Serial killers have existed for centuries. Many of them seemed to have some past childhood trauma and broken families and some were just ‘plain heartless’. For whatever the reason, their crimes shocked and disturbed the world. Here is a look at a list of Top 10 serial killers.
10. Alexander Pichuskin
Also known as The Chessboard Killer and The Bitsa Park Maniac, is a Russian serial killer. Growing up, he was considered a fairly normal child until he was struck on the head by a swing while he was playing. The speculation of a possible damage to the frontal cortex post the incident may have initiated the personality changes noticed in him, such as hostility and aggression. His mother enrolled him into a school for special children with learning disabilities but Pichuskin’s grandfather noticed the boy was highly intelligent and encouraged him. Pichuskin was an outstanding chess player. However the death of his grandfather deeply affected him and he took up drinking vodka to alleviate this loss and to calm his aggressive tendencies, while playing chess with the elderly men at Bitsa Park. He committed his first murder in 1991, and Pichuskin said his aim was to kill 64 people ‘the number of squares on a chess board’. He would lure homeless men on the pretext of giving them free vodka and after their were drunk he would kill them with repeated blows to the head, and then insert a bottle of vodka into the gaping wounds in their skull (this would become his trademark). In order to avoid soiling himself with the victim’s blood, he would attack the victim from behind, also to surprise them. He claims to have ‘felt like God’ as he decided on who should live and who should die. The murder of a 36 year old woman in the spring of 2006 was his last murder, when her body was found in Bitsa Park with his trademark style, a ticket was found in her possession that was traced back to the Moscow Metro system, and surveillance footage was then checked to find that Pichuskin was seeing accompanying her. He was arrested on 16 June 2006, and convicted on 24 October 2007 of 60 murders and 3 attempted murders. He was sentenced to life in prison with the first 15 years to be spent in solitary confinement.
9. Edmund Kemper
An American serial killer who committed the abduction and murder of several women in the early 1970s. Born on December 18, 1948 in Burbank, California, he was a big child and was taller than his peers by age 4, with high intelligence but also exhibited antisocial and psychotic behavior which started with cruelty to animals. At the age of 10, he buried his pet cat alive; once it died, he dug it up and mounted its head on a spike. He would again kill another family cat at the age of 13. He used to play with his sisters dolls and remove their heads and hands. Kemper claimed that one of his favorite games as a kid was “Electric chair” and “Gas Chamber”. He would his sister tie him up in a chair and flip an imaginary switch and he would flap around and writhe on the floor pretending he was dead. He had a close relationship with his father and was devastated when his parents separated. He was verbally humiliated and abused by his alcoholic mother. In 1964, at the age if 15, Kemper shot and killed his grandparents, and when taken into custody, told the officers he did it because he “just wanted to see what it felt like to kill grandma”. The court Psychiatrists diagnosed him with Paranoid Schizophrenia and he was sent to the criminally insane unit of Atascadero State Hospital. While at the state hospital, Kemper would take pride in his work, one of which was administering psychological tests to sex offenders. It is said that it is here he learn how to manipulate psychiatrists as he understood the tests worked and also “learnt” a lot from the sex offenders. On December 18, 1969, at 21, Kemper was released on parole from Atascadero. Kemper embarked on a murder spree that took the lives of college co-eds, one high school student, his mother and his mother’s best friend. Kemper would pick up female students who were hitchhiking and take them to isolated areas where he would shoot, stab, smother or strangle them. After the murder of his mother and his best friend (in which he had intercourse with the corpse of his mother and then proceeded to decapitate the body), Kemper called the police and confessed, and as he claimed, he turned himself in because he ‘Emotionally, he could not handle it any longer’. On November 8, 1973 Kemper was declared guilty of murder and received 7 years to life for each count of murder.
8. Tsutomu Miyazaki
Also known as The Otaku Murderer or The Little Girl Murderer, was a Japanese serial killer who murdered four young girls. It was found that Miyazaki was the product of an incestuous relationship between his father and his sister. He was born premature with a deformed hand, and due to this was ostracized and consequently kept to himself at school. Miyazaki felt abandoned by his family as he claimed they were more worried about the material than the sentimental. He found solace in his grandfather, but after the death of his grandfather he was severely depressed and even ate the ashes of his grandfather in order ‘to retain something from him’. He murdered four girls, 2 of then aged four years old, 1 five and 1 seven. He would indulge in sexual intercourse with the corpse before disposing of the bodies. Miyazaki sent a postcard to one of the victims (Erika) family, assembled using words cut out of magazines: "Erika. Cold. Cough. Throat. Rest. Death." On July 23rd 1989, he was caught while trying to film a little girl. The contents of his camera revealed the videos of his victims. In 1990 he was awarded the death sentence and in 2008 Miyazaki was hanged to death. Miyazaki blamed his actions on "Rat Man"; an alter ego who Miyazaki claimed forced him to kill the little girls.
7. Ahmad Surdaji
An Indonesian cattle breeder, also known as Nasib Kelewang, who admitted killing 42 girls and women over a period of 11 years. Surdaji believed he could become a mystic healer or sorcerer because his father’s ghost appeared to him in a dream and told him to drink the saliva of 70 dead women, in order to develop mystic powers. He believed it would take him forever to encounter 70 dead women so he took up the initiative to kill. Women came to him for spiritual advice or on making themselves more beautiful or richer. Surdaji would take them into a sugarcane field and bury them up to their waist, claiming it was part of the ritual. He would then strangle them until they were dead and proceed to drink their saliva; after which he would strip the clothes from their bodies to accelerate decomposition and bury them back into the ground with their heads pointing toward his house, which he believed would give him extra power. Suradji was arrested on 30 April 1997, after bodies were discovered near his home on the outskirts of Medan, the capital of North Sumatra. His three wives, who were sisters, were also arrested for assisting in the murders and helping him hide the bodies. He was sentenced to death by firing squad and executed on 10 July 2008.
6. Andrei Chikatilo
Born on 16 October 1936, was a Soviet serial killer, nicknamed the Butcher of Rostov, the Red Ripper, and the Rostov Ripper, who murdered 52 women and children between 1978 and 1990. Chikatilo was born into an impoverished family, at a time when Ukraine was in the grip of a famine. He claimed that they were so poor that he first ate bread at the age of twelve and growing up the family barely had food that they would eat grass and leaves. In September 1944, Chikatilo began schooling, and was constantly bullied due to his weak physical stature and timid nature. At home, he and his sister were constantly berated by their mother. Studious in school, he received praise from his teachers; however, after graduation he failed his entrance exam to Moscow State University. He did not attempt to enroll at another university and instead travelled to the city of Kursk in 1955 where he became a communication engineer. The same year, Chikatilo formed his first serious relationship, with a local girl two years his junior. On three separate occasions, the couple attempted intercourse, although on each occasion, he was unable to sustain an erection. After 18 months their relationship ended. In 1963 Chikatilo married a woman named Feodosia Odnacheva, with whom he had 2 children and loved a fairly outwardly normal family life. In May 1973, He committed his first sexual crimes, while working a teacher, wherein he groped a girls breast and genitilia and ejaculated immediately. He repeated many more such acts but no disciplinary action was taken against him. On 22nd December 1978, Chikatilo killed his first documented victim, a 9 year old girl, who he lured into a shed, and attempted to rape her. While trying to control the struggling girl, he slashed her with a knife and ejaculated while doing so, thus confirming his psychological connection between violent death and sexual gratification. This became a pattern for his substitute attacks, where he would befriend young runaways of both sexes, take them to a forest, attack them attempt rape and use his knife as a penis substitute. On 6 November 1990, Chikatilo killed and mutilated a 22-year-old woman named Svetlana Korostik. While leaving the crime scene, he was observed by an undercover officer. To the officer, he looked suspicious. The only reason people entered woodland near the station at that time of year was to gather wild mushrooms. The police officer stopped him and verified his papers, but having no formal reason to arrest him, let him go. When the policeman returned to his office, he filed a routine report, containing the name of the person he had stopped at the station. On 13 November, Korostik's body was found, and after doing a background search with previous employers, Chikatilo’s name appeared in all places where other victims’ bodies were found. He was arrested on 20th November 1990, following more suspicious behavior. He confessed to 34 of the 36 murders police had linked to him, and was awarded the death sentence. On 14 February 1994 Chikatilo was taken from his death row cell to a soundproofed room in Novocherkassk prison and executed with a single gunshot behind the right ear.
5. Luis Garavito
Also known as ‘Le Bestia’ or the beast is a Colombian rapist and serial killer, born on January 25, 1957, raped, murdered and tortured 147 young boys. He was the oldest of seven children and lived with an alcoholic father who abused and humiliated him. He ran away from home at age 16 years and had many jobs and even fathered a child with his girlfriend. His friends described him to be kind yet easily angered. During 1992, at the time of the civil war in Colombia, Garavito would target young orphaned or homeless boys between 6 to 16 years of age. Due to the civil war, many of the children never had families to file police reports of them going missing, hence many murders went unnoticed. Garavito took advantage of this; he would bribe his victims with candy and small gifts, even dress in characters such as a priest to gain their trust. Once they had full faith in him, he would walk them till they were tires, and then over power them, bind their hands, torture them, rape and decapitate the victim. In many cases, the child’s genitilia were severed and paced in the victim’s mouth. Many corpses showed signs of prolonged torture. In 1998, 2 bodies of naked boys were found in the town of Genos. The next day, a few meters away another body was found and all showed same characteristic torture marks. Garvito was arrested, when a homeless man observed a struggle between a young boy and Garavito. Even after the arrest, the police had no idea that they had in their possession the person who had committed the murder of 47 boys. After interrogation, Garavito confessed to the crimes. But surprisingly, the biggest clue to framing Garavito, apart from the DNA tests, his underwear at the scene of the crime and a liquor bottle, were his glasses that were found at the site of a mass grave. Garavito suffered from a rare eye condition called ‘Left eye syndrome’ that required him to wear glasses. He was found guilty on 138 of the 172 accounts; the others are ongoing. Although the maximum sentence for murder in Colombia multiplied by 138 comes to 1,853 years and 9 days, Colombian law limits imprisonment to 40 years, but because Garavito helped police find the victims’ bodies, his sentence was further reduced to 22 years.
4. Jeffery Dahmer
Also known as the Milwaukee Cannibal, was an American serial killer, born on May 21, 1960, was one of two sons to his parents and was described as a happy, energetic child until he underwent a hernia surgery, after which he became quiet and subdued. The children never received much attention from either parent. From a young age he manifested an interest in animals. He would collect insects and place them in jars. He would collect carcasses from the road and then dismember the animal’s body and store the body parts in jars. He once dismembered a dog and impaled he dogs head on a stick behind his home. In high school, he would smuggle alcohol to class and drink in the classroom claiming it was his medicine. At puberty, Dahmer realized he was homosexual, but did not reveal his sexual orientation to his parents. Dahmer committed his first murder in 1978, just three weeks after his graduation. He picked up an 18 year old hitchhiker and lured the youth to his house were they drank alcohol. Later, when the boy wanted to leave Dahmer insisted he stay, after which he bludgeoned him with a dumbbell. When the boy fell unconscious, he strangled him to death and then masturbated over his body. He then disposed the body in a shallow grave. In 1979, Dahmer enlisted in the army, where 2 soldiers claimed they were raped by Dahmer repeatedly over a period of 17 months. In 1981 he was formally discharged from services. Between 1978 to 1991, He killed 17 victims and many of his murders involved necrophilia, cannibalism and preservation of body parts. Dahmer once, after killing his victim, kissed and talked to the severed head while dismembering the body. In 1991, one of Dahmers victims managed to overpower him and escape and reported to the police about what had happened and also about the strong odor emanating from barrels in his room. Police officers then entered Dahmers home and found the strong odor of decomposing bodies, human hearts and blood dripping from the fridge, a severed head and a knife. On 25th July 1991, Dahmer was found guilty of murder. The forensic Psychiatrist diagnosed Dahmer with borderline personality disorder, schizotypal personality disorder, necrophilia, alcohol dependence, and a psychotic disorder. The prosecution rejected the defense's argument that Dahmer was insane. He was sentenced to 16 terms of life imprisonment. On November 28, 1994, Dahmer was beaten up by Christopher Scarver, he had sustained severe head trauma as a result of which he died an hour after being rushed to the hospital.
3. Pedro Rodrigues Filho
Filho was born in a farm at Santa Rita do Sapucaí, Brazil, on June 17, 1954. He was nicknamed ‘Killer Petey’ and was convicted of murdering about 71 people. He was born with a deformed skull that was indirectly caused by his father when he assaulted his mother while she was pregnant with him. Filho was also physically abused by his father during his childhood. He attempted, albeit unsuccessfully, to murder his cousin by pushing him into a sugarcane field, while still a child. When he was 14 years old, he shot and killed the vice-mayor of Alfenas with a shotgun, because the same man, fired his father from his job as a security officer after accusing him of stealing food. A month later, he killed another guard at the school whom he believed to be the real thief. After killing them, he took refuge in São Paulo, where he started to burglarize local slums. During one of his burglary sprees, he killed a drug leader. Filho committed a massacre during a wedding organized by the gang's leader, where he and some friends brutally killed seven people and injured sixteen others, because they murdered his fiancé. Filho found out that his father was in prison for murdering and dismembering his mother with a machete. Filho visited his father in prison, and killed him by stabbing him 22 times. After the murder, he carved his heart out, chewed it, and threw it away. Filho continued to kill many criminals and was finally arrested on May 24, 1973. During his incarceration he continued killing within the prison walls, claiming the lives of almost 47 inmates. He killed one of the inmates, simply because he snored too much. Filho was almost released from prison in 2003, but the release request was turned down because of his murders inside prison. He was officially released on April 24, 2007, but he was arrested again at his house on September 15, 2011. He was later sentenced to 128 years in prison for these charges.
2 John Wayne Gacy
An American serial killer and rapist who murdered 33 teenage boys and young men between 1972 and 1978. He was born on March 17th, 1942 and throughout his childhood he was physically assaulted and ridiculed by his father. In school, Gacy was considered an average student who would run errands for his teachers. He was bullied and ridiculed by his classmates. He was considered hard working and was a successful contractor, however he had a few jobs before that, as a manager at a chain of KFC that was purchased by his Father-in-law , and as a mortuary attendant. In his role as a mortuary attendant, he confessed that he once entered into the coffin of a young teenaged male, and embraced and caressed the body. Gacy confessed to his wife that he was bi-sexual, and he also claimed that he and his wife had intercourse only once until their divorce. His ‘other’ job, involved dressing up as a clown and performing at parties. He claimed that the clown allowed him to regress into childhood. In 1968, Gacy was imprisoned on charges of sodomy of a young boy and was granted parole after serving 18 months of his 10 year sentence. It was in 1972, when Gacy committed his first murder and realized that death was the ultimate thrill, when he murdered a 16 year old boy and experienced an orgasm while committing the crime. However, majority of his murders would take place between 1976 and 1978, in what he described as his ‘cruising’years. Gacy’s web of secrets began to unravel after the disappearance of a young boy named Robert Piest. It was reported to police that the boy was last seen by his mother at the store he worked at as he headed out to meet Gacy in relation to a potential job - and never returned. The police obtained the details of the contractor who offered Piest the job, and questioned Gacy who denied ever knowing the boy, and he was let free. But a background search by the police revealed the past history of sodomy for which Gacy was sentenced and later released. A search warrant was obtained for Gacy’s home, and items such as handcuffs, nylon ropes, hypodermic syringes, child pornography were discovered. On further investigation the police entered the crawl space under his home were they found a rancid odor emanating, which at that time they thought to be sewage; however the ground was sprinkled with lime. However Frustrated by the lack of evidence connecting Gacy to the Piest disappearance, the police decided to book him on possession of marijuana. While he was being charged with possession, the police lab and investigators were coming up with critical evidence against Gacy from the items taken from his home. One of the rings found in Gacy’s house belonged to another teenager who had disappeared about a year earlier -- John Szyc. Another critical piece of evidence that was discovered in his home was a receipt that actually belonged to a co-worker of Robert Piest. A second search warrant was obtained for Gacy’s home and the crawl space was dug up to reveal the corpses of his victim and when the police confronted Gacy to tell him that the crawl space under his house was being dug up, he broke down and confessed to the murders. Ironically, Gacy sensed the end was near. He admitted to the police that he had killed at least 30 people and that most of their remains were buried beneath the house. He was brought to trial on February 6, 1980, charged with 33 murders and was awarded the death sentence. He remained incarcerated on death row for 14 years. Isolated in his prison cell, Gacy began to paint. Many of his paintings were displayed at exhibitions and sold. On the morning of May 9, 1994, he was transferred Stateville Correctional Center in Crest Hill to be executed by lethal injection, which ironically, got botched, because of an IV tube that got clogged by the chemicals and further delayed the execution by 10 minutes. His final spoken words were "Kiss my ass." Stories go that the Gacys home where the bodies were discovered was haunted, because for no reason at all, plants could not grow on the land despite there being no known cause found to hamper any growth. Except for a few weeds. Until the new owners built a new foundation and also changed the physical address of the house, after which the soil was fertile and that’s why Gacy ranks number two on this list. He terrorized in life and seemed to terrorize in death; and that brings us to the worst of them;
1. Ted Bundy
Theodore Robert Cowell, was an American serial killer, murderer and necrophile, who was active in the mid to late 70’s and killed young women and girls. He confessed to 30 murders but the actual victim count remains unknown. Born on November 24th, 1946, was born to ‘Louise’; his father’s identity remained unknown. He was raised by his Grandparents, who told him that ‘Louise’ was his older sister (there are many speculations about his mother and his childhood some even stating that he may have been the result of an incestual relationship between his grandfather and mother, but there has been no evidence to support or refute this). He didn't find out that ‘Louise’was his mother until his college years, after which he developed resentment towards her. Later, Louise changed his surname from Cowell to Bundy. Growing up, in high school years, claimed he could not understand teenage social behavior and friendship. He started committing petty crimes such as thievery and burglary. Bundy dropped out of school after a fall out with one his friends that drove him to depression. It was during this time that Bundy discovered his true parentage. He moved back to Washington, where he enrolled in the University of Washington as a psychology major and was well-liked by students and professors. In 1974, Bundy first attempted murder. He broke into the basement bedroom of a female student at the University of Washington, bludgeoned her in her sleep with a metal rod from her bed frame, and sexually assaulted her. She survived, but suffered permanent brain damage. Over the following four months he killed three female students. After more abductions and murders, the authorities became aware that the same man, who a number of witnesses had said called himself "Ted" who wore his arm in a sling and drove a tan or bronze-colored Volkswagen Beetle. But the police paid no attention to the tips because Ted was a ‘clean a shaven, charming, educated’ student with no past criminal record. Bundy then moved on to Salt Lake City, Utah where he attended the University Of Utah College Of Law. During the first semester, he killed four more women, one of which was the daughter of a police chief. On August 16, he was pulled over when he wouldn't stop for a police officer. Inside his car, the officer found balaclavas, gloves, a crowbar, woman’s panties, handcuffs, and other items he suspected to be burglary tools. On March 1, 1976, he was sentenced to 15 years in prison for the kidnapping of Carol DaRonch, who he had tried to abduct in Utah in 1974 by pretending to be a police officer. In 1977, investigators had found enough evidence to charge Bundy with the January 1975 murder of Caryn Campbell, but managed to escape during a visit to the courthouse library. He was caught and put in jail where managed to escape again. He managed to survive not being caught by surviving on shoplifting and purse snatching. On February 9, 1978, Bundy committed his last known murder of 12-year-old Kimberly Leach. On the morning of February 15, he was arrested for driving a stolen vehicle and was quickly linked to the murders at the University. At 7:06 a.m. on January 24, 1989, Bundy was executed by electric chair. His last words were "I'd like you to give my love to my family and friends.”
What puts Bundy at the top of this list is his Modus Operandi. Bundy was an unusually organized and calculating criminal who used his extensive knowledge of the law to elude identification and capture for years. Bundy targeted brunette, petite Caucasian women aged 12 to 26 years old. All of the victims were either in college or had a middle-class background. While looking for his victims, he would consume large quantities of alcohol. His method of obtaining the victims varied; sometimes he would burglarize their homes and bludgeon them in their sleep, sometimes he would use an elaborate ruse, and being a ‘charming, handsome and charismatic’ man, he would sometime use his looks to lure his victims. His initial attacks involved him raping them, either with incidental objects found in the victim's bedroom or ones he brought with him, and then fatally bludgeoning them with a crowbar. He would burn all clothing to remove any trace of evidence. He admitted to applying makeup to the corpses, having sex with them, and would lie with them for hours afterward. He decapitated at least 12 of his victims, and kept some of the severed heads in his apartment for a period of time as mementos. He took photos of the victims to preserve the memory of the crime. While on death row, Bundy helped the “Green River Killer” task force where he was quoted saying “In my opinion, the best chance you have to catching this guy is to get a site with a fresh body and stake it out”. Attorney Polly Nelson, a member of his last defense team, wrote, that Ted "was the very definition of heartless evil.”
Thats our list of Top 10 serial Killers; shocking, disturbing and evil. This article can be disturbing to readers. Do let us know what you think.
