per 100,000 people, in 2008 murders went down to 15,000),[127] approximately 16,000 murders in South Africa,[128] approximately 15,000 murders in the United States,[129] approximately 26,000 murders in Mexico,[130] about 8,000 murders committed in Russia,[131] approximately 13,000 murders in Venezuela,[132] approximately 4,000 murders in El Salvador,[133] approximately 1,400 murders in Jamaica,[134] approximately 550 murders in Canada[135] and approximately 470 murders in Trinidad and Tobago.[134] Pakistan reported 12,580 murders.[136]
United States
The Lake Bodom murders in Espoo, Finland is the most famous unsolved homicide case in Finnish criminal history.[137] The tent is investigated immediately after the murders in 1960.
The scene of a murder in Rio de Janeiro. More than 800,000 people were murdered in Brazil between 1980 and 2004.[138]

In the United States, 666,160 people were killed between 1960 and 1996.[139] Approximately 90% of murders in the US are committed by males.[140] Between 1976 and 2005, 23.5% of all murder victims and 64.8% of victims murdered by intimate partners were female.[141] For women in the US, homicide is the leading cause of death in the workplace.[142]

In the US, murder is the leading cause of death for African American males aged 15 to 34. Between 1976 and 2008, African Americans were victims of 329,825 homicides.[143][144] In 2006, Federal Bureau of Investigation's Supplementary Homicide Report indicated that nearly half of the 14,990 murder victims that year were Black (7421).[145] In the year 2007, there were 3,221 black victims and 3,587 white victims of non-negligent homicides. While 2,905 of the black victims were killed by a black offender, 2,918 of the white victims were killed by white offenders. There were 566 white victims of black offenders and 245 black victims of white offenders.[146] The "white" category in the Uniform Crime Reports (UCR) includes non-black Hispanics.[147] Murder demographics are affected by the improvement of trauma care, which has resulted in reduced lethality of violent assaults – thus the murder rate may not necessarily indicate the overall level of social violence.[116]

Workplace homicide, which tripled during the 1980s, is the fastest growing category of murder in America.[142][148][149]

Development of murder rates over time in different countries is often used by both supporters and opponents of capital punishment and gun control. Using properly filtered data, it is possible to make the case for or against either of these issues. For example, one could look at murder rates in the United States from 1950 to 2000,[150] and notice that those rates went up sharply shortly after a moratorium on death sentences was effectively imposed in the late 1960s. This fact has been used to argue that capital punishment serves as a deterrent and, as such, it is morally justified. Capital punishment opponents frequently counter that the United States has much higher murder rates than Canada and most European Union countries, although all those countries have abolished the death penalty. Overall, the global pattern is too complex, and on average, the influence of both these factors may not be significant and could be more social, economic, and cultural.

Despite the immense improvements in forensics in the past few decades, the fraction of murders solved has decreased in the United States, from 90% in 1960 to 61% in 2007.[151] Solved murder rates in major U.S. cities varied in 2007 from 36% in Boston, Massachusetts to 76% in San Jose, California.[152] Major factors affecting the arrest rate include witness cooperation[151] and the number of people assigned to investigate the case.[152]
Investigation

The success rate of criminal investigations into murders (the clearance rate) tends to be relatively high for murder compared to other crimes, due to its seriousness. In the United States, the clearance rate was 62.6% in 2004.[citation needed]
See also
Related lists

    Lists of murders
    List of types of killing
        Axe murder
    List of unsolved deaths

Related topics

    Child murder
    Culpable homicide
    Depraved-heart murder
    Double murder
    Letting die
    Mass murder
    Misdemeanor murder
    Murder conviction without a body
    Seven laws of Noah
    Stigmatized property
    Thrill killing
    Capital murder
    Assassination, the murder of a prominent person, such as a head of state or head of government.

Laws by country

    Australia
    Brazil
    Canada
    China
    Cuba
    Denmark
    England and Wales
    Finland
    France
    Germany
    Hong Kong
    India
    Israel
    Italy
    Netherlands
    Northern Ireland
    Norway
    Peru
    Portugal
    Romania
    Russia
    Sweden
    Switzerland
    United States

Notes

    This is "malice" in a technical legal sense, not the more usual English sense denoting an emotional state. See malice (law).

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Bibliography

    Lord Mustill on the Common Law concerning murder
    Sir Edward Coke Co. Inst., Pt. III, ch.7, p. 50

External links
Look up murder in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Murder.

    Introduction and Updated Information on the Seville Statement on Violence
    The Seville Statement
    Atlas of United States Mortality – U.S. Centers for Disease Control
    Cezanne's depiction of "The Murder" – National Museums Liverpool

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The All-Time Worst People in History
Ranker Community
Ranker Community
Updated April 16, 2024
4.8M views
Ranked By

3.1M
VOTES
361.9K
VOTERS
Voting Rules
Horrible, real (not fictional) people who have committed historical crimes. No celebrities (actors, TV personalities, musicians, athletes) or politicians you disagree with.
The absolute worst people in history, ranked by the wisdom of the crowd. Who are the worst people in history? This list includes mass-murdering dictators, psychopathic serial killers, sociopathic religious leaders, insane politicians, deceptive political commentators, infamous historical figures, and bad people make our eyes and ears bleed. Who are the worst people of all time? This human scum has incited genocide, executed ethnic cleansing, enslaved entire races of people, practiced cannibalism, orchestrated arbitrary homicide, and brainwashed people who trusted them. In short, these are some of the most evil people in history.

Anyone can vote on this list of vile villains and evil lunatics, making it an accurate, real-time ranking of the world's worst people ever. Call out history's most terrible people, and see how your picks stack up against everyone else's. Which names do you expect to see related to the top 10 most hated people or even the meanest person in the world?

Most divisive: 'Kalaignar' Karunanithy
Over 361.9K Ranker voters have come together to rank this list of The All-Time Worst People in History

Ranked by
region
age
search list
Adolf Hitler
1


151,223 VOTES
Agree or Disagree?
Adolf Hitler
Dec. at 56 (1889-1945)
Khalid Sheikh Mohammed
2


8,026 VOTES
Khalid Sheikh Mohammed
Age: 60
Abu Musab al-Zarqawi
3


7,275 VOTES
Abu Musab al-Zarqawi
Dec. at 39 (1966-2006)
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Mohamed Atta
4


5,337 VOTES
Mohamed Atta
Dec. at 33 (1968-2001)
Abubakar Shekau
5


4,021 VOTES
Abubakar Shekau
Uday Hussein
6


3,855 VOTES
Uday Hussein
Dec. at 39 (1964-2003)
Ayman al-Zawahiri
7


5,317 VOTES
Ayman al-Zawahiri
Age: 72

Abu Ali Al-anbari
8


2,424 VOTES
Abu Ali Al-anbari
Mullah Omar
9


3,916 VOTES
Mullah Omar
Age: 65
Josef Fritzl
10


1,620 VOTES
Josef Fritzl
Age: 89


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Dennis Rader - BTK
11


4,511 VOTES
Dennis Rader - BTK
Age: 79
Daniel Camargo Barbosa
12


1,667 VOTES
Daniel Camargo Barbosa
Dec. at 64 (1930-1994)
Abu Khattab Al-kurdi
13


2,026 VOTES
Abu Khattab Al-kurdi
Jihadi John
14


5,556 VOTES
Jihadi John
Abu Omar Al-baghdadi
15


2,056 VOTES
Abu Omar Al-baghdadi

Jeffrey Epstein
16


1,492 VOTES
Jeffrey Epstein
Age: 71
Mu'awiyeh Ibn Abu Sufyan
17


2,208 VOTES
Mu'awiyeh Ibn Abu Sufyan
Dec. at 78 (602-680)
Gary Ridgway - The Green River Killer
18


3,499 VOTES
Gary Ridgway - The Green River Killer
Age: 75
Abu Muslim Al-turkmani
19


1,381 VOTES
Abu Muslim Al-turkmani
Elias Abuelazam
20


1,403 VOTES
Elias Abuelazam
Age: 47


See what is ranked #1
11 Times People Disregarded Orders And Changed History
Abu Anas al-Shami
21


1,416 VOTES
Abu Anas al-Shami
Dec. at 35 (1969-2004)
Richard Ramirez - The Night Stalker
22


4,866 VOTES
Richard Ramirez - The Night Stalker
Dec. at 53 (1960-2013)
David Berkowitz
23


1,687 VOTES
David Berkowitz
Age: 70
Ramadan Abdel Rehim Mansour
24


1,238 VOTES
Ramadan Abdel Rehim Mansour
Age: 44
Ed Gein
25


4,162 VOTES
Ed Gein
Dec. at 77 (1906-1984)
Jack the Ripper
26


8,997 VOTES
Jack the Ripper
Zodiac Killer
27


7,401 VOTES
Zodiac Killer

Osama Bin Laden
28


106,680 VOTES
Osama Bin Laden
Dec. at 54 (1957-2011)
Abu Omar al-Kurdi
29


1,266 VOTES
Abu Omar al-Kurdi
Rudolf Höss
30


4,944 VOTES
Rudolf Höss
Dec. at 46 (1900-1947)


Tom Hanks
 falling to #8 on
The Most Trustworthy Celebrities In The World
Abu Izzadeen
31


1,114 VOTES
Abu Izzadeen
Age: 48
Sani Abacha
32


3,207 VOTES
Sani Abacha
Dec. at 54 (1943-1998)
Genrikh Lyushkov
33


1,255 VOTES
Genrikh Lyushkov
Dec. at 45 (1900-1945)
Cheka murderer.
Gertrude Baniszewski
34


3,435 VOTES
Gertrude Baniszewski
Dec. at 60 (1929-1990)
Ramzi Mohammed
35


1,515 VOTES
Ramzi Mohammed
Age: 42
Mohammed Bijeh
36


684 VOTES
Mohammed Bijeh
Dec. at 30 (1975-2005)
Shamil Basayev
37


2,537 VOTES
Shamil Basayev
Dec. at 41 (1965-2006)
Shirō Ishii
38


9,497 VOTES
Shirō Ishii
Dec. at 67 (1892-1959)
Josef Mengele
39


39,077 VOTES
Josef Mengele
Dec. at 67 (1911-1979)
Susan Smith
40


3,088 VOTES
Susan Smith
Age: 52


See what is ranked #1
Movies With 0% On Rotten Tomatoes, Ranked By How Bad They Truly Are
Joel Rifkin
41


2,301 VOTES
Joel Rifkin
Age: 65
Yasuhiko Asaka
42


1,682 VOTES
Yasuhiko Asaka
Dec. at 93 (1887-1981)
Mikhail Sergeevich Kedrov
43


2,124 VOTES
Mikhail Sergeevich Kedrov
Dec. at 63 (1878-1941)
Cruel sadistic Cheka murderer.

Edward Bernays
44


523 VOTES
Edward Bernays
Dec. at 103 (1891-1995)
Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi
45


22,733 VOTES
Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi
Age: 53
Miyuki Ishikawa
46


3,194 VOTES
Miyuki Ishikawa
Pol Pot
47


84,717 VOTES
Pol Pot
Dec. at 72 (1925-1998)

Pedro López
48


4,376 VOTES
Pedro López
Age: 75
Paul Kagame
49


2,263 VOTES
Paul Kagame
Age: 66
Józef Beck
50


317 VOTES
Józef Beck
Dec. at 49 (1894-1944)

Serial killer

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For other uses, see Serial killer (disambiguation).

This section's factual accuracy may be compromised due to out-of-date information. The reason given is: Definitions have since changed, and it is now widely accepted by most law enforcement that the threshold for serial murder is two separate killings. Please help update this article to reflect recent events or newly available information. (June 2023)
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An 1829 illustration of Irish serial killer William Burke murdering Margery Campbell
A serial killer (also called a serial murderer) is a person who murders three or more people,[1] with the killings taking place over a significant period of time between them.[1][2] The serial killers' psychological gratification is the motivation for the killings, and many serial murders involve sexual contact with the victims at different points during the murder process.[3] The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) states that the motives of serial killers can include anger, thrill-seeking, financial gain, and attention seeking, and killings may be executed as such.[4] The victims tend to have things in common such as, demographic profile, appearance, gender or race.[5] The FBI will focus on a particular patterns that the serial killers follow throughout their murders.[6] They will then use on the patterns they find for key clues into finding the killer along with their motives.[7] Although a serial killer is a distinct classification that differs from that of a mass murderer, spree killer, or contract killer, there are overlaps between them.

Etymology and definition
The English term and concept of serial killer are commonly attributed to former Federal Bureau of Investigation special agent Robert Ressler, who used the term serial homicide in 1974 in a lecture at Police Staff College,in Bramshill, Hampshire, England, United Kingdom.[8] Author Ann Rule postulates in her 2004 book Kiss Me, Kill Me, that the English-language credit for coining the term goes to Los Angeles Police Department detective Pierce Brooks, who created the Violent Criminal Apprehension Program (ViCAP) system in 1985.[9]

The German term and concept were coined by criminologist Ernst Gennat, who described Peter Kürten as a Serienmörder ('serial-murderer') in his article "Die Düsseldorfer Sexualverbrechen" (1930).[10] In his book, Serial Killers: The Method and Madness of Monsters (2004), criminal justice historian Peter Vronsky notes that while Ressler might have coined the English term "serial homicide" within the law in 1974, the terms serial murder and serial murderer appear in John Brophy's book The Meaning of Murder (1966).[11] The Washington, D.C., newspaper Evening Star, in a 1967 review of the book:[12]

There is the mass murderer, or what he [Brophy] calls the "serial" killer, who may be actuated by greed, such as insurance, or retention or growth of power, like the Medicis of Renaissance Italy, or Landru, the "bluebeard" of the World War I period, who murdered numerous wives after taking their money.

Vronsky states that the term serial killing first entered into broader American popular usage when published in The New York Times in early 1981, to describe Atlanta serial killer Wayne Williams. Subsequently, throughout the 1980s, the term was used again in the pages of The New York Times, one of the major national news publications of the United States, on 233 occasions. By the end of the 1990s, the use of the term had increased to 2,514 instances in the paper.[13]

When defining serial killers, researchers generally use "three or more murders" as the baseline,[1] considering it sufficient to provide a pattern without being overly restrictive.[14] Independent of the number of murders, they need to have been committed at different times, and are usually committed in different places.[15] The lack of a cooling-off period (a significant break between the murders) marks the difference between a spree killer and a serial killer. The category has, however, been found to be of no real value to law enforcement, because of definitional problems relating to the concept of a "cooling-off period".[16] Cases of extended bouts of sequential killings over periods of weeks or months with no apparent "cooling off period" or "return to normality" have caused some experts to suggest a hybrid category of "spree-serial killer".[11]

In Controversial Issues in Criminology, Fuller and Hickey write that "[t]he element of time involved between murderous acts is primary in the differentiation of serial, mass, and spree murderers", later elaborating that spree killers "will engage in the killing acts for days or weeks" while the "methods of murder and types of victims vary". Andrew Cunanan is given as an example of spree killing, while Charles Whitman is mentioned in connection with mass murder, and Jeffrey Dahmer with serial killing.[17]

The FBI defines serial killing as "a series of two or more murders, committed as separate events, usually, but not always, by one offender acting alone".[18] In 2005, the FBI hosted a multi-disciplinary symposium in San Antonio, Texas, which brought together 135 experts on serial murder from a variety of fields and specialties with the goal of identifying the commonalities of knowledge regarding serial murder. The group also settled on a definition of serial murder which FBI investigators widely accept as their standard: "The unlawful killing of two or more victims by the same offender(s) in separate events".[16]

History
Further information: List of serial killers before 1900

Juhani Aataminpoika, a Finnish serial killer also known as "Kerpeikkari" (which means 'executioner'), was one of the most active serial killers of the 19th century, killing as many as 12 people in 1849 within five weeks before being caught.[19]
A phantom brandishing a knife floats through a slum street
The 'Nemesis of Neglect': Jack the Ripper depicted as a phantom stalking Whitechapel, and as an embodiment of social neglect, in a Punch cartoon of 1888
Historical criminologists suggest that there have been serial killers throughout history.[20] Some sources suggest that legends such as werewolves and vampires were inspired by medieval serial killers.[21] In Africa, there have been periodic outbreaks of murder by leopard men.[22]

Liu Pengli of China, nephew of the Han Emperor Jing, was made Prince of Jidong in the sixth year of the middle period of Jing's reign (144 BC). According to the Chinese historian Sima Qian, he would "go out on marauding expeditions with 20 or 30 slaves or with young men who were in hiding from the law, murdering people and seizing their belongings for sheer sport". Although many of his subjects knew about these murders, it was not until the 29th year of his reign that the son of one of his victims finally sent a report to the emperor. Eventually, it was discovered that he had murdered at least 100 people. The officials of the court requested that Liu Pengli be executed; however, the emperor could not bear to have his own nephew killed, so Liu Pengli was made a commoner and banished.[23]

In the 9th century (year 257 of the Islamic Calendar), "a strangler from Baghdad was apprehended. He had murdered a number of women and buried them in the house where he was living."[24]

In the 15th century, one of the wealthiest men in Europe and a former companion-in-arms of Joan of Arc, Gilles de Rais, was alleged to have sexually assaulted and killed peasant children, mainly boys, whom he had abducted from the surrounding villages and had taken to his castle.[25] It is estimated that his victims numbered between 140 and 800.[26]

Between 1564 and 1589, German farmer Peter Stumpp killed 14 children, including his own son. He also murdered two pregnant women and had an incestuous relationship with his daughter. Stumpp claimed to have been granted the ability to turn into a werewolf by the Devil. As punishment for his crimes, Stumpp was put on a torture wheel and executed. His head was later severed and put on a pole next to the figure of a wolf to scare other people away from claiming themselves werewolves too.[27]

The Hungarian aristocrat Elizabeth Báthory, born into one of the wealthiest families in Transylvania, allegedly tortured and killed as many as 650 girls and young women before her arrest in 1610.[28]

Members of the Thuggee cult in India may have murdered a million people between 1740 and 1840.[29] Thug Behram, a member of the cult, may have murdered as many as 931 victims.[30]

In his 1886 book, Psychopathia Sexualis, psychiatrist Richard von Krafft-Ebing noted a case of a serial murderer in the 1870s, a Frenchman named Eusebius Pieydagnelle who had a sexual obsession with blood and confessed to murdering six people.[31]

The unidentified killer Jack the Ripper, who has been called the first modern serial killer,[32] killed at least five women, and possibly more, in London in 1888. He was the subject of a massive manhunt and investigation by the Metropolitan Police, during which many modern criminal investigation techniques were pioneered. A large team of policemen conducted house-to-house inquiries, forensic material was collected and suspects were identified and traced.[33] Police surgeon Thomas Bond assembled one of the earliest character profiles of the offender.[34]

The Ripper murders also marked an important watershed in the treatment of crime by journalists.[35] While not the first serial killer in history, Jack the Ripper's case was the first to create a worldwide media frenzy.[35] The dramatic murders of financially destitute women in the midst of the wealth of London focused the media's attention on the plight of the urban poor and gained coverage worldwide. Jack the Ripper has also been called the most infamous serial killer of all time, and his legend has spawned hundreds of theories on his real identity and many works of fiction.[36]

H. H. Holmes was a serial killer in the United States, responsible for the death of at least nine victims in the early 1890s. The case gained notoriety and wide publicity through possibly sensationalized accounts in William Randolph Hearst's newspapers. At the same time in France, Joseph Vacher became known as "The French Ripper" after killing and mutilating 11 women and children. He was executed in 1898 after confessing to his crimes.[37][38]

The majority of documented serial killers in the 20th century were active in the United States.[39][40]

Late 20th century

Elmer Wayne Henley (left) and David Owen Brooks (right), accomplices to serial killer Dean Corll, who murdered at least 28 teenage boys between 1970 and 1973
The serial killing phenomenon in the United States was especially prominent from 1970 to 2000, which has been described as the "golden age of serial murder".[41] The cause of the spike in serial killings has been attributed to urbanization, which put people in close proximity and offered anonymity.[citation needed]

The number of active serial killers in the country peaked in 1989 and has been steadily trending downward since, coinciding with an overall decrease in crime in the United States since that time. The decline in serial killers has no known single cause but is attributed to a number of factors. Mike Aamodt, emeritus professor at Radford University in Virginia, attributes the decline in number of serial killings to less frequent use of parole, improved forensic technology, and people behaving more cautiously.[42] Causes for the general reduction in violent crime following the 1990s include increased incarceration in the United States, the end of the crack epidemic in the United States, and decreased lead exposure in early childhood.[43][44][45]

Characteristics
Some commonly found characteristics of serial killers include the following:

They may exhibit varying degrees of mental illness or psychopathy, which may contribute to their homicidal behavior.[46]
For example, someone who is mentally ill may have psychotic breaks that cause them to believe they are another person or are compelled to murder by other entities.[47]
Psychopathic behavior that is consistent with traits common to some serial killers include sensation seeking, a lack of remorse or guilt, impulsivity, the need for control, and predatory behavior.[16] Psychopaths can seem 'normal' and often quite charming, a state of adaptation that psychiatrist Hervey Cleckley called the "mask of sanity".[48]
They were often abused—emotionally, physically, or sexually—by a family member.[5]
Serial killers may be more likely to engage in fetishism, partialism or necrophilia, which are paraphilias that involve a strong tendency to experience the object of erotic interest almost as if it were a physical representation of the symbolized body. Individuals engage in paraphilias which are organized along a continuum; participating in varying levels of fantasy perhaps by focusing on body parts (partialism), symbolic objects which serve as physical extensions of the body (fetishism), or the anatomical physicality of the human body; specifically regarding its inner parts and sexual organs (one example being necrophilia).[49]
A disproportionate number exhibit one, two, or all three of the Macdonald triad[dubious – discuss] of predictors of future violent behavior:
Many are fascinated with fire setting.[5]
They are involved in sadistic activity; especially in children who have not reached sexual maturity, this activity may take the form of torturing animals.[5]
More than 60 percent, or simply a large proportion, wet their beds beyond the age of 12.[5][50]
They were frequently bullied or socially isolated as children.[5] For example, Henry Lee Lucas was ridiculed as a child and later cited the mass rejection by his peers as a cause for his hatred of everyone. Kenneth Bianchi was teased as a child because he urinated in his pants, suffered twitching, and as a teenager was ignored by his peers.[5]
Some were involved in petty crimes, such as fraud, theft, vandalism, or similar offenses.[51]
Often, they have trouble staying employed and tend to work in menial jobs. The FBI, however, states, "Serial murderers often seem normal; have families and/or a steady job."[16] Other sources state they often come from unstable families.[5]
Studies have suggested that serial killers who got caught generally have an average or low-average IQ, although they are often described, and perceived, as possessing IQs in the above-average range.[5][16][52] A sample of 202 IQs of serial killers who got caught had a median IQ of 89.[53] Some organized serial killers who got caught have a slightly higher IQ score averaging a little bit over 99, to where disorganized killers average just under 93 in theirs. The average IQ of serial killers who got caught is 94.7.[54]
There are exceptions to these criteria, however. For example, Harold Shipman was a successful professional (a General Practitioner working for the NHS). He was considered a pillar of the local community; he even won a professional award for a children's asthma clinic and was interviewed by Granada Television's World in Action on ITV.[55] Dennis Nilsen was an ex-soldier turned civil servant and trade unionist who had no previous criminal record when arrested. Neither was known to have exhibited many of the tell-tale signs.[56] Vlado Taneski, a crime reporter, was a career journalist who was caught after a series of articles he wrote gave clues that he had murdered people.[57] Russell Williams was a successful and respected career Royal Canadian Air Force Colonel who was convicted of murdering two women, along with fetish burglaries and rapes.[58]


Mug shot of serial killer, cannibal and necrophile Ottis Toole
Juana Barraza, also known as the Old Lady Killer, was a professional wrestler. From the years of 1998 to 2006 she committed over 12 murders, all of which were of older women. She would rob them after knocking on their door pretending to be a government worker. This stems from hatred and resentment from her mother.[59]

Development

German serial killer Fritz Haarmann with police detectives, November 1924
Many serial killers have faced similar problems in their childhood development.[60] Hickey's Trauma Control Model explains how early childhood trauma can set the child up for deviant behavior in adulthood; the child's environment (either their parents or society) is the dominant factor determining whether or not the child's behavior escalates into homicidal activity.[61]

Family, or lack thereof, is the most prominent part of a child's development because it is what the child can identify with on a regular basis.[62] "The serial killer is no different from any other individual who is instigated to seek approval from parents, sexual partners, or others."[63] This need for approval is what influences children to attempt to develop social relationships with their family and peers. "The quality of their attachments to parents and other members of the family is critical to how these children relate to and value other members of society."[64]

Wilson and Seaman (1990) conducted a study on incarcerated serial killers, and what they concluded was the most influential factor that contributed to their homicidal activity.[65] Almost all of the serial killers in the study had experienced some sort of environmental problems during their childhood, such as a broken home caused by divorce, or a lack of a parental figure to discipline the child. Nearly half of the serial killers had experienced some type of physical or sexual abuse, and more of them had experienced emotional neglect.[64]

When a parent has a drug or alcohol problem, the attention in the household is on the parents rather than the child. This neglect of the child leads to the lowering of their self-esteem and helps develop a fantasy world in which they are in control. Hickey's Trauma Control Model supports how parental neglect can facilitate deviant behavior, especially if the child sees substance abuse in action.[66] This then leads to disposition (the inability to attach), which can further lead to homicidal behavior, unless the child finds a way to develop substantial relationships and fight the label they receive. If a child receives no support from anyone, then they are unlikely to recover from the traumatic event in a positive way. As stated by E. E. Maccoby, "the family has continued to be seen as a major—perhaps the major—arena for socialization".[67]

Chromosomal makeup
There have been studies looking into the possibility that an abnormality with one's chromosomes could be the trigger for serial killers.[68] Two serial killers, Bobby Joe Long and Richard Speck, came to attention for reported chromosomal abnormalities. Long had an extra X chromosome.[69] Speck was erroneously reported to have an extra Y chromosome; in fact, his karyotype was performed twice and was normal each time.[70] While attempts have been made to link the XYY karyotype to violence, including serial murder, research has consistently found little or no association between violent criminal behaviour and an extra Y chromosome.[71]

Fantasy
Children who do not have the power to control the mistreatment they suffer sometimes create a new reality to which they can escape. This new reality becomes their fantasy that they have total control of and becomes part of their daily existence. In this fantasy world, their emotional development is guided and maintained. According to Garrison (1996), "the child becomes sociopathic because the normal development of the concepts of right and wrong and empathy towards others is retarded because the child's emotional and social development occurs within his self-centered fantasies. A person can do no wrong in his own world and the pain of others is of no consequence when the purpose of the fantasy world is to satisfy the needs of one person" (Garrison, 1996). Boundaries between fantasy and reality are lost and fantasies turn to dominance, control, sexual conquest, and violence, eventually leading to murder. Fantasy can lead to the first step in the process of a dissociative state, which, in the words of Stephen Giannangelo, "allows the serial killer to leave the stream of consciousness for what is, to him, a better place".[72]

Criminologist Jose Sanchez reports, "the young criminal you see today is more detached from his victim, more ready to hurt or kill. The lack of empathy for their victims among young criminals is just one symptom of a problem that afflicts the whole society."[62] Lorenzo Carcaterra, author of Gangster (2001), explains how potential criminals are labeled by society, which can then lead to their offspring also developing in the same way through the cycle of violence. The ability for serial killers to appreciate the mental life of others is severely compromised, presumably leading to their dehumanization of others.[73]

This process may be considered an expression of the intersubjectivity associated with a cognitive deficit regarding the capability to make sharp distinctions between other people and inanimate objects. For these individuals, objects can appear to possess animistic or humanistic power while people are perceived as objects.[73] Before he was executed, serial killer Ted Bundy stated media violence and pornography had stimulated and increased his need to commit homicide, although this statement was made during last-ditch efforts to appeal his death sentence.[64] There are exceptions to the typical fantasy patterns of serial killers, as in the case of Dennis Rader, who was a loving family man and the leader of his church.[citation needed]

Organized, disorganized, and mixed

Ted Bundy in custody, Florida, United States, July 1978 (State Archives of Florida)
In the 1970s and '80s, FBI profilers instigated a simple division of serial killers into "organized" and "disorganized"; that is, those who plan their crimes, and those who act on impulse.[74]

The FBI's Crime Classification Manual now places serial killers into three categories: organized, disorganized, and mixed (i.e., offenders who exhibit organized and disorganized characteristics).[75][76] Some killers descend from organized to disorganized as their killings continue,[77] as in the case of psychological decompensation or overconfidence due to having evaded capture, or vice versa, as when a previously disorganized killer identifies one or more specific aspects of the act of killing as their source of gratification and develops a modus operandi that focuses on them.[citation needed]

Organized serial killers often plan their crimes methodically, usually abducting victims, killing them in one place and disposing of them in another. They often lure the victims with ploys appealing to their sense of sympathy. Others specifically target prostitutes, who are likely to go voluntarily with a stranger. These killers maintain a high degree of control over the crime scene and usually have a solid knowledge of forensic science that enables them to cover their tracks, such as burying the body or weighing it down and sinking it in a river. They follow their crimes in the news media carefully and often take pride in their actions as if it were all a grand project.[78]

Often, organized killers have social and other interpersonal skills sufficient to enable them to develop both personal and romantic relationships, friends and lovers and sometimes even attract and maintain a spouse and sustain a family including children. Among serial killers, those of this type are in the event of their capture most likely to be described by acquaintances as kind and unlikely to hurt anyone. Ted Bundy and John Wayne Gacy are examples of organized serial killers.[78] In general, the IQs of organized serial killers tend to be normal range, with a mean of 98.7.[79]

Disorganized serial killers are usually far more impulsive, often committing their murders with a random weapon available at the time, and usually do not attempt to hide the body. They are likely to be unemployed, a loner, or both, with very few friends. They often turn out to have a history of mental illness, and their modus operandi (M.O.) or lack thereof is often marked by excessive violence and sometimes necrophilia or sexual violence.[80] Disorganized serial killers have been found to have a lower mean IQ than organized serial killers, at 89.4. Mixed serial killers, with both organized and disorganized traits, have an average IQ of 100.9, but a low sample size.[79]

Medical professionals
Main article: Angel of mercy (criminology)
Some people with a pathological interest in the power of life and death tend to be attracted to medical professions or acquiring such a job.[81] These kinds of killers are sometimes referred to as "angels of death"[82] or angels of mercy. Medical professionals will kill their patients for money, for a sense of sadistic pleasure, for a belief that they are "easing" the patient's pain, or simply "because they can".[83] Perhaps the most prolific of these was the British doctor Harold Shipman. Another such killer was nurse Jane Toppan, who admitted during her murder trial that she was sexually aroused by death.[84] She would administer a drug mixture to patients she chose as her victims, lie in bed with them and hold them close to her body as they died.[84]

Another medical professional serial killer is Genene Jones. It is believed she killed 11 to 46 infants and children while working at Bexar County Medical Center Hospital in San Antonio, Texas, United States.[85] She is currently serving a 99-year sentence for the murder of Chelsea McClellan and the attempted murder of Rolando Santos,[85] and became eligible for parole in 2017 due to a law in Texas at the time of her sentencing to reduce prison overcrowding.[85] A similar case occurred in Britain in 1991, where nurse Beverley Allitt killed four children at the hospital where she worked, attempted to kill three more, and injured a further six over the course of two months.

A 21st-century example is Canadian nurse Elizabeth Wettlaufer, who murdered elderly patients in the nursing homes where she worked. William George Davis is another hospital nurse who was sentenced to death in Texas for the murdering of four patients.[86]

Female

Highway sex worker Aileen Wuornos killed seven men in Florida between 1989 and 1990.
Female serial killers are rare compared to their male counterparts.[87] Sources suggest that female serial killers represented less than one in every six known serial murderers in the United States between 1800 and 2004 (64 females from a total of 416 known offenders), or that around 15% of U.S. serial killers have been women, with a collective number of victims between 427 and 612.[88] The authors of Lethal Ladies, Amanda L. Farrell, Robert D. Keppel, and Victoria B. Titterington, state that "the Justice Department indicated 36 female serial killers have been active over the course of the last century."[89] According to The Journal of Forensic Psychiatry & Psychology, there is evidence that 16% of all serial killers are women.[90]

Michael D. Kelleher and C. L. Kelleher created several categories to describe female serial killers. They used the classifications of black widow, angel of death, sexual predator, revenge, profit or crime, team killer, question of sanity, unexplained, and unsolved. In using these categories, they observed that most women fell into the categories of the black widow or team killer.[91] Although motivations for female serial killers can include attention seeking, addiction, or the result of psychopathological behavioral factors,[92] female serial killers are commonly categorized as murdering men for material gain, usually being emotionally close to their victims,[87] and generally needing to have a relationship with the victim,[91] hence the traditional cultural image of the "black widow".

The methods that female serial killers use for murder are frequently covert or low-profile, such as murder by poison (the preferred choice for killing).[93] Other methods used by female serial killers include shootings (used by 20%), suffocation (16%), stabbing (11%), and drowning (5%).[92] They commit killings in specific places, such as their home or a health-care facility, or at different locations within the same city or state.[94] A notable exception to the typical characteristics of female serial killers is Aileen Wuornos,[95] who killed outdoors instead of at home, used a gun instead of poison, and killed strangers instead of friends or family.[96] One "analysis of 86 female serial killers from the United States found that the victims tended to be spouses, children or the elderly".[91] Other studies indicate that since 1975, increasingly strangers are marginally the most preferred victim of female serial killers,[97] or that only 26% of female serial killers kill for material gain only.[98] Sources state that each killer will have her own proclivities, needs and triggers.[99][91] A review of the published literature on female serial murder stated that "sexual or sadistic motives are believed to be extremely rare in female serial murderers, and psychopathic traits and histories of childhood abuse have been consistently reported in these women."[91]

A study by Eric W. Hickey (2010) of 64 female serial killers in the United States indicated that sexual activity was one of several motives in 10% of the cases, enjoyment in 11% and control in 14% and that 51% of all U.S. female serial killers murdered at least one woman and 31% murdered at least one child.[100] In other cases, women have been involved as an accomplice with a male serial killer as a part of a serial killing team.[99][91] A 2015 study published in The Journal of Forensic Psychiatry & Psychology found that the most common motive for female serial killers was for financial gain and almost 40% of them had experienced some sort of mental illness.[101]

Peter Vronsky in Female Serial Killers (2007) maintains that female serial killers today often kill for the same reason males do: as a means of expressing rage and control. He suggests that sometimes the theft of the victims' property by the female "black widow" type serial killer appears to be for material gain, but really is akin to a male serial killer's collecting of totems (souvenirs) from the victim as a way of exerting continued control over the victim and reliving it.[102] By contrast, Hickey states that although popular perception sees "black widow" female serial killers as something of the Victorian past, in his statistical study of female serial killer cases reported in the United States since 1826, approximately 75% occurred since 1950.[103]

Elizabeth Báthory is sometimes cited as the most prolific female serial killer in all of history. Formally countess Elizabeth Báthory de Ecsed (Báthory Erzsébet in Hungarian, August 7, 1560 – August 21, 1614), she was a countess from the renowned Báthory family. Before her husband's death, Elizabeth took great pleasure in torturing the staff, by jamming pins under the servant's fingernails or stripping servants and throwing them into the snow.[104] After her husband's death, she and four collaborators were accused of torturing and killing hundreds of girls and young women, with one witness attributing to them over 600 victims, though the number for which they were convicted was 80. Elizabeth herself was neither tried nor convicted. In 1610, however, she was imprisoned in the Csejte Castle, where she remained bricked in a set of rooms until her death four years later.[105]

A 2010 article by Perri and Lichtenwald addressed some of the misconceptions concerning female criminality.[106] In the article, Perri and Lichtenwald analyze the current research regarding female psychopathy, including case studies of female psychopathic killers featuring Münchausen syndrome by proxy, cesarean section homicide, fraud detection homicide, female kill teams, and a female serial killer.[106]

Juvenile
Juvenile serial killers are rare. There are three main categories that juvenile serial killers can fit into: primary, maturing, and secondary killers. There have been studies done to compare and contrast these three groups and to discover similarities and differences between them.[107] Although these types of serial killers are less common, oftentimes adult serial killers may make their debut at an early age and it can be an opportunity for researchers to study what factors brought about the behavior. While juvenile serial killers are rare, the youngest felon on death row is a juvenile serial killer named Harvey Miguel Robinson who was 17 at the time of his crimes and 18 at the time of his arrest.[108][109]

Ethnicity and demographics in the United States
The racial demographics regarding serial killers are often subject to debate. In the United States, the majority of reported and investigated serial killers are white males, from a lower-to-middle-class background, usually in their late 20s to early 30s.[5][16] However, there are African American, Asian, and Hispanic (of any race) serial killers as well, and, according to the FBI, based on percentages of the U.S. population, whites are not more likely than other races to be serial killers.[16] Criminal profiler Pat Brown says serial killers are usually reported as white because serial killers usually target victims of their own race, and argues the media typically focuses on "All-American" white and pretty female victims who were the targets of white male offenders; that crimes among minority offenders in urban communities, where crime rates are higher, are under-investigated; and that minority serial killers likely exist at the same ratios as white serial killers for the population. She believes that the myth that serial killers are always white might have become "truth" in some research fields due to the over-reporting of white serial killers in the media.[110]

According to some sources, the percentage of serial killers who are African American is estimated to be between 13% and 22%.[111][112] Another study has shown that 16% of serial killers are African American, what author Maurice Godwin describes as a "sizeable portion".[113] A 2014 Radford/FGCU Serial Killer Database annual statistics report indicated that for the decades 1900–2010, the percentage of white serial killers was 52.1% while the percentage of African American serial killers was 40.3%.[79]

In a 2005 article, Anthony Walsh, professor of criminal justice at Boise State University, argued a review of post-WWII serial killings in the U.S. finds that the prevalence of non-white serial killers has typically been drastically underestimated in both professional research literature and the mass media. As a paradigmatic case of this media double standard, Walsh cites news reporting on white killer Gary M. Heidnik and African American killer Harrison Graham. Both men were residents of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; both imprisoned, tortured, and killed several women; and both were arrested only months apart in 1987. "Heidnik received widespread national attention, became the subject of books and television shows, and served as a model for the fictitious Buffalo Bill in Silence of the Lambs", writes Walsh, while "Graham received virtually no media attention outside of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, despite having been convicted of four more murders than Heidnik".[114]

Outside the United States
In one study of serial homicide in South Africa, many patterns were similar to established patterns in the U.S., with some exceptions: no offenders were female, offenders were lower educated than in the U.S., and both victims and offenders were predominantly black.[115]

There are many more serial killers outside of the United States. Most notably is Jack the Ripper, a serial killer from the United Kingdom who was active in the autumn of 1888. He killed 5 women but it is believed that he killed more than that.[116]

One notable non-American serial killer is Pedro Lopez, a serial killer from South America. He killed a minimum of 110 young girls between 1969 and 1980. However, he claims that the number is over 300. He was released from a mental facility in 1998 and his whereabouts are still unknown. He is commonly nicknamed the Monster of the Andes.

Another notable non-American serial is Luis Garavito who was a serial killer in Colombia. Garavito would kill and torture boys using various disguises. He murdered around 140 boys ranging in ages from 8 to 16. He would dump his victims' bodies in mass graves.[117]

Motives

According to psychiatric reports, Michael Maria Penttilä, the so-called "serial strangler" reportedly admired the primordial, violent manhood of her teenage years.[118]
The motives of serial killers are generally placed into four categories: visionary, mission-oriented, hedonistic, and power or control; however, the motives of any given killer may display considerable overlap among these categories.[119]

Visionary
Visionary serial killers suffer from psychotic breaks with reality,[120] sometimes believing they are another person or are compelled to murder by entities such as the Devil or God.[121] The two most common subgroups are "demon mandated" and "God mandated".[47]

Herbert Mullin believed the American casualties in the Vietnam War were preventing California from experiencing the Big One. As the war wound down, Mullin claimed his father instructed him via telepathy to raise the number of "human sacrifices to nature" to delay a catastrophic earthquake that would plunge California into the ocean.[122] David Berkowitz ("Son of Sam") may also be an example of a visionary serial killer, having claimed a demon transmitted orders through his neighbor's dog and instructed him to commit murder.[123] Berkowitz later described those claims as a hoax, as originally concluded by psychiatrist David Abrahamsen.[124]

Mission-oriented
Mission-oriented killers typically justify their acts as "ridding the world" of certain types of people perceived as undesirable, such as the homeless, ex-cons, homosexuals, drug users, prostitutes, or people of different ethnicity or religion; however, they are generally not psychotic.[125] Some see themselves as attempting to change society, often to cure a societal ill.[126]

An example of a mission-oriented killer would be Joseph Paul Franklin, an American white supremacist who exclusively targeted Jewish, biracial, and African American individuals for the purpose of inciting a "race war".[127][128]

Saeed Hanaei was a serial killer convicted of murdering at least sixteen women in his native Iran, many of whom were sex workers. He reported his goal was to cleanse his city of "moral corruption" and that his mission was sanctioned by God.[129]

Hedonistic
This type of serial killer seeks thrills and derives pleasure and satisfaction from killing, seeing people as expendable means to this goal. Forensic psychologists have identified three subtypes of the hedonistic killer: "lust", "thrill", and "comfort".[130]

Lust

Paul Durousseau raped and murdered at least seven young women.
Sex is the primary motive of lust killers, whether or not the victims are dead, and fantasy plays a large role in their killings.[131] Their sexual gratification depends on the amount of torture and mutilation they perform on their victims. The sexual serial murderer has a psychological need to have absolute control, dominance, and power over their victims, and the infliction of torture, pain, and ultimately death is used in an attempt to fulfill their need.[132] They usually use weapons that require close contact with the victims, such as knives or hands. As lust killers continue with their murders, the time between killings decreases or the required level of stimulation increases, sometimes both.[133]

Kenneth Bianchi, one of the "Hillside Stranglers", murdered women and girls of different ages, races, and appearance because his sexual urges required different types of stimulation and increasing intensity.[134] Jeffrey Dahmer searched for his perfect fantasy lover—beautiful, submissive and eternal. As his desire increased, he experimented with drugs, alcohol, and exotic sex. His increasing need for stimulation was demonstrated by the dismemberment of victims, whose heads and genitals he preserved, and by his attempts to create a "living zombie" under his control (by pouring acid into a hole drilled into the victim's skull).[135]

Dahmer once said, "Lust played a big part of it. Control and lust. Once it happened the first time, it just seemed like it had control of my life from there on in. The killing was just a means to an end. That was the least satisfactory part. I didn't enjoy doing that. That's why I tried to create living zombies with acid and the drill." He further elaborated on this, also saying, "I wanted to see if it was possible to make—again, it sounds really gross—uh, zombies, people that would not have a will of their own, but would follow my instructions without resistance. So after that, I started using the drilling technique."[136] He experimented with cannibalism to "ensure his victims would always be a part of him".[137]

Thrill
Main article: Thrill killing
Further information: Serial offender hunting patterns
The primary motive of a thrill killer is to induce pain or terror in their victims, which provides stimulation and excitement for the killer.[131] They seek the adrenaline rush provided by hunting and killing victims. Thrill killers murder only for the kill; usually, the attack is not prolonged, and there is no sexual aspect. Usually, the victims are strangers, although the killer may have followed them for a period of time. Thrill killers can abstain from killing for long periods of time and become more successful at killing as they refine their murder methods. Many attempt to commit the perfect crime and believe they will not be caught.[138]

Robert Hansen took his victims to a secluded area, where he would let them loose and then hunt and kill them.[139] In one of his letters to San Francisco Bay Area newspapers in San Francisco, California, the Zodiac Killer wrote "[killing] gives me the most thrilling experience it is even better than getting your rocks off with a girl".[140] Carl Watts was described by a surviving victim as "excited and hyper and clappin' and just making noises like he was excited, that this was gonna be fun" during the 1982 attack.[141] Slashing, stabbing, hanging, drowning, asphyxiating, and strangling were among the ways Watts killed.[142]

Comfort (profit)
Material gain and a comfortable lifestyle are the primary motives of comfort killers.[143] Usually, the victims are family members and close acquaintances.[131] After a murder, a comfort killer will usually wait for a period of time before killing again to allow any suspicions by family or authorities to subside. They often use poison, most notably arsenic, to kill their victims. Female serial killers are often comfort killers, although not all comfort killers are female.[144]

Dorothea Puente killed her tenants for their Social Security checks and buried them in the backyard of her home.[145] H. H. Holmes killed for insurance and business profits.[146] Puente and Holmes had previous records of crimes such as theft, fraud, non-payment of debts, embezzlement and others of a similar nature. Dorothea Puente was finally arrested on a parole violation, having been on parole for a previous fraud conviction.[147]

Contract killers ("hitmen") may exhibit serial killers traits, but are generally not classified as such because of third-party killing objectives and detached financial and emotional incentives.[148][149][150] Nevertheless, there are occasionally individuals that are labeled as both a hitman and a serial killer.[151]

Power/control

A policeman discovering the body of Catherine Eddowes, one of Jack the Ripper's victims
The main objective for this type of serial killer is to gain and exert power over their victim. Such killers are sometimes abused as children, leaving them with feelings of powerlessness and inadequacy as adults. Many power- or control-motivated killers sexually abuse their victims, but they differ from hedonistic killers in that rape is not motivated by lust (as it would be with a lust murder) but as simply another form of dominating the victim.[152] Ted Bundy is an example of a power/control-oriented serial killer. He traveled around the United States seeking women to control.[153]

Media influences
Many serial killers claim that a violent culture influenced them to commit murders. During his final interview, Ted Bundy stated that hardcore pornography was responsible for his actions. Others idolise figures for their deeds or perceived vigilante justice, such as Peter Kürten, who idolized Jack the Ripper, or John Wayne Gacy and Ed Kemper, who both idolized the actor John Wayne.[5]

Killers who have a strong desire for fame or to be renowned for their actions desire media attention as a way of validating and spreading their crimes; fear is also a component here, as some serial killers enjoy causing fear. An example is Dennis Rader, who sought attention from the press during his murder spree.[154]

In popular culture
Many movies, books, and documentaries have been created, detailing serial killers' lives and crimes. For example, the biographical films Ted Bundy (2002) and Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile focuses on serial killer Ted Bundy's personal life in college, leading up to his execution, and Dahmer (2002) tells the story of Jeffrey Dahmer. A Netflix series on the life of Jeffrey Dahmer and his victims was released in 2022.

Serial killers are also portrayed in fictional media, oftentimes as having substantial intelligence and looking for difficult targets, despite the contradiction with the psychological profile of serial killers.[155]

Theories
Biological and sociological
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Theories for why certain people commit serial murder have been advanced. Some theorists believe the reasons are biological, suggesting serial killers are born, not made, and that their violent behavior is a result of abnormal brain activity. Holmes believe that "until a reliable sample can be obtained and tested, there is no scientific statement that can be made concerning the exact role of biology as a determining factor of a serial killer personality."[156]

The "Fractured Identity Syndrome" (FIS) is a merging of Charles Cooley's "looking glass self" and Erving Goffman's "virtual" and "actual social identity" theories. The FIS suggests a social event, or series of events, during one's childhood results in a fracturing of the personality of the serial killer. The term "fracture" is defined as a small breakage of the personality which is often not visible to the outside world and is only felt by the killer.[157]

"Social Process Theory" has also been suggested as an explanation for serial murder. Social process theory states that offenders may turn to crime due to peer pressure, family and friends. Criminal behavior is a process of interaction with social institutions, in which everyone has the potential for criminal behavior.[158] A lack of family structure and identity could also be a cause leading to serial murder traits. A child used as a scapegoat will be deprived of their capacity to feel guilt. Displaced anger could result in animal torture, as identified in the Macdonald triad, and a further lack of basic identity.[159]

Military

A dishonorably discharged Marine, Charles Ng participated in the kidnapping, sadistic torture, rape, and murder of numerous victims.
The "military theory" has been proposed as an explanation for why serial murderers kill, as some serial murderers have served in the military or related fields. According to Castle and Hensley, 7% of the serial killers studied had military experience.[160] This figure may be a proportional under-representation when compared to the number of military veterans in a nation's total population. For example, according to the United States census for the year 2000, military veterans comprised 12.7% of the U.S. population;[161] in England, it was estimated in 2007 that military veterans comprised 9.1% of the population.[162] Though by contrast, about 2.5% of the population of Canada in 2006 consisted of military veterans.[163][164]

There are two theories that can be used to study the correlation between serial killing and military training: Applied learning theory states that serial killing can be learned. The military is training for higher kill rates from servicemen while training the soldiers to be desensitized to taking a human life.[165] Social learning theory can be used when soldiers get praised and accommodated for killing. They learn or believe that they learn, that it is acceptable to kill because they were praised for it in the military. Serial killers want accreditation for the work that they have done.[166]

In both military and serial killing, the offender or the soldier may become desensitized to killing as well as compartmentalized; the soldiers do not see enemy personnel as "human" and neither do serial killers see their victims as humans.[167] The theories do not imply that military institutions make a deliberate effort to produce serial killers; to the contrary, all military personnel are trained to recognize when, where, and against whom it is appropriate to use deadly force, which starts with the basic Law of Land Warfare, taught during the initial training phase, and may include more stringent policies for military personnel in law enforcement or security.[168]

Investigation
FBI: Issues and practices
In 2008, the FBI published a handbook titled Serial Murder which was the product of a symposium held in 2005 to bring together the many issues surrounding serial murder, including its investigation.[169]

Identification

Ángel Maturino Reséndiz, who was an FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitive
According to the FBI, identifying one, or multiple, murders as being the work of a serial killer is the first challenge an investigation faces, especially if the victim(s) come from a marginalized or high-risk population and is normally linked through forensic or behavioral evidence.[169] Should the cases cross multiple jurisdictions, the law enforcement system in the United States is fragmented and thus not configured to detect multiple similar murders across a large geographic area.[170] Ted Bundy was particularly famous for such geographic exploitations. He used his knowledge about the lack of communication between multiple jurisdictions to avoid arrest and detection.[171] The FBI suggests utilizing databases and increasing interdepartmental communication. Keppel suggests holding multi-jurisdictional conferences regularly to compare cases giving departments a greater chance to detect linked cases and overcome linkage blindness.[172]

One such collaboration, the Radford/FGCU Serial Killer Database Project[173] was proposed at the 2012 FDIAI Annual Conference.[174] Utilizing Radford's Serial Killer Database as a starting point, the new collaboration,[175] hosted by FGCU Justice Studies, has invited and is working in conjunction with other universities to maintain and expand the scope of the database to also include spree and mass murders. Utilizing over 170 data points, multiple-murderer methodology and victimology; researchers and Law Enforcement Agencies can build case studies and statistical profiles to further research the Who, What, Why and How of these types of crimes.

Leadership
Leadership, or administration, should play a small or virtually non-existent role in the actual investigation past assigning knowledgeable or experienced homicide investigators to lead positions. The administration's role is not to run the investigation but to establish and reaffirm the primary goal of catching the serial killer, as well as provide support for the investigators. The FBI (2008) suggests completing Memorandums of Understanding to facilitate support and commitment of resources from different jurisdictions to an investigation.[169] Egger takes this one step further and suggests completing mutual aid pacts, which are written agreements to provide support to each other in a time of need, with surrounding jurisdictions. Doing this in advance would save time and resources that could be used on the investigation.[170]

Organization

Albert De Salvo, who claimed to be the "Boston Strangler", after being caught in Lynn, Massachusetts, in 1967
The structural organization of an investigation is key to its success, as demonstrated by the investigation of Gary Ridgway, the Green River Killer. Once a serial murder case was established, a task force was created to track down and arrest the offender. Over the course of the investigation, for various reasons, the task force's organization was radically changed and reorganized multiple times – at one point including more than 50 full-time personnel, and at another, only a single investigator. Eventually, what led to the end of the investigation was a conference of 25 detectives organized to share ideas to solve the case.[176]

The FBI handbook provides a description of how a task force should be organized but offers no additional options on how to structure the investigation. While it appears advantageous to have a full-time staff assigned to a serial murder investigation, it can become prohibitively expensive. For example, the Green River Task Force cost upwards of $2 million per year,[176] and as was witnessed with the Green River Killer investigation, other strategies can prevail where a task force fails.

A common strategy, already employed by many departments for other reasons, is the conference, in which departments get together and focus on a specific set of topics.[177] With serial murders, the focus is typically on unsolved cases, with evidence thought to be related to the case at hand.

Similar to a conference is an information clearing-house in which a jurisdiction with a suspected serial murder case collects all of its evidence and actively seeks data that may be related from other jurisdictions.[177] By collecting all of the related information into one place, they provide a central point in which it can be organized and easily accessed by other jurisdictions working toward the goal of arresting an offender and ending the murders.

A task force provides for a flexible, organized, framework for jurisdictions depending on the needs of the investigation. Unfortunately due to the need to commit resources (manpower, money, equipment, etc.) for long periods of time it can be an unsustainable option.[177][169][172]

In the case of the investigation of Aileen Wournos, the Marion County Sheriff coordinated multiple agencies without any written or formal agreement.[170] While not a specific strategy for a serial murder investigation, this is certainly a best practice in so far as the agencies were able to work easily together toward a common goal.

Finally, once a serial murder investigation has been identified, the use of an FBI Rapid Response Team can assist both experienced and inexperienced jurisdictions in setting up a task force. This is completed by organizing and delegating jobs, by compiling and analyzing clues, and by establishing communication between the parties involved.[170]

Resource augmentation
During the course of a serial murder investigation, it may become necessary to call in additional resources; the FBI defines this as Resource Augmentation. Within the structure of a task force, the addition of a resource should be thought of as either long-term or short-term. If the task force's framework is expanded to include the new resource, then it should be permanent and not removed. For short-term needs, such as setting up roadblocks or canvassing a neighborhood, additional resources should be called in on a short-term basis. The decision of whether resources are needed short or long term should be left to the lead investigator and facilitated by the administration.[169]

The confusion and counter productiveness created by changing the structure of a task force mid investigation is illustrated by the way the Green River Task Force's staffing and structure was changed multiple times throughout the investigation. This made an already complicated situation more difficult, resulting in the delay or loss of information, which allowed Ridgway to continue killing.[176] The FBI model does not take into account that permanently expanding a task force, or investigative structure, may not be possible due to cost or personnel availability. Egger (1998) offers several alternative strategies including; using investigative consultants, or experienced staff to augment an investigative team. Not all departments have investigators experienced in serial murder and by temporarily bringing in consultants, they can educate a department to a level of competence then step out. This would reduce the initially established framework of the investigation team and save the department the cost of retaining the consultants until the conclusion of the investigation.[170]

Communication
The FBI handbook (2008) and Keppel (1989) both stress communication as paramount. The difference is that the FBI handbook concentrates primarily on communication within a task force, while Keppel makes getting information out to and allowing information to be passed back from patrol officers a priority.[169][172] The FBI handbook suggests having daily e-mail or in-person briefings for all staff involved in the investigation and providing periodic summary briefings to patrol officers and managers. Looking back on a majority of serial murderer arrests, most are exercised by patrol officers in the course of their everyday duties and unrelated to the ongoing serial murder investigation.[170][172]

Keppel provides examples of Larry Eyler, who was arrested during a traffic stop for a parking violation, and Ted Bundy, who was arrested during a traffic stop for operating a stolen vehicle.[172] In each case, it was uniformed officers, not directly involved in the investigation, who knew what to look for and took the direct action that stopped the killer. By providing up-to-date (as opposed to periodic) briefings and information to officers on the street the chances of catching a serial killer, or finding solid leads, are increased.

Data management
A serial murder investigation generates staggering amounts of data, all of which needs to be reviewed and analyzed. A standardized method of documenting and distributing information must be established and investigators must be allowed time to complete reports while investigating leads and at the end of a shift (FBI 2008).[169] When the mechanism for data management is insufficient, leads are not only lost or buried but the investigation can be hindered and new information can become difficult to obtain or become corrupted.[176]

During the Green River Killer investigation, reporters would often find and interview possible victims or witnesses ahead of investigators. The understaffed investigation was unable to keep up the information flow, which prevented them from promptly responding to leads. To make matters worse, investigators believed that the journalists, untrained in interviewing victims or witnesses of crimes, would corrupt the information and result in unreliable leads.[176]

Memorabilia
Notorious and infamous serial killers number in the thousands[178] and a subculture revolves around their legacies. That subculture includes the collection, sale, and display of serial killer memorabilia, dubbed "murderabilia" by Andrew Kahan, one of the best-known opponents of collectors of serial killer remnants. Kahan is the director of the Mayor's Crime Victims Office in Houston. He is backed by the families of murder victims and "Son of Sam laws" existing in some states that prevent murderers from profiting from the publicity generated by their crimes.[179]

Such memorabilia includes the paintings, writings, and poems of these killers.[180] Recently, marketing has capitalized even more upon interest in serial killers with the rise of various merchandise such as trading cards, action figures, and books. Some serial killers attain celebrity status in the way they acquire fans and may have previous personal possessions auctioned off on websites like eBay. A few examples of this are Ed Gein's 150-pound stolen gravestone and Bobby Joe Long's sunglasses.[181]

See also
List of serial killers by country
List of serial killers by number of victims
List of songs about or referencing serial killers
Serial crime
Serial rapist
Footnotes
 an offender can be anyone.
Holmes & Holmes 1998, Serial murder is the killing of three or more people over a period of more than 30 days, with a significant cooling-off period between the murders The baseline number of three victims appears to be most common among those who are the academic authorities in the field. The time frame also appears to be an agreed-upon component of the definition.
Petherick 2005, p. 190 Three killings seem to be required in the most popular definition of serial killing since they are enough to provide a pattern within the killings without being overly restrictive.
Flowers 2012, p. 195 in general, most experts on serial murder require that a minimum of three murders be committed at different times and usually different places for a person to qualify as a serial killer.
Schechter 2012, p. 73 Most experts seem to agree, however, that to qualify as a serial killer, an individual has to slay a minimum of three unrelated victims.
 Burkhalter Chmelir 2003, p. 1.
 Geberth 1995, p. ? "The base population was 387 serial murderers, who killed (under various motivations), three or more persons over a period of time with cooling-off periods between the events. The author identified 232 male serial murderers who violated their victims sexually".
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Further reading
Borgeson; Kristen Kuehnle (2010). Serial Offenders: Theory and Practice. Jones & Bartlett Publishers. ISBN 978-0-7637-7730-2. Archived from the original on May 14, 2019. Retrieved February 19, 2018.
Brady, Ian; Colin Wilson (Introduction); Peter Sotos (Afterword) (2001). The Gates of Janus: Serial Killing and Its Analysis. Feral House. ISBN 978-0922915736.
Douglas, John; Mark Olshaker (1997). Journey into Darkness. Pocket Books. ISBN 978-0-671-00394-4. Archived from the original on August 19, 2020. Retrieved February 19, 2018.
Douglas, John; Mark Olshaker (1997). Mind Hunter: Inside the FBI's Elite Serial Crime Unit. Pocket Books. ISBN 978-0-671-01375-2. Archived from the original on September 2, 2016. Retrieved February 27, 2016.
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Haggerty, Kevin D. (2009). "Crime, Media, Culture: Modern Serial Killer". Crime, Media, Culture. 5 (2): 1–21. doi:10.1177/1741659009335714. S2CID 11395289.
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