Book Project (Cri 212)
Book Project (Cri 212)
Book Project (Cri 212)
I. Personal Background
Al Capone, born on January 17, 1899,
in Brooklyn, New York, was a notorious
American gangster and crime boss during the
Prohibition era. His involvement in organized
crime made him a symbol of the lawless and
violent era of the 1920s and 1930s.
Al Capone grew up in a tough
neighborhood and faced adversity from a
young age. He dropped out of school at 14
after being expelled for hitting a teacher.
Capone joined a street gang and engaged in
various criminal activities, eventually moving to
Chicago where he became associated with
Johnny Torrio, a prominent mobster. Under
Torrio's guidance, Capone rose through the
ranks of organized crime and eventually took over as the leader after Torrio was
seriously wounded in an assassination attempt.
Early involvement in crime: Capone joined the Five Points Gang in his youth,
exposing him to criminal activities.
Move to Chicago: Capone relocated to Chicago relocated to Chicago in 1920,
where he quickly rose through the ranks of the criminal underworld.
Political connections: Capone maintained corrupt relationships with politicians
and law enforcement, avoiding serious legal consequences.
Imprisonment for tax evasion: Capone was eventually convicted in 1931 for
tas evasion, marking the end of his criminal career.
Al Capone's criminal
career was marked by violence,
intimidation, and control over
illegal industries. He was
involved in various criminal
activities, including bootlegging,
gambling, and prostitution.
Capone was known for his
ruthless nature and was
implicated in numerous cases of
violence and murder.
One of the most infamous
incidents associated with Capone was the St. Valentine's Day Massacre in 1929.
Capone's gang allegedly executed seven members of a rival gang in a Chicago
garage, solidifying his reputation for brutality.
I. Personal Background
Pablo Escobar, born on December 1, 1949, in Rionegro, Colombia, was a
notorious Colombian criminal and the head of the Medellín cartel. In his early life, he
engaged in various criminal activities, including selling fake diplomas, smuggling,
and theft. As the cocaine industry grew in Colombia, Escobar became a key figure in
drug smuggling and co-founded the Medellín cartel in the mid-1970s. By the mid-
1980s, the cartel dominated the cocaine trade, making Escobar one of the world's
most powerful and wealthy drug traffickers, with an estimated net worth of around
$25 billion. Escobar led a lavish lifestyle, owning a vast estate called Hacienda
Nápoles and engaging in philanthropy, earning him comparisons to Robin Hood.
However, his benevolent image was contradicted by his ruthless tactics, using "plata
o plomo" (bribes or bullets) to deal with problems.
He targeted rival traffickers, government officials, policemen, and civilians,
causing significant violence, including a bomb attack that killed over 100 people in
1989. Facing the threat of extradition to the United States, Escobar initiated
negotiations for his surrender in 1991. He was imprisoned in a luxurious facility
known as La Catedral, where he continued criminal activities. After torturing and
killing two cartel members, authorities decided to move him to a less-accommodating
prison. However, Escobar escaped custody in July 1992, leading to a massive
manhunt. On December 2, 1993, at the age of 44, he was fatally shot by Colombian
forces on a Medellín rooftop, marking the collapse of the Medellín cartel. While some
speculated suicide, his death ended an era of drug-related violence in Colombia.
4. Guillermo
Cano Isaza was
assassinated on December 17, 1986, at the entrance
to the office of El Espectador, the newspaper founded
by his father. He had served as the editor since the
age of 27. Cano was a victim of drug trafficking
mafias, whom he fearlessly denounced and about
whose harmful effects on Colombian society he
cautioned. The newspaper's building was destroyed in
a bomb attack three years later by the Cartel. Popeye
was later charged with helping to plan the attack on El
Espectador.
I. Personal Background
Jeffrey Lionel Dahmer, May 21, 1960 – November 28, 1994), also known as
the Milwaukee Cannibal or the Milwaukee Monster, was an American serial killer and
sex offender who killed and dismembered seventeen males between 1978 and 1991.
Many of his later murders involved necrophilia, cannibalism, and the permanent
preservation of body parts—typically all or part of the secleton.Although he was
diagnosed with borderline personality disorder (BPD), schizotypal personality
disorder (StPD), and a psychotic disorder, Dahmer was found to be legally sane at
his trial. He was convicted of fifteen of the sixteen homicides he had committed in
Wisconsin and was sentenced to fifteen terms of life imprisonment on February 17,
1992.Dahmer was later sentenced to a sixteenth term of life imprisonment for an
additional homicide committed in Ohio in 1978. On November 28, 1994, Dahmer was
beaten to death by Christopher Scarver, a fellow inmate at the Columbia
Correctional Institution in Portage, Wisconsin.
II. Turning to point that led to criminality:
Jeffrey Dahmer's turning point toward criminality is often linked to a
combination of psychological, environmental, and personal factors. His troubled
childhood, marked by his parents' divorce and a sense of isolation, contributed to a
deep-seated emotional disturbance. Dahmer's early fascination with death and
cruelty, manifested in acts of cruelty toward animals, raised concerns about his
mental state. Additionally, his struggle with his sexuality and social awkwardness
added to the complexity of his psychological makeup. The gradual progression from
early signs of disturbance to increasingly heinous crimes suggests a culmination of
these factors, highlighting the intricate interplay between nature and nurture in the
development of criminal behavior.
I. Personal Background
John Wayne Gacy was born at Edgewater
Hospital in Chicago, Illinois, on March 17, 1942, the
second of three children and only son of John
Stanley Gacy and Marion Elaine Robison. His father
was an auto repair machinist and World War I
veteran, and his mother was a homemaker. Gacy
was of a Polish and Danish ancestry, and his family
was Catholic. Gacy and Myers married in
September 1964. He opened a “club” in his
basement where his employees could drink alcohol
and play pool. Although Gacy employed teenagers
of both sexes, he socialized only with the young
men. Gacy gave many of them alcohol before he
made sexual advancements; if they rebuffed him, he
would claim his advances were jokes or a test of morals.
John Wayne Gacy was an American serial killer and sex offender who raped,
tortured, and murdered at least 33 young men and boys in Norwood Park Township,
near Chicago, Illinois. He became known as the Killer Clown due to his public
performances as a clown prior to the discovery of his crimes.
I. Personal Background
David Berkowitz was born Richard David Falco on June 1, 1953 in Brooklyn,
New York. His unmarried parents separated shortly before he was born, and he was
put up for adoption. His adoptive parents switched his first and middle names, and
gave him their surname. From a young age, Berkowitz began to show early signs of
his future violent behavior patterns. While he was of above-average intelligence, he
lost interest in school and instead focused on more rebellious habits. Berkowitz got
involved in petty larceny and pyromania. However, his misbehaviour never led to
legal troubles or impacted his school records. When he was 14, Berkowitz’s adoptive
mother died of breast cancer and his relationship with his adoptive father and new
stepmother grew strained.
When he was 18, in 1971, Berkowitz entered the U.S. Army and served both in the
U.S. as well as South Korea. He was honourably discharged three years later.
Berkowitz then tracked down his birth mother, Betty Falco. His mother told him about
his illegitimate birth and the recent death of his birth father, which greatly upset
Berkowitz. He eventually lost contact with his birth mother and began working a
number of blue-collar jobs.
Shortly after midnight on November 27, 1976, 16-year old Donna DeMasi and
18-year old Joanne Lomino were sitting on Lomino’s porch in Bellerose,
Queens. As they talked, a man approached them, dressed in military fatigues.
He began to ask them for directions in a high-pitched voice before taking out a
revolver and shooting at them. They both fell, injured, and the shooter ran
away. Both girls survived their wounds, but Lomino was paralyzed. Police
were able to determine that the bullets were from an unknown .44 caliber gun.
They were also able to make composite sketches based on testimony from
the girls and neighborhood witnesses.
On January 30, 1977, Christine Freund and John Diel were sitting in Diel’s car
in Queens when the car was shot at. Diel suffered minor injuries and Freund
died of injuries at the hospital. Neither victim ever saw the shooter. After this
shooting, police publicly connected this case with the previous shootings.
They observed that all shootings involved a .44 caliber gun, and the shooter
seemed to target young women with long, dark hair. When the composite
sketches from the various attacks were released, NYPD officials noted that
they were likely searching for multiple shooters.
On June 26, 1977, the Son of Sam made another appearance, in Bayside,
Queens. Sal Lupo and Judy Placido were sitting in their car in the early
morning hours when they were shot with three gunshots. They both suffered
minor injuries, and survived, though neither saw their attacker. However,
witnesses reported seeing a tall, stocky man with dark hair fleeing the crime
scene, as well as a blond man with a mustache driving in the area. Police
believed that the dark man was their suspect, and the blond man was a
witness.
On July 31, 1977, just two days after the anniversary of the first shooting,
Berkowitz shot again, this time in Brooklyn. Stacy Moskowitz and Robert
Violante were in Violante’s car, parked near a park when a man walked up to
the passenger side and began shooting. Moskowitz died at the hospital, and
Violante suffered non-life threatening injuries. Unlike most of the other female
victims, Moskowitz did not have long or dark hair. There were several
witnesses to this shooting who were able to provide descriptions of the
shooter to police. One of the witnesses described that the man looked like he
was wearing a wig, which could account for the varying descriptions of
suspects with blond and dark hair. Several witnesses saw a man matching
Berkowitz’s description -wearing a wig- driving a yellow car, without any
headlights and speeding away from the crime scene. Police decided to
investigate the owners any yellow cars matching the description. David
Berkowitz’s car was one of those cars, but investigators initially pegged him
as a witness rather than a suspect.
In August 1977, a woman named Cacilia Davis saw a car being ticketed by a
cop in her neighborhood; moments later, a suspicious-looking man with some kind of
object in his hand appeared near the car and seemed to stare at her. She ran home
as shots rang out behind her. After she reported the incident to the authorities, they
tracked down all the cars that had been ticketed in the area on the night in question
and ultimately located what they believed to be the “Son of Sam” killer’s car, which
had guns and ammunition inside. Police waited for Berkowitz to leave his nearby
apartment and apprehended him at his vehicle. He reportedly told his arresting
officers, “Well, you got me… I’m Sam.”
Not only is he still alive, but he claims he's born again! In 1987, he became an
evangelical Christian while in prison after a fellow inmate gave him a Bible. He has
since stated through his website that he now refers to himself as the "Son of Hope."
After pleading guilty to all charges against him, Berkowitz tried to jump out a
seventh-story window at his sentencing in 1978. (Throughout his legal proceedings,
he underwent numerous psychiatric exams, but was always found competent to
stand trial.) He was sentenced to 25 years-to-life for each of his killings. He’s served
time in various New York State correctional facilities; he’s currently detained at the
Shawangunk Correctional Facility in the tiny upstate town of Wallkill.
He received the maximum sentence of 25 years to life for each of the six 'Son
of Sam' killings. Berkowitz, 67, is still alive today and is believed to be incarcerated in
Shawangunk Correctional Facility in Wallkill, New York. He is just 43 years into his
six consecutive life sentences. However, because Berkowitz pleaded guilty to the
killings, he was eligible for parole after serving 25 years. Despite his eligibility for
parole since 2002, he has never applied for release.
H.H HOLMES
h.h holmes
I. Personal Background
Herman Webster Mudgett or Dr. Henry Howard Holmes, he is well known
as H.H Holmes, (born May 16, 1861, Gilmanton, New Hampshire, U.S.—died May
7, 1896, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania), An American swindler and confidence trickster
who is widely considered the country’s first known serial killer. He was born into a
wealthy family and showed signs of high intelligence from an early age. Always
interested in medicine, he allegedly trapped animals and performed surgery on them;
some accounts of his life even suggest that he killed a childhood playmate.
Victims
Known Murder Victims: 9
Possible Number of Murder Victims: 200+
Youngest Murder Victim: 6 years old.
Oldest Murder Victim: Unknown.
Confirmed Murders
December 25, 1891: Julia and Pearl Conner:
Julia Smythe (overdosed with chloroform)
Pearl Smythe (Julia's daughter; poisoned and butchered)
1892:
June 1: Emily Van Tessel, 16 (poisoned)
December 6: Emeline Cigrand, 23-24 (suffocated in the vault)
July 5, 1893:
Anna "Annie" Williams, 23 (suffocated in the vault like the previous victim)
Minnie R. Holmes, 25 (his wife and Anna's sister; poisoned)
1894: The Pitezel family:
September 2: Benjamin Frelan Pitezel (father and Holmes's accomplice;
knocked unconscious with chloroform and fatally burned alive)
October 5: Alice and Nellie Pitezel (daughters; both locked in a trunk and
fatally gassed; burned and dismembered post-mortem) Alice Pitezel Nellie
Pitezel (also cut her feet off post-mortem)
October 25: Howard Pitezel, 8 (son; poisoned; dismembered and burned
post-mortem)
Possible Murders
Unspecified dates in 1886:
Doctor Robert Leacock (overdosed with laudanum)
Unnamed boy (killed by unknown causes)
Unnamed boy (poisoned)
Elizabeth Holton (killed by unknown causes)
Late 1887: Doctor Russell (first name unrevealed; killed by unknown causes)
Unspecified dates in 1888:
Rodgers (first name unrevealed; bludgeoned with an oar)
Charles Cole (bludgeoned with a pipe)
"Lizzie" (pseudonym; suffocated in the vault)
Sarah Cook (suffocated in the vault like the previous victim; was pregnant at
the time of her death)
Mary Haracamp (incidental; suffocated in the vault)
Unspecified date in 1890: Russell (surname unrevealed; struck with a chair)
Unspecified date in 1891:
Rasine Van Jassund (poisoned with cyanide)
Robert Latimer (gassed or starved to death)
Wade Warner (burned alive)
Unnamed banker (starved and overdosed with chloroform)
Unnamed woman (overdosed with chloroform)
1892: February 8:
Anna Betts, 24 (poisoned)
July 18: Eva Gertrud Conner (poisoned like the previous victim)
1893: Unspecified date:
Unnamed woman (overdosed with chloroform)
May-October: Unnamed victim (killed by unknown causes)
Unspecified dates in 1894:
Milford Cole (bludgeoned with a pipe by an unnamed accomplice)
Baldwin H. Williams (shot)
Unspecified dates:
Kate Durkee (suffocated in the vault)
Mr. Rogers (first name unrevealed; overdosed with chloroform)
As a child he feared Doctors and anything that involved them. Some children
who knew him forced him to look at a skeleton but rather then fearing it Holmes was
morbidly fascinated with it. He would usually kill young female drifters who would
stay at his hotel - aka The Murder Castle - and then he would strip the bodies down
to their bones so he could sell the Skeletons to medical practices.
In 1886 Mudgett moved to Chicago and took a job as a pharmacist under the
name “Dr. H.H. Holmes.” Soon afterward he apparently began killing people in order
to steal their property. The house he built for himself, which would become known as
“Murder Castle,” was equipped with secret passages, trapdoors, soundproof rooms,
doors that could be locked from the outside, gas jets to asphyxiate victims, and a kiln
to cremate the bodies. At the reputed peak of his career, during the World’s
Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893, he allegedly seduced and murdered a
number of women, typically by becoming engaged to them and then killing them after
securing control of their life savings. Holmes also required his employees to carry life
insurance policies naming him as beneficiary so that he could collect money after he
killed them. He sold the bodies of many of his victims to local medical schools.
In 1893 He was arrested for insurance fraud after a fire at his home, but he
was soon released. He then concocted a scheme with an associate, Ben Pitezel, to
defraud an insurance company by faking Pitezel’s death. After Pitezel purchased a
$10,000 life insurance policy, he and H.H Holmes traveled to Colorado, Missouri,
New York, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, and Texas, where they committed other acts
of fraud (along the way, H.H Holmes also married). Returning to Missouri, Holmes
was arrested for fraud and briefly jailed in St. Louis. While in jail he met Marion
Hedgepeth, a career criminal who agreed to help him in the insurance scheme with
Pitezel. Meanwhile, Pitezel moved to Philadelphia and opened a fake patent office to
swindle inventors. After his release from jail, he traveled to Philadelphia and killed
Pitezel. He then convinced Pitezel’s widow, who had been aware of her husband’s
involvement in the insurance scheme, that her husband was still alive, later giving
her $500 of the money he collected. Worried that some of Pitezel’s five children
might alert the authorities, he killed three of them. Insurance investigators were
alerted to the fraud by Hedgepeth, and H.H Holmes was arrested in Boston,
Massachusetts, in 1894. He was tried in Philadelphia for the murder of Pitezel and
was sentenced to death by hanging.
H.H Holmes confessed to 27 murders (he later increased the total to more
than 130), though some researchers have suggested that the real number exceeded
200.
Frank Abagnale
Frank abagnale jr.
I. Personal Background
Frank Abagnale Jr. was born on
April 27, 1948, in Bronxville, New
York. He entered the world of crime
as a youngster with credit card and
check schemes. Growing up in New
Rohelle, New York, he experienced
family challenges, including his
parents’ divorce. His early
fascination with the world of finance
and aviation fueled his audicious
exploits, leading him successfully pose as a Pan American World Airways pilot, a
doctor, and a legal prosecutor. Despite the criminal nature of his actions, Abagnale’s
life story has taken a remarkable turn, as he later transformed himself on fraud
prevention and security, working with various governmental agencies and
corporations to combat the very schemes he once mastered.
IV. How much did it affect the people around Abagnale of his scheme?
JEROME BRUDOS
Jerome brudos
I. Personal Background
Jerome Brudos, also known as the “Shoe Fetish Slayer” or the “Lust Killer,” was an
American serial killer active in the late 1960s. His criminal career and list of victims
are disturbing:
2. Jan Susan Whitney 23, a motorist whose car broke down on Interstate 5
between Salem and Albany on November 26, 1968. Brudos offered to drive
her to his home with the excuse of letting her call a tow truck there. While still
in the car, he strangled her with a leather strap and raped her. He kept the
body hanging from the pulley in his garage for several days, during which he
dressed, photographed and had sex with it. This time Brudos cut off one of
her breasts and made a resin mold of it that he used as a paperweight.
Afterward he tied the body to a piece of railroad iron and threw it in the
Willamette along with Slawson’s foot, which had rotted.
4. Linda Salee, 22, abducted from a shopping mall parking lot on April 23, 1969.
Brudos brought her to his garage where he raped and strangled her, then
played with her corpse. He decided to not cut her breasts off because they
were “too pink” and instead applied an electric current to the body in an
attempt to make it “jump”, which failed. Afterward, he tied the body to a car
transmission with a nylon cord and threw it in the Willamette.
Brudos was eventually apprehended in 1969, leading to his arrest and
subsequent conviction for his crimes. He was sentenced to life in prison but died by
suicide in his cell at the Oregon State Penitentiary on March 28, 2006. His criminal
career is marked by a series of brutal and heinous acts that terrorized the community
during his reign of violence.
I. Personal Background
Dennis Rader (born March 9, 1945, in Pittsburg, Kansas, U.S.) is an American serial
killer who murdered 10 people over a span of three decades before his arrest and
confession in 2005. He called himself BTK because he bound, tortured, and killed his
victims.
Rader was raised in Wichita, Kansas. He later claimed that, as a youth, he had killed
animals and developed violent sexual fantasies that involved bondage. In the 1960s,
he served in the U.S. Air Force, and in 1970 he returned to Wichita, where he
married and had two children. He held various jobs, including a brief stint as a
factory worker for the Coleman Company, a maker of camping equipment. In 1979,
he graduated from Wichita State University, where he studied criminal justice. During
this time, he began working for ADT, a home security company, and in 1991, he
became a compliance officer in Park City, Kansas. Rader was active in his church,
and he served as a Boy Scout leader.
On January 15, 1974, Rader committed his first murder, strangling four family
members, including two children, in their Wichita home; the mother had worked for
Coleman. Semen was found at the scene, though none of the victims had been
sexually assaulted. Rader took a watch from the home, and he would acquire
souvenirs—often underwear—from subsequent victims. In April 1974, Rader
targeted a 21-year-old woman who was another Coleman employee. After breaking
into her house, however, he also encountered her brother, who managed to escape
despite being shot. Rader fatally stabbed the woman before fleeing. Later that year,
he wrote a letter detailing the January murders and saying that “the code words for
me will be...bind them, torture them, kill them, B.T.K.” He left the note in a book at
the Wichita Public Library, and it was eventually recovered by the police.
Over the next two decades, Rader killed five more women. His sixth victim was
strangled in March 1977 after he locked her three young children in the bathroom.
Following the death of his next victim in December 1977, Rader grew irritated by the
lack of media coverage. In a letter to a local TV station, he wrote, “How many people
do I have to kill before I get a name in the paper or some national attention?" The
resulting coverage helped set off a panic. Rader then waited eight years before
murdering a neighbor in her home in 1985; he reportedly later took her body to his
church, where he photographed her in bondage. A 28-year-old mother of two was
killed in 1986, and in 1991, Rader committed his last murder, strangling a 62-year-
old woman in her secluded home. The cases subsequently went cold.
In 2004, on the 30th anniversary of Rader’s first murders, a local paper ran a feature
in which it speculated that the killer had either died or been imprisoned. Rader
responded by sending various pieces of evidence from his ninth murder—notably a
copy of the victim’s driver’s license as well as photographs of her body—to a
reporter. For the next year, he sent packages to the media or simply left items
around Wichita. He often used cereal boxes—possibly a reference to “serial killer”—
to hold drawings; crime souvenirs, including photographs; written descriptions of the
murders; and even dolls posed to mimic the various deaths.
In January 2005, police received a break after recovering a cereal box that included
a note in which Rader asked police whether they would be able to trace a floppy
disk he wanted to send them. Through a classified ad, law enforcement officials
indicated that it would be safe. He then sent them a disk, which the police quickly
traced to his church, where he served as president of the congregation.
Rader’s DNA was then matched to the semen found at the first crime scene. He was
arrested in February 2005, and he soon confessed to the crimes and expressed
shock that the police had lied to him. In June, Rader pleaded guilty, and two months
later, he was sentenced to 10 consecutive life terms.
Dennis Rader, the BTK killer, exhibited a complex interplay of factors that
contributed to his criminal behavior. While there is no single definitive cause for his
actions, a combination of psychological, social, and environmental factors likely
played a role in his development into a serial killer.
Rader's reign of terror began in 1974 with the murder of the Otero family. He
would go on to kill nine more people over the next 17 years, often leaving cryptic
clues and taunting messages for the police.
Victims: Joseph Otero, 38; Julie Otero, 35; Joseph Otero Jr., 11; Kathryn
Otero, 9
Method: Strangulation
Rader's modus operandi was characterized by his meticulous planning and his
sadistic tendencies. He would often stalk his victims for weeks or months before
striking, and he would take trophies from his crimes, such as jewelry or clothing.
His methods of torture and killing were often brutal and prolonged, and he
seemed to derive pleasure from the suffering of his victims.
Rader's taunting communications with the police and the media were a hallmark
of his criminal career. He would send them letters and packages containing
clues, riddles, and even his own artwork. His communications were often cryptic
and designed to confuse the investigators, but they also served to feed his ego
and give him a sense of control over the situation.
In 2005, after a series of mistakes, Rader was finally arrested and charged with ten
counts of first-degree murder. He pleaded guilty to all charges and was sentenced to
ten consecutive life sentences. He is currently serving his sentence at the El Dorado
Correctional Facility in Kansas.
EDMUND KEMPER
EDMUND KEPNER
I. Personal Background
Edmund Kemper was already a head taller than his peers at the age of four. He had
exceptional intelligence as well as evidence of excessive brutality. When he was ten,
he buried their family cat alive, dug it out after it died, decapitated it, and placed its
head on a spike. According to his later statements, the fact that he was lying to his
family about killing the animal brought him pleasure.
Though very bright (he was later found to have an IQ of 145 during adulthood), he
displayed sociopathic traits at an early age; he was a pyromaniac and often used his
sisters' dolls to enact murders and bizarre sexual rituals. He particularly enjoyed
pulling their heads off. He took great delight in torturing and killing cats; one of them
he stabbed to death. Another he reportedly buried alive, dug up again, decapitated it
and put its head on a pole. He fantasized about being executed by electric chair and
would often enact it as a game with his sisters. His emotionally abusive mother
would often lock him in the basement because she was afraid that he would rape the
youngest, the basement often being filled with rats. At the age of 13, he ran away
and made it all the way to his father in California, only to discover that he had
remarried and made his stepson the object of his affection. Kemper, heartbroken,
was sent back to his mother.
At the age of 14, Kemper was sent to live with his paternal grandparents, Edmund
Sr. and Maude Kemper, at their ranch in North Fork, California. Even though he
already was an imposing 6 foot 4 inches (1,93 m) tall, he was easily bullied by
classmates. He also didn't get along with his grandmother. On the afternoon of
August 27, 1964, he shot and killed first her, then Edmund Sr., with a rifle that had
been given to him for Christmas the previous year. Sources vary on exactly how it
happened; some claim it was a spur of the moment after Kemper and she had an
argument. Others claim that she was working on her next children's book when she
was shot and that Kemper did it just to find out how it felt. He then killed his
grandfather when he came home from grocery shopping to spare him the sight of his
dead wife and made two phone calls; first to his mother to tell her what he had done
and then to the local police to do the same. He then sat down on the porch and
waited for their arrival. After being arrested, he was diagnosed with paranoid
schizophrenia and placed in mental care at the Atascadero State Hospital for the
Criminally Insane. He surprisingly got along well with his psychiatrist and was even
made his assistant. On December 18, 1969, on his 21st birthday, Kemper was
released against the wishes of several psychologists and placed in the care of his
mother in Santa Cruz.
1. Kemper was living with his grandparents on August 27, 1964, when he fatally
shot them. Kemper had gotten into another fight with his grandmother, Maude
Kemper. Kemper pulled out his 22-caliber rifle, which his grandfather had
given him. The rifle had previously been taken away. Kemper fatally shot
Maude in the head and twice in the back after she berated him. Her final
words were, "Oh, you'd better not be shooting the birds again." Fearing that
his grandfather would become angry with him, Kemper shot his grandfather
as he returned home from the store. Kemper then called his mother. Clarnell
directed Kemper to contact local authorities after he admitted what he had
done. Kemper followed his mother’s directions and then patiently waited on
the porch of the house to be taken into custody. After authorities detained
Kemper, he told them that the reason he killed his grandmother was that he
“Just wanted to see what it felt like to kill Grandma.” He also said that he killed
his grandfather so that he would not have to deal with the suffering of the loss
of his wife.
2. Kemper was unable to control his desire to kill and later stated, "One side of
me says, 'Wow, what an attractive chick.'" I'd like to talk to her, date her.' On
the other hand, I wonder how her head would look on a stick.Kemper picked
up two 18-year-old Fresno State College students on May 7, 1972. Mary Anne
Pesce and Anita Luchessa were the students' names. Kemper drove the two
women to a nearby, secluded, and wooded area with the intent of raping
them. Kemper, on the other hand, stabbed and choked the two. He then drove
back to his home in Almeda, California, with the bodies in his trunk. He would
then rape the bodies, dismember them, and place the parts in plastic bags to
be disposed of. The evidence of this heinous crime was dumped in a ravine in
the Santa Cruz mountains near Loma Prieta. Later that year, the remains of
Presce were discovered, but not those of Luchessa.
4. Kemper moved back in with his mother in 1973. On January 7, 1973, Kemper
was driving through the Cabrillo College campus when he picked up an 18-
year-old student named Cynthian Ann Schall. Kemper drove to a secluded
and wooded area once more, but this time he shot Schall with a newly
acquired.22 caliber pistol. He then drove home and hid the body in his closet
until the next morning, when his mother left for work. Kemper had sexual
relations with the corpse after his mother had left. He then dismembered the
body and removed the bullet from his mother's bathtub. Kemper discarded her
remains off a cliff. Kemper kept the head for a while and had sexual
intercourse with it until he buried it in his mother's backyard. Kemper
positioned the body facing his mother's room, later explaining that he did so
because his mother "always wanted people to look up to her." Schall's body
was discovered over the next few weeks, with the exception of her right hand
and head.
6. Clarnell Kemper, Kemper's mother, returned home from a party on the night of
April 20th, 1973. Kemper walked into her room, where she was reading a
book, and the following conversation ensued. "I suppose you're going to want
to stay up all night and talk now," Kemper replied. Kemper waited until
Clarnell went to sleep before bludgeoning his mother's head with a claw
hammer and slitting her throat. Kemper then severed her head and raped it.
He also used her head as a dart board and placed it on a shelf so he could
yell at it for an hour. Kemper also removed his mother's larynx and tongue
and threw them down the garbage disposal in the sink. The garbage disposal
was unable to break down the two and ejected them. He then raped his
mother's body and placed it in a closet before cleaning himself up and leaving
the house to go have a drink. Kemper explained why he removed Clarnell's
larynx and tongue: "That seemed appropriate, as much as she'd bitched,
screamed, and yelled at me over the years."
7. Later, he'd invite his mother's friend, Sara Taylor Hallet, over for dinner with
the intention of surprising her. Kemper strangled Hallet to death when she
entered the house. He later removed her clothes and placed her body on his
bed. That evening, he had or attempted to have sexual relations with the
body. Kemper stole Hallet's car before fleeing, but not before leaving a note
for the cops. The following was written on the note: "Approx. 5:15 A.M.
Saturday. There was no need for her to suffer any longer at the hands of this
heinous "murderous butcher." It was quick—asleep—exactly what I wanted.
Not sloppy and incomplete, gents. Just a "lack of time." I got things to do!” He
did this to take suspicion away from him as the murderer of his mother
Kemper would drive none-stop with three guns and hundreds of rounds of
ammunition in his vehicle.
In turn, Kemper was handed seven years to life for each of his eight counts. He was
admitted to prison in September 1973, five months after turning himself in.
Kemper has been serving his sentence at the California Medical Facility in Vacaville
ever since. The California Department Of Corrections And Rehabilitation (CDCR)
inmate locator system has Kemper listed still under the jurisdiction of the California
Medical Facility.
The CDCR inmate locator system reveals that Ed Kemper became eligible for parole
in May 1979, just under six years into his sentence.
Becoming eligible for parole does not mean you will be granted such, it just means
you can request a parole suitability hearing with the Board of Parole Hearings.
Kemper was denied parole several times throughout the 80s and 90s.
Ed Kemper was last denied a parole hearing in 2017 and will not be eligible for
another until 2024.
El Chapo
El Chapo
I. Personal Background
Joaquín Archivaldo Guzmán
Loera (Born on April 4, 1957)
commonly known as "El Chapo" is a
Mexican former drug lord and a former
leader within the Sinaloa Cartel, an
international crime syndicate. He is
considered to have been one of the
most powerful drug traffickers in the
world.
When he was a teenager, his
father kicked him out of the house, and
he went to live with his grandfather. It
was during his adolescence that
Guzmán gained the nickname "El
Chapo" Mexican slang for "shorty" for
his 1.68-metre (5 ft 6 in) stature and
stocky physique after Guzman oversaw
operations whereby mass cocaine, methamphetamine, marijuana and heroin were
produced by his relatives, he left his hometown for greater opportunities to smuggle
and distribute throughout the United States and Europe, the world's largest users.
Charles Ponzi
I. Personal Background
Charles Ponzi was born Carlo Pietro Giovanni Guglielmo Tebaldo Ponzi on
March 3, 1882, in the town of Lugo in northern Italy. His parents, Oreste and Imelda
Ponzi, Ponzi later said, were part of a wealthy Italian family that had become
borderline poor by the time he was born. Ponzi is said to have expressed criminal
tendencies early on, stealing from his parents and even parish priests.
As a young man, he attended Sapienza University in Rome, where, by his
own account, he was less than a model student. As a result, after four years, Ponzi
was forced to leave with no money and no degree. During his university years, he
had heard stories of other Italians who went off to America to find fame and fortune
and decided that this was the only course left open for him.
I. Personal Background
Adolf Hitler was born on April 20,
1889 in Braunau am Inn, Austria-Hungary
(now Austria). His early life was marked
by struggles; his father died when he was
young, and Hitler faced financial
difficulties. In his early adulthood, he
moved to Vienna to pursue a career in art
but faced rejection from the Academy of
Fine Arts. These experiences likely
fueled his growing anti-Semitic and
nationalistic sentiments. Hitler joined the
German Workers’ Party on 1919, which
later became the National Socialist
German Workers’ Party (Nazi Party).
Rising through the ranks, he became the
party’s leader and, ultimately, the
Chancellor of Germany in 1933.
IV. How much damage did Hitler left on the citizens of Germany and the
Jewish people?
Adolf Hitler’s reign during the 1930s and 1940s inflicted profound and
devastating consequences on both the German populace and the Jewish
community. The citizens of Germany endured widespread economic hardship,
political repression, and the erosion of civil liberties under the totalitarian regime.
For the Jewish people, the impact was particularly tragic. The Holocaust,
orchestrated by the Nazi regime, resulted in the systematic genocide of six million
Jews. This dark chapter in history involved mass extermination through
concentration camps, forced labor, and other atrocities, leaving an indelible mark on
the collective memory of the Jewish community.
The aftermath of Hitler’s rule left scars on Germany, forcing introspection and
a commitment to prevent the recurrence of such horrors. The lasting legacy of this
period underscores the importance of vigilance against extremism and the
safeguarding of human rights to prevent the repetition of such catastrophic events.