Sometimes the most non-standard situations break into the measured existence of human society, which unsettle it for a long time. Often, in order to shock modern people who have seen a lot in their lives, a victim is needed, deprived of life with particular cruelty. Specialists spend years studying the psychology of killers and understanding the reasons that push them to such actions. Some of them are successful, and a dangerous representative of human society will live out his days in prison without posing a danger to others. Others are wrong, and murderers have been torturing people for years, killing and torturing unfortunate bodies according to their own sophisticated tastes.
Typical portrait of a maniac
Most serial criminals belong to European nations. If you believe the average, they begin their criminal activities after 25 years. Their education remains at the level of school education, in rare cases - at a technical school or vocational school. Such people lack work acumen, so they occupy positions that do not require special knowledge.
Books about the psychology of serial killers containone curious moment. In everyday life, they try to choose specific jobs that can satisfy hidden desires in violence and blood (military, doctors, nurses).
The influence of childhood problems on the psychology of serial killers
Any modern killer is the result of a pathological upbringing of a child. If you examine the psychology of killers and maniacs, you can identify many common features: an incomplete family, sexual harassment or violence from parents, resentment from the attitude of relatives that many carry throughout their lives, the influence of peer society, and so on. After such a lack of positive emotions, some children begin to shun society, invent imaginary friends for themselves, create in their heads a different, more desirable life.
Robert Ressler, a sex crime researcher, firmly believes that a child abused as a child will eventually become the next serial offender. As a confirmation of this theory, the psychology of terrorists and serial killers contains the so-called "MacDonald triad": urinating in bed - setting it on fire - mocking animals. The likelihood of such a turn of events increases in the presence of parents who are alcoholics or drug addicts. But despite this fate, their child is 100% likely not to inherit bad habits.
General appearance of the criminal
Modern cinema creates a misleading picture. The viewer gets the impression that he recognizescriminal as soon as he meets him on the street. The criminal psychology of serial killers says otherwise.
Such people are no different from the surrounding society, they can hide their illegal actions for years, outwardly remaining the most ordinary citizens. To find a serial killer, law enforcement agencies must literally grab him by the hand, catching him at the crime scene. And even after that, society cannot accept the obvious for a long time, because the person behaved impeccably in everyday life, but thought through the commission of the crime to the smallest detail. The police note the high level of intelligence of hardened criminals, which allowed them to avoid well-deserved punishment for years.
Serial criminal lives a double life. Using the appearance of an ordinary person, he kills, remaining outside the attention of the police and the surrounding people. Some maniacs possess psychology to such an extent that they can lead another person without much resistance from the latter. They instinctively listen to social needs, try not to stand out.
For example, we can remember Gary Schaefer. He lived in the state of Vermont in a society of believers who respected family traditions. For greater persuasiveness, the man joined a sect leading a lifestyle according to the canons of the fundamentalist version of the holy book. And no one could have thought that behind the back of society, he steals, rapes and kills the daughters of his neighbors.
No less famous man John Wayne Gacy is a homosexual serial criminal. No one noticed that he understood how they become murderers. Psychologists are still unraveling the mystery of his personality.
Young John was a member of the political games of Chicago, worked at the local polling station and ran the school club. The father did not understand his hobbies, so he took every opportunity to mock him on this score. The guy endured, tried not to deviate from the chosen path. With his distinctive determination, he was a significant supporter of the Democrats, earned respect as a city volunteer and managed to be a field marshal of the Cleanliness Parade, which was regularly held on the territory of Chicago. In addition, on the list of his achievements was the position of the general director of a construction company, which employed about 700 people.
But no one knew that at the same time he managed to kill 33 young men and bury them under his own house. Law enforcement agencies found out that despite his wife, John was fond of secret meetings with the young men who worked under his leadership. Developing construction processes, under their cover, he managed to speculate on timber prices, rob we althier fellow citizens and trade in narcotic drugs. While searching the home of the perpetrator, the authorities saw a photo of the owner of the house with the then mayor Richard Daly, as well as a handshake with the wife of the President, Rosalynn Carter.
Richard counted on Gracie's help during the election campaign. And we must pay tribute, he lived up to all his expectations. John regularly helped lonely old people, conveyed their complaints and requests from neighbors to the Democrats. He accompanied the President's wife when she visited Chicago at the time of the 1976 election. Society literally carried it in its arms. And so it was so shocked when the truth about his murders came to light that anger and indignation reached neighboring countries.
But his example is the exception rather than the rule. The psychology of a killer does not strive to reach any significant heights on the career ladder. Personal qualities, among which asociality is in the lead, contribute to the fact that they tend not to stand out in the surrounding society. But FBI agents have long proven that serial criminals are highly intelligent, creative and highly sophisticated when it comes to sex crimes.
Such people easily manage the surrounding society. They so naturally endear themselves to the future victim that she will do everything that is asked of her without objection. Another feature of the psychology of terrorists and serial killers, which can amaze the imagination, is that they are all megalomaniacs who consider themselves exceptional and not like other people. They are bold, a little self-confident, so sooner or later they come to the attention of the police. When criminals are under investigation, they talk with particular pleasure about their destiny, sometimes ascribe to themselves those actions that have nothing to do with them. They believe that they were born to fulfill a divine mission, which is to eliminate the "defective" representatives of humanity: prostitutes, representatives of national minorities, lesbians and gays, homosexuals and so on.
Psychiatrists have created a classification according to whichserial killers are included in the category of psychopaths (another name is sociopaths). Psychopaths are closed people, with a relatively he althy psyche, but with barely noticeable anomalies of behavior and character. Many people of this type are under special supervision of law enforcement agencies. The reason is quite simple - often they join the ranks of multi-recidivists. Psychiatrist Hare R. D. has devoted 25 years of his life to studying psychopaths who, under the influence of their nature, commit regular crimes. In his books on the psychology of maniacs and serial killers, he identified key features of this nature:
- prone to deceit and impartial behavior;
- superficiality in judgments and grandiosity;
- feigned emotions, often not affecting the person himself;
- original behavior and self-centeredness;
- complete inability to sympathize or be responsible for one's actions;
- does not suffer from pangs of conscience or guilt for bad actions;
- impulsive acts, poorly controlled by the person himself;
- shuns crowded society.
Relapse Rate
Ill-informed people consider serial killers the same bandits as other criminals. But they are wrong. In the future, the bandits get tired, stop their activities. Each for his own reasons: someone is tired, and the other just stole his own, and he has enough to live. Murderers are a different type of criminal. They cannot, as easily as they become murderers, rebuild their psychology, startanother life. Only a few of them are able to stop. In this regard, the principle of the predator operates: having felt the fear of the driven victim and the smell of blood, they repeat the kill in order to repeat these emotions. They can only be killed, arrested or placed under lifelong surveillance.
In places of deprivation of liberty, they are a model of exemplary behavior, collaborating in every possible way with policemen and other prison personnel. But psychiatrists are categorical in their attitude - people with the psychology of a killer are not able to take the path of correction.
Signs of serial killings
Serial killings have certain characteristics that distinguish them from ordinary multi-victim crimes:
- Psychology of the killer will not allow you to stop at one episode of death. He periodically repeats the search for a new victim, and subsequently the society learns about the next crime.
- Only one victim can be harmed at a time. This feature often interferes with the investigation, as it makes serial murder related to an ordinary domestic crime.
- An experienced serial killer works without assistants, avoiding unnecessary witnesses to his actions. In exceptional cases, works in tandem with a love partner.
- The injured person often has nothing to do with the perpetrator. From the moment of acquaintance to the commission of a murder, it can take a few minutes, or a couple of hours, occupied by a fleeting conversation with the victim. Lack of motive makes it difficult for law enforcement.
- Serial murder is notable for its cruelty. ATunlike an attempted robbery, rape, revenge, and so on, when a person is killed in passing, the first thing that comes to hand, the victim of a serial episode has traces of numerous tortures and signs of painful death on his body.
- After the murder, the criminals quickly leave the scene, trying to get as far as possible in the shortest possible time. Investigators call them wanderers. Their crimes are difficult to combine into one series due to the lack of interconnections and sufficient distance from each other. There is another kind of killer known as homebodies. This is a different type of criminals, who have perfected the skill of concealing crimes to perfection. They often take years to kill, but if they let their guard down, they can fall into the hands of the investigation due to a ridiculous mistake.
- An equally important feature of a serial crime is that in the interval between episodes, the killer's emotions cool down. This period can last either a couple of months or several years. At this time, he lives like an ordinary person, without attracting the close attention of society.
- Every detail of the murder is carefully planned and processed. The offender makes sure not to leave behind visible traces that point to the culprit of what happened. There will usually be no potential witnesses nearby.
- In the everyday life of an ordinary person, a criminal does not in any way resemble the gloomy image of a burnt killer. He can play the role of a social worker, be a respected and beloved neighbor or a respectable family man.
- The specific nature of the serial offender (the ability to manipulate,strong energy, outstanding intellect, the ability to skillfully deceive, accumulated experience in murders) helps to avoid the close attention of law enforcement agencies, and often go unpunished for most of your life.
Psychology of personality of serial killers
The killer can be an avid stay-at-home or wander from one city to another, resemble an exemplary family man or impulsive hysteria, perform some mission or simply kill under the influence of bloodlust. Each of them represents a different kind of criminal.
Werewolves
Cinema loves them. In ordinary life, quiet and unremarkable people who respect the law and interact well with society. They may be single or caring for their family. They are very careful about their appearance, they are attentive to their general well-being.
Society believes that criminals in this category are quite sane, without serious mental illness. But experts correct: along with psychiatric diagnoses, there are psychological ones. In more detail, outwardly a person may not show a noticeable psychosis, but deep inside, in the "subconscious", have serious personality disorders. And this is quite understandable. Murders such as those committed by a serial offender cannot, under any circumstances, be committed by a normal person.
The daily life of a killer is carefully planned out. Possessing developed mental abilities, he often graduates from a university, but will not necessarily work in his speci alty. He is interested in social problems, watches all programs about committed offenses and reads newspaper articles about his own crimes. Even while being interrogated, he has clear answers to all questions, speaks rationally and behaves prudently.
Serial killers are responsible for any planned crime, they carefully think through everything to the smallest detail. People with wanderer tendencies kill far away from their usual habitats in order to avoid the risk of being recognized by a casual passer-by. Homebodies, whose category includes the so-called "respectable neighbors", thoroughly hide the corpses, perfectly master the technique of domestic crimes. These killers are dangerous because they can easily lure a future victim into their house, because the people around them have known him for more than a year, and, accordingly, they trust him very much.
Psychopaths
Such killers do not have the glorified intelligence of serial criminals, they commit their deeds under the influence of external factors or momentary desires. They are potential patients in psychiatric clinics, as they are carriers of mental retardation, schizophrenia, and so on. They have a sloppy appearance, do not like to talk a lot, contact with society and dress in a strange way. They can live alone or with any relative, periodically go to work that does not require special knowledge. Daily life is not organized, subject to fleeting efforts.
They have absolutely no concern for social issues and absolutely no desireexpand your horizons. The complete absence of reflection, therefore, they do not realize the whole essence of the actions they perform, sometimes instantly forgetting about them. Such killers do not understand the need for organization, so they can kill the first passerby, and then leave the corpse at the scene with a lot of evidence against themselves.
A typical representative is the serial criminal Richard Case, who operated in California. Thanks to his beloved habit of drinking blood, and eating the remains of his victims, he left a mark in history as "the vampire from Sacramento". At the age of 10, he was diagnosed with the Macdonald triad, which is typical for most serial killers - three not particularly respectable characteristics of behavior: animal abuse, playing with fire, urinary incontinence. Such a disease is characterized by the fact that it is 100% proof of violence and abuse of parents over a child.
Inspired by
Serial criminals can be:
- "power-hungry" - an attempt to assert themselves by torturing the unfortunate victim, the opportunity to forget about their own shortcomings at least for a while (David Berkowitz);
- "sensualists" - those who want to get sexual satisfaction in the process of killing a female victim (Andrey Chikatilo);
- "visionaries" - mentally ill killers who kill under the influence of delusions and hallucinations (Herbert Mullin);
- "missionaries" - has an inflated conceit, inspiring him about the divine mission of cleaning social society from strangers - prostitutes, lesbians andetc (Jack the Ripper);
- "cannibals" - they kill to eat their victim (Nikolai Dzhumagaliev).
Besides them, there are wanderers (traveling from one place to another in order to commit murders) and homebodies (killing nearby, or in their own home). The psychology of murderers and maniacs of serial scale is not focused on a certain type of crime. As a rule, each of the criminals combines several characteristics.
Seven main signs of a maniac
These include:
- Unusual behavior - such people successfully get used to the role of an ordinary person, but under the influence of random factors they can give out the presence of a killer instinct in psychology: laugh at fallen children, catch up with a passing animal, hit it, and so on.
- Energy vampirism - most criminals have powerful energy. Due to their ordinary appearance, they do not stand out from the crowd, but a random interlocutor instantly falls under their charm.
- Two lives of one person - despite such hobbies, the killers have many relatives, their own families and children. Therefore, when the whole truth about their actions comes to light, society does not believe what is happening for a long time.
- Skillful manipulators - many criminals become such as a result of resentment and complexes earned during childhood. Having matured, they take revenge on an indifferent society by manipulating the people around them.
- Quiet conversations - people who speak quietly are extremely withdrawn, they hardly go tocontact. But, wanting to attract an interlocutor, they easily win him over. At the same time, they manage not to leave any vivid memories of their presence in his memory.
- Deceptive courtesy - The appearance and behavior of this person gives the impression of a sweet and courteous personality. When meeting a future victim, they win her trust with light and casual conversations. Diluting the conversation with funny jokes, they relax the interlocutor, involuntarily forcing him to show the same frankness.
- Ordinary appearance - society expects crimes and just not the best actions from alcoholics, homeless people and violent neighbors, who a priori must have the psychology of a terrorist, a murderer.
But the statistics contain other data. According to them, the majority of criminals are between 25 and 30 years old, they are provided with an average income. Not infrequently among them there are rich people.
