Serial Killers: Willem van Eijk

Born: August 13, 1941

Number of victims: 5 

Date of murders: 1971 - 2001 

Method of murder: Strangulation / Stabbing

Location: Netherlands

A rare Dutch serial killer, Willem van Eijk followed a familiar path to serial murder. Known for his eccentric behavior as a child, he graduated from there to animal cruelty and petty crime. Like most serial killers he also indulged in violent fantasies before he eventually acted out and killed someone.

His first victim was 15-year-old Cora Mantel, picked up while hitchhiking near Uithoorn in June 1971, raped and strangled, her body dumped in a ditch.

Van Eijk waited three years before he killed again. On 19 August 1974, the severely mutilated body of teenager Aaltje van der Plaat was found on a country road. She had multiple stab wounds, her belly had been ripped open and one of her nipples cut off. Van Eijk was living nearby on a houseboat, and several witnesses reported seeing him near the crime scene. Brought in for questioning, he quickly confessed to the crime, adding that he’d also killed Cora Mantel

Van Eijk was sentenced to 18 years imprisonment, and his time inside seemed to have quelled his murderous instincts. After his release, he married and appeared to live a normal life. But after the relationship broke down he once again began attacking women.  

23-year-old prostitute Michelle Fatol was strangled to death in November 1993; Annelies Reinders, 31, was murdered in January 1995; Sasja Schenker died in July 2001. In between those dates there were eight more prostitute murders, all committed near van Eijk’s home.

Arrested eventually for the Schenker murder, Willem van Eijk was sentenced to life imprisonment.

Read the horrific story of the Willem van Eijk, plus 29 more serial killer cases in  Human Monsters Volume 4. Available now on Amazon  

 

Serial Killers: Robert Napper

Born:  February 25, 1966

Number of victims: 3  

Date of murders: 1992 - 1993 

Method of murder: Stabbing 

Location: London, England  




On July 15, 1992 a horrific murder occurred on Wimbledon Common, London. The victim was a young mother named Rachel Nickell, who had been walking in the park with her two-year-old son when she was attacked and stabbed forty-nine times. When the body was found, the two-year-old was clinging to his mother, begging her to wake up.

A massive police investigation was launched, with hundreds of possible suspects questioned. One of those was a 26-year-old man named Robert Napper who had recently been questioned regarding a spate of assaults on women in the area, over the previous four years. At least 70 women had been savagely attacked by a fiend known only as the “Green Chain Rapist.” Napper’s answers must have satisfied the police, because they let him go.

In November 1993, there was an even more horrendous crime than the Nickel murder. 27-year-old Samantha Bisset lived in a basement apartment in Plumstead, South East London, with her four-year-old daughter, Jazmine. Police were called to the apartment by a neighbor and found Samantha Bisset stabbed to death and severely mutilated. Four-year-old Jazmine was found in another room, suffocated with a pillow. She had also been raped.

Police enquiries into the double homicide led them eventually to Robert Napper. Tried and convicted of the double murder in October 1995, he was remanded indefinitely to the state mental hospital at Broadmoor.

While in custody, Napper was questioned about the Nickell murder but denied responsibility. He continued to protest his innocence until 2008, when DNA evidence linked him unquestionably to the crime. In December 2008, Napper was convicted of the manslaughter of Rachel Nickell on the grounds of diminished responsibility. It is doubtful whether he will ever be released.     


Read the horrific story of the Robert Napper, plus 29 more serial killer cases in  Human Monsters Volume 4. Available now on Amazon  

 

Serial Killer Video: Pedro Lopez

Known as “The Monster of the Andes,” Pedro Lopez preyed on young girls aged between 8 and 12. Arrested in 1980, he was convicted of 110 murders, although estimates of his death toll run as high as 300. Amazingly, Lopez served just eight years, before being released in 1998. His current whereabouts are unknown.

Serial Killers: Kenneth McDuff

Born: March 21, 1946

Number of victims: 9

Date of murders: 1966 / 1991 - 1992 

Method of murder: Strangulation

Location: Texas 




Kenneth McDuff is a rare criminal, one who was reprieved from Death Row only to be executed eventually for a different crime. McDuff was first convicted for the murders of three teenagers in August 1966. Robert Brand and Mark Dunman were shot to death. Their friend, Edna Louis Sullivan, was raped and then killed by McDuff after he placed a broomstick across her throat and stood on it.

McDuff was sentenced to death, but the sentence was commuted when the U.S. Supreme Court placed a moratorium on capital punishment in 1972. Then, in 1989, the unthinkable happened. Faced with massive overcrowding in Texas prisons, the state began following an aggressive program of paroles. One of those released was “Broomstick Killer” Kenneth McDuff.

After his release, McDuff made a halfhearted attempt to go straight, but he was soon back in prison on parole violations. He was free again late in 1990. Soon after, women started disappearing from around Waco, where McDuff had enrolled at Texas State Technical College.

Valencia Joshua, 22, was last seen alive February 24, 1991, after apparently meeting up with McDuff on campus. Soon after Regenia Moore disappeared. She had last been seen in McDuff's truck. In December 1991, Colleen Reed vanished from an Austin car wash. Just two months later, on March 1, 1992, Melissa Northrup vanished from the Waco convenience store where she worked. Melissa was pregnant at the time of her disappearance and McDuff had been seen talking to her. But as the police sought him for questioning, he went on the run. 

McDuff fled to Kansas City, where he found work as a garbage collector. However, after the   television show America's Most Wanted flighted a segment on him, someone phoned a tip in to the police. McDuff was arrested and sent back to Texas for trial. Found guilty of murder, he was sentenced to death. He was executed by lethal injection on November 17, 1998.

The case triggered a massive overhaul of the Texas penal system, with new legislation known collectively as the ‘McDuff Laws’ enacted.  


Read the horrific story of the Kenneth McDuff, plus 49 more serial killer cases in  50 American Serial Killers You’ve Probably Never Heard Of Vol 1 Available now on Amazon  

 

Serial Killers: The Lainz Angels of Death

Number of victims:  15+

Date of murders: 1983 - 1989  

Method of murder: Poisoning 

Location: Vienna, Austria  

One of the more unusual killer teams of the 20th century, the “Lainz Angels of Death” were four female nurses - Maria Gruber, Irene Leidolf, Stephanija Meyer, and Waltraud Wagner - who took to murdering patients at the Lainz General Hospital in Vienna, Austria. Together, they are believed to have claimed over 50 elderly victims, during a killing spree that lasted from 1983 to 1989. Some estimates put their toll at close to 200.

The leader of this deadly collective was 23-year-old Waltraud Wagner, who killed her first victim with an overdose of morphine in 1983. That murder, she later claimed, was a mercy killing, but it led her to realise that she enjoyed playing God, and holding the power of life and death in her hands. In short order, she had recruited Gruber, 19, Leidolf, 21, and Meyer, 43, to the cause.

The “Death Angels” had soon turned murder into a deadly game, killing any patient who happened to annoy them in some minor way. They also invented a new method of murder. They would hold the victim's head back, pinch the nose, and then pour water into the victim's mouth until they drowned in their bed. Since elderly patients often have fluid in their lungs, no one suspected murder.

The callous killers were eventually caught after a doctor overheard them laughing and joking about their exploits at a local tavern. He reported the matter to the police and the “Angels” soon found themselves under arrest. In total, they confessed to 49 murders.

At the subsequent trial, Wagner and Leidolf were sentence to life in prison, while Meyer and Gruber both got fifteen years. All have since been paroled, with their early release sparking outrage among the Austrian public. 


Read the horrific story of the Lainz Angels of Death, plus 29 more serial killer cases in Human Monsters Volume 3. Available now on Amazon  

   

 

Serial Killers: Joseph Kallinger

Born: December 11, 1936

Number of victims: 3  

Date of murders: 1974 - 1975 

Method of murder: Stabbing / Drowning 

Location: Pennsylvania / New Jersey  




Adopted as a child and subjected to horrendous abuse during his childhood, it is perhaps understandable that Joseph Kallinger grew up with some issues. He spoke of hearing voices and experiencing hallucinations. Then, after a knifepoint rape by a gang of youths, he became a chronic masturbator, usually clutching a knife in his hand as he pleasured himself.

In 1953, 17-year-old  Kallinger married his childhood sweetheart, Hilda Bergman, fathering two children by her before she left him due to physical abuse. He remarried in 1958, this union producing five more children. However, the domestic abuse continued, as did his psychotic episodes. Over the next decade, Kallinger would be in and out of mental institutions. He also attempted suicide three times.

Kallinger spent time in prison on child abuse charges in 1972, after three of his children went to the police. He was released in 1974 by which time he was constantly suffering auditory hallucinations, and seeing visions of a floating head that was instructing him to kill. In July 1974, he started obeying those instructions. 

Recruiting his 13-year-old son Michael as an accomplice, Kallinger embarked on a crime spree. Over a period of six weeks he and Michael traveled to Philadelphia, Baltimore, Maryland and New Jersey, robbing, assaulting, and sexually abusing four families during a series of violent home invasions. They also committed three murders. 21-year-old nurse Maria Fasching was stabbed to death; 9-year-old Jose Collazo was tortured and killed; Kallinger’s own son, Joseph Jr. was drowned in a barrel in an abandoned house.

The Kallingers were captured after a bloodstained shirt left at one of the crime scenes was traced via a laundry mark to Joseph Kallinger.

Kallinger was sentenced to life in prison, while Michael was placed on probation until his twenty-fifth birthday. Joseph Kallinger died in prison of a seizure on March 26, 1996. He was 59 years old.

Read the full, horrific story of Joseph Kallinger, plus 11 more serial killer cases in
American Monsters Volume 7. Available now on Amazon  

 

Serial Killers: Alexander Pichushkin

Born: April 9, 1974

Number of victims: 49+  

Date of murders: 1992 - 2006 

Method of murder: Bludgeoning 

Location: Moscow, Russia  




His hero was Andrei Chikatilo, the Soviet Union’s most notorious serial killer. He also loved chess. So Alexander Pichushkin came up with a horrific plan than incorporated his two passions. He was going to outdo Chikatilo’s count of 52 victims. In fact, he was going to kill one victim for every square on the chessboard, 64 in all.

Pichushkin committed his first murder in 1992, while he was still a student. But the experience left him sickened, and he swore he’d never kill again. However, by 2001, he’d overcome his inhibitions and stepped up his campaign with a vengeance. Pichushkin started stalking Moscow’s massive Bittsevsky Park. He mainly targeted elderly, homeless men, luring them with vodka then bludgeoning them to death after they became inebriated. The bodies were then dumped in a sewer. But not all of the victims were elderly or homeless. Pichushkin killed anyone he found alone in the park - men, women and children.  A massive manhunt was launched for the “Bitsa Park Maniac,” but Pichushkin always seemed to be one step ahead of the police.

Pichushkin was eventually caught after he murdered 36-year-old Marina Moskalyova, a co-worker. Moskalyova had told he teenaged son that she was going for a walk in the park with Pichushkin. After the boy passed that information on to the police, Pichushkin was arrested. He quickly confessed, saying that his only regret was that he’d fallen one victim short of his target.

Pichushkin was eventually found guilty of 49 murders (although he claimed 63). He was sentenced to life in prison with the first 15 years to be spent in solitary confinement. 


Read the horrific story of the Alexander Pichushkin, plus 29 more serial killer cases in  Human Monsters Volume 1. Available now on Amazon  

 

Serial Killers: Henry Louis Wallace

Born:  November 4, 1965

Number of victims: 9+ 

Date of murders: 1990 - 1994  

Method of murder: Strangulation

Location: Charlotte, North Carolina 




Serial killers tend to target strangers, but Henry Louis Wallace is unique in that he targeted women who were known to him, claiming ten victims in Charlotte, North Carolina between 1990 and 1994.

A promising young student and Navy recruit, Wallace initially turned to crime to support his drug habit. He was a suspect in countless burglaries in Seattle during his military service and was eventually arrested for breaking and entering in 1988. That earned him two years probation and a discharge from the Navy. However it offered only a foretaste of what was to come. 

In early 1990, Wallace murdered Tashonda Bethea, dumping her body in a lake. As an acquaintance of the victim, he was questioned about the murder but never considered a serious suspect. Emboldened by this, he committed another murder in May 1992, beating Sharon Nance to death. He then strangled another friend, Caroline Love, in her apartment, then dumped her body in a wooded area. On February 19, 1993, he murdered Shawna Hawk, later attending her funeral.

On June 22, he killed coworker Audrey Spain. Just weeks later, on August 10, 1993, he murdered Valencia Jumper, then set her on fire to cover up his crime.  A month later, in September 1993, he stabbed and strangled college student Michelle Stinson, killing her in front of her oldest son.

February 20, 1994 brought another murder as Wallace killed Vanessa Mack in her apartment. 
On March 8, 1994, Wallace robbed and strangled Betty Jean Baucom, before stealing and pawning her valuables. That same night, he killed Brandi June Henderson, the girlfriend of one of his friends. 

With the community in uproar, the police beefed up patrols but couldn’t stop Wallace committing one last murder - on March 12, 1994 he strangled and stabbed Deborah Ann Slaughter to death. The following day, he was in police custody.

Wallace was arrested on March 13, 1994 and confessed under interrogation to ten murders. Found guilty at trial, he was sentenced to death. He currently awaits execution.


Read the horrific story of the Henry Louis Wallace, plus 11 more serial killer cases in  American Monsters Volume 3. Available now on Amazon  

 

Serial Killers: Vincenzo Verenzi

Born: 1903

Number of victims: 2 - 35+ 

Date of murders: 1922 - 1935 

Method of murder: Poisoning 

Location: Italy 




Vincenzo Verzeni stood just 5-foot-5, but that did not stop him going down in history as one of Italy’s most ferocious killers. Raised in a dysfunctional family, where he suffered vicious beatings at the hands of his alcoholic father, Verzeni was nonetheless known as a polite and pleasant child. Behind that personable exterior though, lived a monster who spent most of his time indulging in violent fantasies.

In 1870, Verzeni eventually acted on his impulses, killing and severely mutilating 14-year -old Giovanna Matta. When the girl’s body was found, it was clear that her killer had tried to suck blood from the victim. Thus began the reign of the monstrous Vampire of Bergamo.

Over the next two years, Verzeni wandered the countryside at will, attacking at least seven more women and killing at least one. When he was eventually caught, he admitted freely to the crimes. He said that he had felt the compulsion to bite his victims and suck blood from their wounds. However, he had never sexually molested any of the women. Indeed, he appeared totally ignorant on sexual matters.

At trial, Verzeni was found guilty by a majority of one vote and for was sentenced to prison with hard labor. He was later declared insane and sent to a mental asylum in the town of Porta Vittoria il Senavra. Here, he was subjected to incredibly cruel treatments,  including boiling glue burns, electric shocks, ice showers and immersion in boiling hot water. 

Given these treatments it is perhaps unsurprising that Vincenzo Verzeni hanged himself in his cell.


Read the horrific story of the Vincenzo Verenzi, plus 29 more serial killer cases in  Human Monsters Volume 1. Available now on Amazon  

 

Serial Killer Video: Albert Fish

He looked like a frail and kindly old man, but Albert Fish was actually one of America's most horrendous serial killers, a cannibal who preyed on children.

Serial Killers: Peter Tobin

Born: August 27, 1946

Number of victims: 3+  

Date of murders: 1991 - 2006 

Method of murder: Stabbing 

Location: United Kingdom  




Born in Johnstone, Renfrewshire, Scotland, Peter Tobin grew from a troubled child to a brutal and abusive young man, whose three wives all divorced him on grounds of domestic abuse. He was also a violent sex offender convicted of the knife-point rape to two 14-year-old girls in Havant, in August 1993.

The rapes earned him a 14 year prison term. On his release in 2004, he moved back to Scotland where he soon received a 30-month sentence for failing to register as a convicted sex offender.  

In September 2006,  Tobin was working as a handyman at St. Patrick's Roman Catholic Church in Glasgow, when he raped and murdered 23-year-old student Angelika Kluk, burying her body under the chapel floorboards. By the time the corpse was discovered on September 29, Tobin had fled. He was tracked to London shortly afterwards, arrested and brought back to Scotland for trial.

Tobin denied killing Angelika, but was found guilty and sentenced to life imprisonment. While serving that term, it emerged that Angelika Kluk was not his only victim.

In November 2007, a search of Tobin's former home in Margate, Kent turned up the remains of two females. The victims were believed to be 15-year old Vicky Hamilton, last seen alive in February 1991, and Dinah McNicol who had disappeared while hitchhiking home from a music festival on August 5, 1991. Tobin was later tried and found guilty of both these murders earning two more life sentences.

Peter Tobin will never be freed from prison. But he remains a suspect in at least 18 more murders. In addition, Scottish police believe that he may have been “Bible John,” a still unidentified serial killer who murdered three Glasgow women in the late sixties.  


Read the horrific story of the Peter Tobin, plus 29 more serial killer cases in  Human Monsters Volume 5. Available now on Amazon  

 

Serial Killers: Anthony Sowell

Born: August 19, 1949

Number of victims: 11 

Date of murders: 2007-2009  

Method of murder: Strangulation

Location: Cleveland, Ohio 




A native of East Cleveland, Ohio, Anthony Sowell was a former US Marine who served with honor and received various commendations. However, after his discharge from the military, things started to go wrong in Sowell’s life, beginning with his arrest and incarceration for the rape of a pregnant woman in 1989. Sowell served 15 years for that crime, and was released in 2005. Soon after women started to go missing in his neighborhood and neighbors began complaining about the foul smell emanating from his house.

In September 2009, Sowell invited a woman to his home. However, after a few drinks, he punched and choked her, then began raping her as she blacked out. The woman woke to find Sowell passed out on the floor. She escaped by climbing through an upstairs window, and reported the assault to the police.

One week later, on October 29, the police eventually got round to investigating the complaint. Sowell was not home when two officers arrived to question him about the alleged rape. However, the officers could not help but notice the unmistakable reek of death coming from his home. Forcing the front door they soon discovered its source, two rotting corpses on the living room floor.

Sowell was eventually located and arrested two days later. In the interim, crime scene units had gone through his home and located nine more bodies, bringing the death toll to eleven. 

After a much delayed trial Anthony Sowell was eventually found guilty of multiple counts of murder. He was sentenced to death and currently awaits execution.


Read the horrific story of the Anthony Sowell, plus 11 more serial killer cases in  American Monsters Volume 9. Available now on Amazon  

 

Serial Killers: Dayton Leroy Rogers

Born: September 30, 1953

Number of victims: 8 

Date of murders: 1987 

Method of murder: Stabbing 

Location: Oregon  



Like many serial killers, Dayton Leroy Rogers showed signs of his aberrant psychology early in life. At 15, he stabbed his girlfriend in the stomach, earning four years probation. A year later, he attacked two teenaged girls with a soda bottle. This time, he was acquitted on grounds of diminished responsibility and sent to a state mental hospital, where he remained until December 1974.

In January 1976, Rogers was indicted for first-degree rape, a charge of which he would eventually be found not guilty. However, while awaiting trial, he committed two more knife-point rapes and this time was sent to prison for five years. The prosecutor at that trial called Rogers a “murder case looking for a place to happen.” Those words would turn out to be prophetic.

In the early morning hours of August 7, 1987, the mutilated corpse of prostitute Jennifer Smith was found in a Portland parking lot. A pickup was seen fleeing the scene and an eyewitness passed on the license plate number to police, leading to the arrest of Rogers at his home. Shortly thereafter, several prostitutes came forward to testify how they’d been beaten and tortured by Rogers.  

On August 31, police were summoned to a timber farm near Molalla, Oregon, where a hiker had found the decomposing remains of a woman. A search of the area turned up the bodies of six more victims, all of them showing signs of torture prior to death. Evidence pointed to Dayton Rogers, but he escaped indictment on grounds of insufficient evidence. When he went on trial in January 1988, it was only for the murder of Jennifer Smith.

Rogers presented a quite ludicrous defense at trial, claiming self-defense. He was found guilty of aggravated murder on February 20, and sentenced to life imprisonment. 


Read the horrific story of the Dayton Leroy Rogers, plus 11 more serial killer cases in  American Monsters Volume 4. Available now on Amazon  

 

Serial Killers: Zhang Yongming

Born: 1956

Number of victims: 12+  

Date of murders: 2008 - 2012 

Method of murder: Strangulation 

Location: Yunnan Province, China 




In May 2012, the Ministry of Public Security of the People's Republic of China sent an investigative team to a village in Yunnan Province, to look into the disappearances of several teenaged boys. The investigators soon picked up a pattern. All of the boys had disappeared along a remote stretch of road. Then, as the investigation continued, they began hearing strange stories about a man named Zhang Yongming.

Zhang, as it turned out, was an ex-con, having moved to the area after he was paroled from a life sentence for murder. According to the villagers, they had seen plastic bags hanging from hooks on Zhang’s porch, with bones protruding from them. Zhang was also known to sell strange cuts of dried meat at the village market, which he said was “ostrich.”

The police were at first skeptical of these reports, but they couldn’t help noticing that Zhang’s shack was situated on the exact route that the victims had disappeared from. They therefore decided to pay him a visit. They were unprepared for what they discovered.     

Upon entering the home, investigators immediately noted the bones that had been reported, and they were indeed human. Inside, they found chunks of flesh hanging from meat hooks, they found human eyeballs preserved in bottles of opaque liquid, they found human remains buried in the garden.

Zhang was arrested and put on trial, although there was never any doubt as to the outcome. On January 10, 2013, China’s state run Xinhua News Agency announced that Zhang had been “taken to a place of execution, and executed.”


Read the horrific story of the Zhang Yongming, plus 29 more serial killer cases in  Human Monsters Volume 1. Available now on Amazon

Serial Killers: Lyda Trueblood

Born: October 16, 1892

Number of victims: 6 

Date of murders: 1915-1920 

Method of murder: Poisoning

Location: Montana / Idaho  




A classic “Black Widow” Lyda Trueblood married six men during her murderous career and killed four of them, collecting substantial insurance payouts along the way. She also murdered her daughter and brother-in-law. 

Husband number one was Robert C. Dooley, who met the plain-looking Lyda in Twin Falls, Idaho and asked her to be his bride in 1912. Soon after they were married and had a daughter who they named Lorraine. However, in 1915, tragedy struck when first Lorraine and then Robert's brother, Edward, died suddenly. Later that same year, Robert died, leaving Lyda as the sole beneficiary of his estate.

Within two years, Lydia married a man named William G. McHaffle and the couple moved to Montana. Just over a year later, McHaffle died, leaving Lyda considerably richer. A year later, her third husband, Harlan Lewis, died after just three months of marriage. Edward Meyer lasted an even shorter time. He passed just a month after tying the knot with Lyda.  

Although the spate of deaths had still not attracted official attention, a chemist from Idaho named Earl Dooley was suspicious. He performed tests on Meyer’s body and found copious amounts of arsenic. Tests were then performed on the exhumed bodies of Lyda’s former husbands, brother-in-law, and daughter. All showed traces of arsenic.

A warrant was issued for Trueblood’s arrest, but she had already fled to California and married a fifth man, Paul Southard. Fortunately for him, he refused Lyda’s request to take out a large insurance policy. It probably saved his life. A short while later Southard was transferred to Hawaii, and it was there that the authorities eventually caught up with Lyda Trueblood.

Lyda was tried, convicted and sent to prison, but she managed to escape and marry a sixth husband, Harry Whitlock. She’d just convinced him to take out life insurance when she was recaptured. Sent back to prison, she spent the rest of her life behind bars, dying in February 1958.

Read the horrific story of the Lydia Trueblood, plus 49 more serial killer cases in  50 American Serial Killers You’ve Probably Never Heard Of Vol 4 Available now on Amazon  

 

Serial Killers: Moses Sithole

Born: November 17, 1964

Number of victims: 38  

Date of murders: 1994-1995 

Method of murder: Strangulation

Location: South Africa  




Moses Sithole is South Africa’s most prolific serial killer, a vicious sex slayer who claimed as many as 38 victims over a period of just two years. Sithole first came to police attention in the eighties when he committed three rapes and was eventually arrested and sent to prison. His murder spree began in 1994, shortly after his release.

Like any true predator Sithole, exploited a weakness in his victims. South Africa has a very high unemployment rate, so he posed as a businessman willing to employ young, black females in his fake charity organization. Desperate for work, the victims willingly went with him, whereupon he would lead them to an isolated spot and attack, raping and then strangling them. By 1995, he had already claimed over 30 victims, sparking a national panic and the biggest manhunt in South Africa’s history. 

Sithole was eventually identified after police found fake employment application forms on one of his victims. He was caught after he contacted his brother-in-law asking him to procure a firearm. The brother-in-law agreed to meet Sithole but instead contacted the police. They were there to arrest him when he showed up. 

Found guilty of multiple murders Sithole was sentenced to a total of  2,410 years imprisonment. He is only likely to serve a very short portion of that term, as he is HIV positive. Moses Sithole is currently incarcerated at Pretoria’s maximum security C-Max prison.

Read the horrific story of the Moses Sithole, plus 29 more serial killer cases in  Human Monsters Volume 2.  Available now on Amazon  

 

Serial Killer Video: John Wayne Gacy

One of America’s most notorious serial killers, John Wayne Gacy murdered at least 33 teenaged boys and young men in Chicago, Illinois, burying most of the bodies in the crawlspace under his house. Arrested in 1978, Gacy eventually went to the electric chair for his horrendous crimes.

Serial Killers: Michael Ross

Born: July 26, 1959

Number of victims: 8 

Date of murders: 1981 - 1984 

Method of murder: Strangulation 

Location: Connecticut  




Michael Ross was an enigma. An intelligent boy who later earned a degree from Cornell University, he was also beset by violent, sadistic fantasies during his childhood. As with all serial killers, those fantasies eventually escalated to a point where he felt compelled to act out on them.

Ross’ first known murder occurred in his hometown of Brooklyn, Connecticut on January 5, 1982, when he abducted, raped and killed 17-year-old Tammy Williams. A short while later, Ross was arrested after he attacked an undercover policewoman. That earned him a period in a mental institution, but it did nothing to curb his murderous urges. On June 15 he found Debra Taylor walking along a rural road after he car had run out of gas. Her skeletal remains were discovered four months later. 

On November 16, 1983, Ross raped and murdered Robin Stravinsky. On April 22, 1984, he committed a double homicide in Griswold, Connecticut, killing 14-year-olds April Brunais and Leslie Shelley. In June, he murdered Wendy Baribeault.

However, Ross’ Toyota had been spotted in the vicinity of the Baribeault murder scene, leading to his arrest on  June 28, 1984. Once in custody, he quickly confessed, admitting to the crimes police knew about, plus two more in New York, Dzung Ngoc Tu, 25 and Paula Perrera, 16. He later led police to the bodies of Shelley, Brunais, and Williams.

Convicted of murder Ross was eventually executed by lethal injection on on May 13, 2005. He was the first person executed in Connecticut in almost half a century.

 
Read the horrific story of the Michael Ross, plus 11 more serial killer cases in  American Monsters Volume 8. Available now on Amazon  

 

Serial Killers: Thierry Paulin

Born:  November 28, 1963

Number of victims: 21 

Date of murders: 1984 - 1987  

Method of murder: Strangulation 

Location: Paris, France 




Between 1984 and 1987, a succession of elderly women were murdered in their homes in the Montmartre district of Paris, France. The victims were found with their hands and legs tied, and had been brutally strangled, stabbed, and beaten. One of the women suffered over 60 stab wounds to her frail body, while another had been forced to swallow bleach.

As the police hunted desperately for the sadistic killer, panic spread through the area, with the elderly locking themselves indoors and only venturing out in groups. After sunset, the streets of the thriving area were all but deserted. 

But despite the massive police operation three years passed with very little progress in the case. Then investigators caught a break when the killer blundered and left one of his victims alive. She was able to give an excellent description of her attacker leading the police directly to a petty thief and small-time drug dealer named Thierry Paulin.

A tall, athletic twenty-five year old, Paulin was originally from the French colonial island of  Martinique, but had moved to France at age 12 to live with his father. Once in custody, Paulin nonchalantly confessed to 21 murders, offering up sickening details of his crimes. He also told the police something the did not know, many of the murders had been committed with the help of his gay lover, Jean-Thierry Mathurin. Mathurin was arrested and soon admitted his role in the killing spree. 

Paulin and Mathurin were both convicted on multiple counts of murder and sentenced to life imprisonment. However, by the time he started his prison term, Paulin was already afflicted with AIDS. He died on April 16, 1989, at the age of 26.

Jean-Thierry Mathurin remains in prison and is unlikely to ever be released.


Read the horrific story of the Thierry Paulin, plus 29 more serial killer cases in  Human Monsters Volume 5. Available now on Amazon  

 

Serial Killers: Robert Nixon

Born: 1920 in Tallulah, Louisiana

Number of victims: 5  

Date of murders: 1936 - 1938 

Method of murder: Bludgeoning 

Location: Illinois / California  


Known as the “Brick Moron,” Robert Nixon used a unique murder weapon. He bludgeoned five women to death using a brick, the murders taking place in Chicago and Los Angeles between 1936 to 1938.

Nixon was a somewhat dimwitted youth who, at 18, had already served several terms for burglary but had never displayed any propensity for violence until June 1936, when he broke broke into a room at the Devonshire Hotel in Chicago and bludgeoned 24-year-old Florence Castle to death.The murder was witnessed by the victim’s 7-year-old son but his description of the killer didn’t help police. In any case, Nixon had already fled to California. 

But the change of venue did nothing to dim the killer’s homicidal lust.  In the space of just two months, he claimed three more victims, including 12-year-old Marguerite Warden.

With the heat on in L.A., Nixon headed back to Chicago, where he committed a final outrage on May 27, 1938. Florence Johnson, a fireman’s wife, was beaten to death with Nixon’s favorite weapon.

Shortly after the Johnson murder, Nixon was picked up on unrelated charges and his fingerprints were matched to the Castle and Johnson crime scenes. He initially denied involvement in the crimes but eventual cracked and confessed under sustained interrogation. Later, he demonstrated to police officers how he’d gained entry to his victim’s homes, scaling the side of buildings with remarkable agility. 

Robert Nixon died in Illinois’ electric chair on June 15, 1939.

Read the horrific story of the Robert Nixon, plus 49 more serial killer cases in  50 American Serial Killers You’ve Probably Never Heard Of Vol 4 Available now on Amazon  

 

Serial Killers: Rhonda Bell Martin

Born: 1907

Number of victims: 6+

Date of murders: 1937 - 1951

Method of murder: Poisoning

Location: Alabama 




A prolific poisoner, Rhonda Bell Martin dispensed with her mother, two husbands and three of her children by feeding them rat poison. A fifth husband (who was the son of one of the men she’d murdered) survived her deadly ministrations but was left permanently paralyzed. That attempted murder brought the 49-year-old waitress to the attention of the authorities in Montgomery, Alabama.

Under questioning, Martin confessed to six murders, carried out over a 14 year period. For some reason, she denied killing two more of her children, even though they had died in virtually identical circumstances to the others.

What really baffled the police was the motive for the murders. At trial, the prosecution suggested that Martin had killed for the insurance money, but that hardly made sense since none of the victims was heavily insured. The proceeds of the policies barely covered the cost of the funerals.  

Whatever the reason for her murderous spree, Rhonda Bell Martin was found guilty of murder and sentenced to death. She died in Alabama's electric chair on October 11, 1957.

Read the horrific story of the Rhonda Bell Martin, plus 49 more serial killer cases in  50 American Serial Killers You’ve Probably Never Heard Of Vol 2.  Available now on Amazon  

 

Serial Killers: Edward Leonski

Born:  December 12, 1918

Number of victims: 3 

Date of murders: May, 1942  

Method of murder: Strangulation

Location: Melbourne, Australia  




Edward Leonski described himself as “Jekyll and Hyde,” and the heavy-drinking U.S. Army private certainly lived up to that billing while stationed in Melbourne, Australia during World War II. Over the space of just four weeks, he strangled three women.

The first victim was Ivy McLeod, found dead on the night of May 2, 1942, after leaving a bar to walk home. Just a week later another woman, Pauline Thompson, was murdered in a startlingly similar fashion. With the police now hunting the killer, Gladys Hosking was murdered on May 28. And the strangler attempted another murder just days later. However, the obviously inebriated assailant inexplicably let his victim go after she threatened to report him to the police.

Suspicion focused on American soldiers after the police received a report of a G.I.spotted with blood-stained clothing after the Hasking murder. Troops in Melbourne were assembled for a parade, and the surviving victim unerringly picked out Edward Leonski as the man who had attacked her. Under interrogation, the stocky Texan quickly broke and gave a full confession. He also offered a strange motive, saying that the female voice drove him crazy. 

Leonski was dubbed the “Brown-out Strangler" because his attacks occurred while lights in Melbourne were dimmed due to war time regulations. At trial he entered a plea of not guilty by reason of insanity, but was found sane and guilty. He was hanged on November 9, 1942.

Read the full, horrific story of Edward Leonski, plus 29 more serial killer cases in  Human Monsters Volume 4. Available now on Amazon  

 

Serial Killers: Edwin Kaprat III

Born: 1964

Number of victims: 5  

Date of murders: 1991 - 1993 

Method of murder: Beating 

Location: Florida  




Among the very worst of serial killers are those who prey on the aged. Edwin Kaprat was one such a man. The husky 200-pound handyman carried out a series of deadly attacks on the elderly residents of Brooksville, Florida in 1993, killing four in under two months.

Kaprat had already been tried and acquitted for the beating death of a motorist in 1991. He was however found guilty of using the dead man’s credit cards and was sent to prison for two years. Released in mid-1993, he moved to Brooksville to live with his sister, supporting himself by doing odd jobs around the neighborhood.      

The first murder occurred on August 7, when 80-year-old Sophia Garrity was found dead in her home. The police believed that she had died in a fire caused by an electric short, and they reached the same conclusion when 70-year-old Ruth Goldsmith's burned body was found in her mobile home the following day.

However, two more deaths within a month seemed like too much of a coincidence. The police began searching for a serial killer after 79-year-old Lydia Ridell was found dead on September 2. They hadn’t yet caught him by the time Mrs. Garrity's elderly neighbor, Loraine Dawe, was murdered four weeks later.

Shortly after that murder, the police received an anonymous tip naming Edwin Kaprat as the killer. Kaprat was placed under surveillance while the police gathered evidence. He was arrested after fingerprints linked him to all of the crime scenes. Once in custody, he quickly confessed. “I had urges,” was the only motive he offered.

Tried and found guilty, Kaprat was sentenced to death February 28, 1995. He lasted just six months in prison. On April 19, 1995, Kaprat was stabbed to death by fellow inmates, Mario Lara and Rigoberto Sanchez-Velasco.

Read the full, horrific story of Edwin Kaprat III, plus 49 more serial killer cases in  50 American Serial Killers You’ve Probably Never Heard Of Vol 4 Available now on Amazon  

 

Serial Killer Video: Donald "PeeWee" Gaskins

Dubbed "The Meanest Man in America" Gaskins was a prolific killer who may have claimed over 80 victims. He conveniently divided these into "Serious Murders" (murders for profit) and "Coastal Kills" (murders committed for his own amusement.

Serial Killers: Keith Hunter Jesperson

Born: April 6, 1955

Number of victims: 8+ 

Date of murders: 1990 - 1995  

Method of murder: Strangulation 

Location: Nebraska / California / Florida / Washington /Oregon / Wyoming   



Known as the “Happy Face Killer,” Keith Hunter Jesperson was a deadly trucker who committed murders across the USA, from Oregon to Florida. A hulking man of 6’6 and 240 pounds, Canadian born Jesperson had ambitions of joining the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. However, after suffering a serious injury during training, he was declared unfit for duty. Bitterly disappointed, he moved to Cheney, Washington, where he found work as a truck driver.

Jesperson’s first known victim was Taunja Bennett, strangled to death on January 23, 1990 near Portland, Oregon. That murder sparked a five year killing spree during which at least seven more women would die at Jesperson’s hands. Cryptic messages about the murders were scrawled on bathroom walls at various truck stops, each accompanied by a drawing of a smiley face. This led police to refer to the, as-yet unidentified, murderer as the “Happy Face Killer.”

Like many serial killers before him, Jesperson was caught after he changed his M.O. and killed someone he knew, in this case his 41-year-old girlfriend, Julie Ann Winningham. Arrested on that charge he soon began talking about his other crimes. “It was their fate to die by my hands,” he declared, “like a car accident or an illness.”

Keith Jesperson is currently serving three consecutive life sentences at the Oregon State Penitentiary in Salem. 
  Read the full, horrific story of Keith Jesperson, plus 11 more serial killer cases in  American Monsters Volume 7. Available now on Amazon  

 

Serial Killers: Archibald Hall

Born: July 17, 1924

Number of victims: 5  

Date of murders: 1977 - 1978 

Method of murder:  Shooting / Suffocation / Bludgeoning 

Location: United Kingdom 




Known as “The Monster Butler,” Archibald Hall was a career criminal who committed five murders, including those of his aristocratic employers. Hall began stealing at the age of 15, progressing to burglary and fraud. While serving a prison term, he studied etiquette and took elocution lessons. On his release in 1975, he began working as butler to Lady Margaret Hudson, a elderly lady who lived at Kirtleton House, Dumfriesshire. Hall initially planned on robbing his employer, but found that he was genuinely fond of her. When another employer, David Wright, stole from Lady Hudson, Hall decided to exact revenge. He took Wright on a rabbit hunt and shot him in the back of the head.

After the murder, Hall quit his job and returned to London where found work as a butler to 82-year-old Walter Scott-Elliot, and his 60-year-old wife Dorothy. Hall's plan was to rob his new employers, but when Mrs Scott-Elliot caught him casing the house with an accomplice, Michael Kitto, he put his hand over her mouth and suffocated her.

Hall and Kitto then drugged Walter Scott-Elliot and drove him to Scotland, helped by Mary Coggles, a prostitute. Mrs Scott-Elliot was buried in Braco, Perthshire. Her frail husband was beaten to death and buried in the woods near Tomich, Invernesshire.

Hall’s next victim was Mary Coggles, who had taken to wearing Mrs Scott-Elliot's expensive clothes and jewellery and was drawing attention to herself. Her body was found in a barn in Middlebie, Dumfriesshire on Christmas Day 1977. 

The final victim was Hall's hated half-brother Donald, a pedophile who had just been released from prison. Hall invited him to his home in Cumbia, chloroformed him and then drowned him in the bathtub. Afterwards, Hall and Kitto headed back to Scotland, with Donald’s body in the trunk of their car. They planned on burying him in the wilderness, but bad weather forced them to stop the night at a hotel. There, the hotel manager became suspicious of their behavior and called the police. A search of their car turned up Donald’s corpse.

It didn’t take long for the police to link Hall and Kitto to the other murders. Tried on four counts, they were both sentenced to life imprisonment. While incarcerated Hall made several unsuccessful attempts to take his own life. He died eventually at Kingston Prison, Portsmouth, on September 16, 2002, aged 78. 


Read the full, horrific story of Archibald Hall, plus 29 more serial killer cases in  Human Monsters Volume 1. Available now on Amazon  

 

Serial Killers: Irina Gaidamachuk

Born: 1972

Number of victims: 17 

Date of murders: 2002 - 2010  

Method of murder: Bludgeoning

Location: Krasnoufimsk, Russia  




She was known as 'Satan In A Skirt,' and with good reason. Born in the town of Nyagan, Russia, Irina developed at taste for vodka at a young age. By her teens she was already an alcoholic and beyond the control of her parents. In 1990, aged 18, she moved to Krasnoufimsk where she met a man named Yuri and subsequently had two children by him. But Irina's heavy drinking caused trouble in the relationship. Yuri eventually tired of her drinking away all the housekeeping money he gave her and refused to give her any more. Desperate for her fix, Irina resorted to monstrous measures. 



Between 2002 and 2010, 17 elderly women were bludgeoned to death in their homes in Krasnoufimsk. The obvious motive was theft as all of the residences had been ransacked. But the police investigation was hampered as they hunted for a male suspect. Then reports began to come in of a well dressed woman spotted near the crime scenes. Gaidamachuk was eventually caught after she murdered a woman who was known to her.

Under interrogation, Gaidamachuk admitted to multiple murders and explained her M.O. She would  approach her elderly victims posing as a social worker. Once she gained entry to the apartment she'd beat and bludgeon the unfortunate woman to death, then rob her of her meager possessions. The motive, she said, was to get money for booze.    

Irina Gaidamachuk went on trial in February 2012. Found guilty of 17 counts of murders, she was sentenced to just 20 years in prison, a sentence that was broadly criticized as too lenient.


Read the full, horrific story of Irina Gaidamachuk, plus 29 more serial killer cases in  Human Monsters Volume 5. Available now on Amazon  

 

Serial Killers: Leonard John Fraser

Born: June 27, 1951

Number of victims: 4+  

Date of murders: 1998 - 1999  

Method of murder: Strangulation 

Location: Rockhampton, Queensland, Australia  





One of Australia's most notorious serial killers, Leonard Fraser was sentenced to life in prison for the rapes and murders of three women and a 9-year-old schoolgirl. However, it is almost certain that he claimed more victims, and the killer suggested as much while serving his prison time.

Although, he'd previously served time for rape, Fraser first achieved notoriety after he snatched 9-year-old Keyra Steinhardt from a Rockhampton street in April 1999. An eyewitness reported the abduction to the police and a frantic search was launched, later finding Keyra's brutalized body in a field. The witness was, however, able to identify Fraser's car and he was arrested soon after.

Fraser was sentenced to life in prison. Once inside, police linked him to four more rape / murders, those of Sylvia Benedetti, 19, Beverly Leggo, 36 and Julie Turner, 39. All of the killings had occurred in the four months prior to Fraser's arrest.



But was that the full extent of Fraser's killing spree? The police believed not, especially after they found an extensive trophy haul in Fraser's home, including braids of hair cut from several unknown women.

Fraser has since been linked to the murders of teenaged hitchhiker Sandy Lawrence and an unidentified Abroriginal girl. As for the rest, we will never know. The convicted murderer died in prison on January 1, 2007, taking his secrets with him to the grave.


Read the full, horrific story of Leonard John Fraser, plus 29 more serial killer cases in  Human Monsters Volume 3. Available now on Amazon  

 

Serial Killers: Gary Evans

Born:  October 7, 1954

Number of victims: 5 

Date of murders: 1985 - 1997 

Method of murder: Shooting

Location: New York  




For the first part of his criminal career Gary Evans was a small time thief who served several terms for burglary. But Evans did not waste his prison time, he studied up on antiques and, after his release in March 1980, set himself up as a high-end thief, targeting antiques dealers and jewellery stores, usually working with a sidekick.  Evans, however, seemed reluctant to share the loot with his criminal accomplices. One by one they went missing, never to be seen again.

The first to disappear was Evans’ boyhood friend Michael Falco. Falco vanished in February 1985, after pulling off a robbery with Evans in East Greenbush, New York. His body would be recovered 13 years later, from a swamp near Lake Worth, Florida. 

Shortly after the Greenbush robbery, Evans was arrested and sent to Sing Sing. There he became close friends with infamous “Son of Sam” killer, David Berkowitz.

After being paroled, Evans hooked up with a new accomplice, Damien Cuomo. On September 8, 1989, the pair broke into a jewellery store owned by 63-year-old Douglas Berry. When Berry awoke during the burglary, Evans shot him in the head.

Four months after Berry's murder, Damien Cuomo left his apartment with Evans and was never seen again. Evans then moved in with Cuomo's girlfriend, telling her that Damien had abandoned her and their child. 

In October 1991, Evans shot 36-year-old Gregory Jouben to death while robbing a jewellery store in Little Falls, New York.

Evans served two more jail terms before hooking up with another childhood friend, Timothy Rysedorph. The duo committed several burglaries together before Rysedorph disappeared in October 1997. Soon after, Evans went on the run, sparking an eight month manhunt that culminated in his arrest. In custody, he admitted to killing Falco, Cuomo and Rysedorph, as well as Berry and Jouben. 

Evans was indicted on five counts of murder but he was not about to go quietly. While being transported to the court in Albany, New York, he broke free of his restraints and kicked out a window in the police van. He then jumped from the Troy-Menands Bridge into the Hudson River 60 feet below, dying on impact. 


Read the full, horrific story of Gary Evans, plus 49 more serial killer cases in   50 American Serial Killers You’ve Probably Never Heard Of Vol 4.  Available now on Amazon  

 

Serial Killers: Ronald Dominique

Born: January 9, 1964

Number of victims: 8 - 23 

Date of murders: 1997 - 2006 

Method of murder: Strangulation

Location: Louisiana 




Known as the “Bayou Strangler,” Ronald Dominique preyed mostly on gay men in Houma County, Louisiana. Over a nine year period, from 1997 to 2006, he is believed to have committed at least  23 murders.

Dominique’s M.O. was simple. He’d cruise bars to pick up his victims. If the man was gay, he’d convince him to come back to his trailer for sex. With straight victims, he’d talk the man into coming home with him to have sex with his wife. The wife, of course, did not exist.

Once at the trailer, Dominique would ask the victim if he could tie him up for sex. If the man refused, Dominique would take the matter no further. However, if the victim agreed to be tied up, he would end up being raped, tortured and eventually strangled. The body would then be dumped in one of the many bayous in the area.

This simple method was extremely successful for Dominique, but as the bodies kept showing up, Louisiana formed a multi-jurisdictional task force in order to catch the Bayou Strangler. The break came when a parole officer called in a story he’d heard from one of his parolees. The man had escaped Dominique’s clutches after running from the trailer rather than allowing himself to be bound.

Ronald Dominique was arrested on  December 1, 2006. At trial he entered guilty pleas to eight murders and was sentenced to eight terms of life imprisonment. The police suspect him of as many as 15 more murders. 


Read the full, horrific story of Ronald Dominique, plus 49 more serial killer cases in
50 American Serial Killers You’ve Probably Never Heard Of Vol 2. Available now on Amazon