Real Serial KillersLists about infamous repeat murderers to chill your blood and remind you to lock your doors and windows and maybe keep a knife under your pillow.
The following is a list of known serial killers who were born in or have operated in the US. Serial killers in the USA outnumber those in other countries on a per capita basis, but this data may be due to better law enforcement records. This list of notable US serial killers is alphabetical by last name.
Charles Frederick Albright (born August 10, 1933) is an American killer from Dallas, Texas, who was convicted of killing one woman and suspected of killing two others in 1991. He is incarcerated in the John Montford Psychiatric Unit in Lubbock, Texas.
Joseph D. Ball (January 7, 1896 – September 24, 1938) was an American serial killer, sometimes referred to as "The Alligator Man", the "Butcher of Elmendorf" and the "Bluebeard of South Texas". He is known to have killed two and is said to have killed as many as 20 women in the 1930s. His existence was long believed to be apocryphal, but he is a familiar figure in Texas folklore. His great-great grandfather was John Hart Crenshaw, the notorious illegal slave trader, kidnapper, and illegal slave breeder in Gallatin County, Illinois.
Herbert Richard Baumeister (April 7, 1947 – July 3, 1996) was an American suspected serial killer. A resident of Westfield, Indiana, Baumeister was under investigation for murdering over a dozen men in the early 1990s, most of whom were last seen at gay bars. Police found human remains on Baumeister's property and issued an arrest warrant, after which he fled to Canada and subsequently committed suicide before he could be brought to trial. He never confessed to the crimes and his suicide note made no mention of the murder allegations. He was later linked to a series of murders of at least nine men along Interstate 70, which occurred in the early to mid-1980s.
Photo: John Towner James (author), Kan-Okla Publishing Company (Wichita, KS), publisher. / Wikimedia Commons / Public Domain
Bloody Benders
The Bloody Benders were a family of serial killers who lived and operated in Labette County, KS, from 1871 to 1873. The family consisted of John Bender; his wife, Elvira Bender; son, John, Jr.; and daughter, Kate.
Robert Andrew Berdella Jr. (January 31, 1949 – October 8, 1992) was an American serial killer, known as The Kansas City Butcher and The Collector, who kidnapped, raped, tortured, and murdered at least six men between 1984 and 1987 in Kansas City, Missouri after having forced his victims to endure periods of up to six weeks of captivity.Describing his murders as being "some of my darkest fantasies becoming my reality", Berdella pleaded guilty and was sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole for the first degree murder of one of his victims, Larry Pearson, in August 1988, and would later plead guilty to one further charge of first degree murder, and four charges of second degree murder in December 1988. He died of a heart attack while incarcerated at the Missouri State Penitentiary in October 1992.Berdella became known as "The Kansas City Butcher" due to his practice of extensively dissecting his victims' bodies, which he would then dispose of in garbage bags, and "The Collector" due to both the movie which he stated was the basis of the fantasies behind the modus operandi of his crimes, and much of the evidence subsequently uncovered by investigators.
David Richard Berkowitz (born Richard David Falco; June 1, 1953), also known as the Son of Sam and the .44 Caliber Killer, is an American serial killer who pleaded guilty to eight separate shooting attacks that began in New York City during the summer of 1976. Using a .44 caliber Bulldog revolver, he killed six people and wounded seven others by July 1977. As the number of victims increased, Berkowitz eluded the biggest police manhunt in the history of New York City while leaving letters that mocked the police and promised further crimes, which were highly publicized by the press. The killing spree terrorized New Yorkers and achieved worldwide notoriety.
On the night of August 10, 1977, Berkowitz was taken into custody by New York City police homicide detectives in front of his Yonkers apartment building, and he was subsequently indicted for eight shooting incidents. He confessed to all of them, and initially claimed to have been obeying the orders of a demon manifested in the form of a dog named "Harvey" which belonged to his neighbor "Sam". Despite his explanation, Berkowitz was found mentally competent to stand trial. He pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and was incarcerated in state prison. He subsequently admitted that the dog-and-devil story was a hoax. In the course of further police investigations, Berkowitz was also implicated in many unsolved arsons in the city.
Intense coverage of the case by the media lent a kind of celebrity status to Berkowitz, and some observers noted that he seemed to enjoy it. In response, the New York State legislature enacted new legal statutes known popularly as "Son of Sam laws", designed to keep criminals from profiting financially from the publicity created by their crimes. The statutes have remained law in New York in spite of various legal challenges, and similar laws have been enacted in several other states.
Berkowitz has been incarcerated since his arrest and is serving six consecutive life sentences. During the mid-1990s, he amended his confession to claim that he had been a member of a violent Satanic cult that orchestrated the incidents as ritual murder. A few law enforcement authorities have said that his claims might be credible, but he remains the only person ever charged with the shootings. A new investigation of the murders began in 1996 but was suspended indefinitely after inconclusive findings.
