review book for law, provide answers on a separate word document labeled with numbers for which question they go to, 3 sources for information are provided, you may need outside sources
Mass Murderers, Spree Murderers and Serial Murderers
Serial killers are people who, on multiple occasions spread over time, murder victims who are generally unknown to them beforehand. Their killings are marked by long periods of ‘normality’ (sometimes as long as 5-10yrs). This characteristic of the SK makes them particularly difficult to capture. Hence the need for different types of homicide investigations (Criminal Profiling).
Their crimes are committed as a result of a compulsion that, in many but not all cases, has roots in the killer’s (often dysfunctional) youth, as opposed to those who are motivated by financial gain (e.g., contract killers) or ideological/political motivations (e.g., terrorists, democide). Many times, this compulsion is linked to the individual’s sexual drive.
The term “serial killer” was coined either by FBI agent Robert Ressler or by Dr. Robert D. Keppel in the 1970s (the credit for the term is still disputed); “serial killer” entered the popular vernacular in large part due to the well-publicized crimes of Ted Bundy and David Berkowitz (“Son of Sam”) in the middle years of the decade.
The term allows criminologists to distinguish those who claim victims over a long period of time from those who claim multiple victims all at once (mass murderer). A third type of multiple killer is a spree killer.
The following are brief definitions of these three types:
• A serial killer is someone who commits three or more murders over an extended period of time with cooling-off periods in between. In between their crimes, they appear to be quite normal, a state which Hervey Cleckley and Robert Hare call the “mask of sanity.” There is frequently—but not always—a sexual element to the murders. Sadist or Sexual Deviant.
• A mass murderer, on the other hand, is an individual who kills three or more or conspires to kill 3 or more people in many events and in one or many locations spread over a period that can range from a few weeks to a few years. There is no cooling off or period of normality for a Mass Murderer. The perpetrators sometimes commit suicide, meaning knowledge of their state of mind and what triggers their actions is often left to more speculation than fact. Mass murderers who are caught sometimes claim they cannot clearly remember the event. Some examples of Mass murders include, Hitler, Stalin, the Genocide in Rwands, South Africa, World Trade Tower Bombings, “Going Postal”. Etc.
• A spree killer commits multiple murders in one or a few different locations over a short period of time that may vary from a few hours to several days. Unlike serial killers, however, they do not revert to their normal behavior in between slayings. Examples:, Although most research suggests that the Columbine Murders are considered the act of a Spree Killer- they happened all in one place and at one time- the key! By two individuals not one.
All of the above types of crimes are usually carried out by solitary individuals. There have been examples in all three categories whereby two or more perpetrators have acted together.
Author Michael Newton states that this happens in about a third of the cases. Lee Boyd Malvo and John Muhammad are prime examples. Both are known for the Beltway sniper attacks.
Serial killers are generally, but not always, male. Noted female exceptions include Aileen Wuornos, Myra Hindley and Erzsébet Báthory.
Serial killers are specifically motivated by a variety of psychological urges, primarily power and sexual compulsion. They often have feelings of inadequacy and worthlessness, sometimes owing to humiliation and abuse in childhood or the pressures of poverty and low socioeconomic status in adulthood, and their crimes compensate for this and provide a sense of potency and often social revenge, by giving them a feeling of power, both at the time of the actual killing and also afterwards for power-control killers. The knowledge that their actions terrify entire communities and often baffle police adds to this sense of power. This motivational aspect separates them from contract killers and other multiple murderers who are motivated by profit. For example, in Scotland during the 1820s, William Burke and William Hare murdered people in what became known as the “Case of the Body Snatchers.” They would not count as serial killers by most criminologists’ definitions, however, because their motive was economic. Of course, people do things for multiple motivations.
This ignores the other, more minuscule serial killer categories, visionary and missionary types, and barely covered the lust killer. The above stated definition covers only power-control killers, and hedonistic killers. A visionary killer is motivated to commit their series of murders by delusional visions and/or thoughts (e.g Richard Chase). These are highly disorganized generally and lie in delusion rather than sexual urges. The missionary killer has an object, such as the Zebra Killers or KKK members, their series of kills has an actual object and is not rooted in sexual urges. The hedonistic lust killer does not care generally about the attention or the actions pre-mortem, but wish to kill solely for use of the body post-mortem like Ed Gein.
In many cases, a serial killer will plead not guilty by reason of insanity in a court of law. This defense is almost uniformly unsuccessful. In most U.S. jurisidictions (i.e., the states), the legal definition of insanity is still generally based upon the classic common law “right or wrong” test delineated by an English court in the 1843 M’Naughten case. The M’Naughten rule, as it’s generally known in the legal profession, hinges upon whether the defendant knows the difference between right and wrong at the time of the offense. With serial killers, extensive premeditation, combined with lack of any obvious delusions or hallucinations that would hinder the defendant’s ability to elude detection after commiting multiple murders, make this defense extremely difficult.