150-681: Ricardo Leyva Muñoz Ramirez ( / r ə ˈ m ɪər ɛ z / ; February 29, 1960 – June 7, 2013), better known as Richard Ramirez , and nicknamed the Night Stalker , was an American serial killer and sex offender whose killing spree occurred in Greater Los Angeles and the San Francisco Bay Area in the state of California . From April 1984 to August 1985, Ramirez murdered at least fourteen people during various break-ins, with his crimes usually taking place in
300-606: A Serienmörder ('serial-murderer') in his article " Die Düsseldorfer Sexualverbrechen " (1930). In his book, Serial Killers: The Method and Madness of Monsters (2004), criminal justice historian Peter Vronsky notes that while Ressler might have coined the English term "serial homicide" within the law in 1974, the terms serial murder and serial murderer appear in John Brophy 's book The Meaning of Murder (1966). The Washington, D.C., newspaper Evening Star , in
450-517: A Vietnam War veteran with schizophrenia and PTSD , who extensively bragged about the war crimes he had committed , and who killed his wife in front of him when he was 15. Ramirez learned military skills from him that he would later employ during his killing spree. He also cultivated a strong interest in Satanism and the occult . By the time he had left his home in Texas and moved to California at
600-548: A biological neural network within a single cerebral hemisphere . Temporal lobe epilepsy occurs from seizures arising within the temporal lobe. Temporal lobe epilepsy is the most common focal onset epilepsy, and 80% of temporal lobe epilepsy is mesial (medial) temporal lobe epilepsy , temporal lobe epilepsy arising from the inner ( medial ) part of the temporal lobe that may involve the hippocampus , parahippocampal gyrus or amygdala . The less common lateral temporal lobe or neocortical temporal lobe seizures arise from
750-694: A cardiac pacemaker , defibrillator or cochlear implant may receive a CT scan. CT scan may better demonstrate calcium containing brain abnormalities causing epilepsy such as in tuberous sclerosis and Sturge–Weber syndrome . Anticonvulsant oral medications control seizures in about two-thirds of persons with epilepsy, and control commonly occurs with one or two medications. Those with uncontrolled seizures despite treatment with multiple anticonvulsant medications have pharmacoresistant epilepsy, and they may require epilepsy surgery to achieve seizure control. Penfield and Flanigan first described anterior temporal lobectomy , partial surgical removal of
900-522: A prison officer and other inmates about having killed "more than 20 people." Erickson gave a detailed description of her assailant to investigators, and police obtained a cast of Ramirez' footprint from the Romero house. The stolen Toyota was found abandoned on August 28 in Koreatown, Los Angeles , and police obtained a single fingerprint from the rear-view mirror despite Ramirez' careful efforts to wipe
1050-416: A switchblade , hanging her partially nude body from a pipe by her blouse. The killing was not linked to Ramirez until 2009, when his DNA was matched to a sample obtained at the crime scene . In 2016, officials disclosed evidence of a second suspect, identified through another DNA sample retrieved from the scene, who is believed to have been present at Leung's murder. Authorities had not publicly identified
1200-561: A "cooling-off period." Cases of extended bouts of sequential killings over periods of weeks or months with no apparent "cooling off period" or "return to normality" have caused some experts to suggest a hybrid category of "spree-serial killer". In Controversial Issues in Criminology , Fuller and Hickey write that "[t]he element of time involved between murderous acts is primary in the differentiation of serial, mass, and spree murderers", later elaborating that spree killers "will engage in
1350-437: A "made" psychopath as opposed to a "born" psychopath. He says that Ramirez' schizoid personality disorder contributed to his indifference to the suffering of his victims and his untreatability. Stone also stated that Ramirez was knocked unconscious and almost died on multiple occasions before he was six years old, and as a result "later developed temporal lobe epilepsy , aggressivity , and hypersexuality ." At age 12, Ramirez
1500-508: A 10-inch butcher knife from her kitchen. Ramirez repeatedly stabbed Cannon's body after she was already dead. Three nights later, Ramirez broke into a home in Sierra Madre and bludgeoned 16-year-old Whitney Bennett with a tire iron as she slept in her bedroom. After searching in vain for a knife in the kitchen, Ramirez tried to strangle the girl with a telephone cord. He stated that he was startled to see electrical sparks emanate from
1650-747: A 1967 review of the book: There is the mass murderer, or what he [Brophy] calls the "serial" killer, who may be actuated by greed, such as insurance, or retention or growth of power, like the Medicis of Renaissance Italy, or Landru , the " bluebeard " of the World War I period, who murdered numerous wives after taking their money. Vronsky states that the term serial killing first entered into broader American popular usage when published in The New York Times in early 1981, to describe Atlanta serial killer Wayne Williams . Subsequently, throughout
SECTION 10
#17327868250861800-416: A brain region of decreased glucose metabolism at a time between seizures; this hypometabolic region may correspond to the seizure focus, and PET scan is more sensitive for temporal lobe seizure focus localization compared to epilepsy arising from other brain lobes. Single-photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) may show a region of decreased blood flow occurring 40-60 seconds after injection during
1950-453: A bus to Tucson, Arizona , to visit his brother, unaware that he had become the lead story in virtually every major newspaper and television news program across California. After failing to meet his brother due to his not being home, he returned to Los Angeles early on the morning of August 31. He walked past police officers, who were staking out the bus terminal in hopes of catching the killer should he attempt to flee on an outbound bus, and into
2100-747: A case of a serial murderer in the 1870s, a Frenchman named Eusebius Pieydagnelle who had a sexual obsession with blood and confessed to murdering six people. The unidentified killer Jack the Ripper , who has been called the first modern serial killer, killed at least five women , and possibly more, in London in 1888. He was the subject of a massive manhunt and investigation by the Metropolitan Police , during which many modern criminal investigation techniques were pioneered. A large team of policemen conducted house-to-house inquiries, forensic material
2250-552: A convenience store in East Los Angeles . After noticing a group of elderly Hispanic women fearfully identifying him as " el matador, " Ramirez saw his face on the front page of the newspaper La Opinión with a headline calling him " Invasor Nocturno " (English: "Night Invader") and fled the store in a panic. After running across the Santa Ana Freeway , he attempted to carjack an unlocked Ford Mustang but
2400-465: A crime reporter, was a career journalist who was caught after a series of articles he wrote gave clues that he had murdered people. Russell Williams was a successful and respected career Royal Canadian Air Force Colonel who was convicted of murdering two women, along with fetish burglaries and rapes. Many serial killers have faced similar problems in their childhood development. Hickey's Trauma Control Model explains how early childhood trauma can set
2550-486: A disturbance in the area with few other details. Police quickly arrived on Hubbard Street and took a severely beaten Ramirez into custody. Jury selection for Ramirez's trial began on July 22, 1988. At his first court appearance, he raised a hand with a pentagram drawn on it and yelled, "Hail Satan!" On August 3, 1988, the Los Angeles Times reported that some jail employees overheard Ramirez planning to shoot
2700-422: A focal to bilateral tonic-clonic seizure. Impaired language function ( dysphasia ) during or soon following a seizure is more likely to occur when seizures arise from the language dominant side of the brain. The major cognitive impairment in mesial temporal lobe epilepsy is a progressive memory impairment. This involves declarative memory impairment, including episodic memory and semantic memory , and
2850-491: A granule cell layer that is widened, poorly demarcated, or accompanied by granule cells outside the layer (ectopic granule cells). In the normal brain, dentate granule cells block seizure spread from entorhinal cortex to the hippocampus. A hypothesis is that granule cell dispersion may disrupt the normal mossy fiber pathway connecting granule cells and CA3 pyramidal cells leading to mossy fiber sprouting and new excitatory networks capable of generating seizures. However,
3000-480: A gunshot to his head. Zazzara's wife, 44-year-old Maxine Levenia Zazzara, was awakened by the gunshot. Ramirez beat her and bound her hands while demanding to know where her valuables were. While he ransacked the room, Maxine escaped her bonds and retrieved a shotgun from under the bed, which she was unaware was not loaded. She pulled the trigger just after he turned around and saw her. The infuriated Ramirez shot her three times with his handgun, killing her, then fetched
3150-486: A health-care facility, or at different locations within the same city or state. A notable exception to the typical characteristics of female serial killers is Aileen Wuornos , who killed outdoors instead of at home, used a gun instead of poison, and killed strangers instead of friends or family. One "analysis of 86 female serial killers from the United States found that the victims tended to be spouses, children or
SECTION 20
#17327868250863300-552: A high degree of control over the crime scene and usually have a solid knowledge of forensic science that enables them to cover their tracks, such as burying the body or weighing it down and sinking it in a river. They follow their crimes in the news media carefully and often take pride in their actions as if it were all a grand project. Often, organized killers have social and other interpersonal skills sufficient to enable them to develop both personal and romantic relationships, friends and lovers and sometimes even attract and maintain
3450-432: A hoax, as originally concluded by psychiatrist David Abrahamsen. Mission-oriented killers typically justify their acts as "ridding the world" of certain types of people perceived as undesirable, such as the homeless , ex-cons , homosexuals , drug users , prostitutes, or people of different ethnicity or religion; however, they are generally not psychotic. Some see themselves as attempting to change society, often to cure
3600-443: A large carving knife from the kitchen. He mutilated her body by cutting an inverted cross into her chest, then removed her eyes and placed them in a jewelry box. He attempted to have sex with her body but found himself so shaken by her attempting to shoot him that he was unable to achieve an erection . He took the jewelry box containing her eyes and kept it at his apartment as a souvenir until his arrest. Ramirez left footprints from
3750-676: A live electrical cord. Ramirez also frequently enjoyed degrading and humiliating his victims, especially those who survived his attacks or whom he explicitly decided not to kill. In 1989, Ramirez was convicted of thirteen counts of murder, five attempted murders, eleven sexual assaults , and fourteen burglaries. The judge who upheld his nineteen death sentences remarked that his deeds exhibited "cruelty, callousness, and viciousness beyond any human understanding." Ramirez never expressed any remorse for his crimes. He died on June 7, 2013, of complications from B-cell lymphoma while awaiting execution on California's death row . Ricardo Leyva Muñoz Ramirez
3900-574: A local cemetery. His father would tie him to a crucifix in a cemetery overnight as punishment. Mike and his wife Josefina "Jesse" Valles ( née Bretado; November 3, 1948 – May 4, 1975) had a son named Miguel Valles Jr. (September 21, 1967 – April 22, 1973) who passed away at the age of 5 in an accidental gas explosion. It is unknown if Ramirez as a child ever interacted with his younger cousin before his death. Shortly after Ramirez had turned 14 in 1974, he began using LSD frequently. He and Mike resumed bonding over their shared use of drugs and alcohol. It
4050-538: A look at what had happened, Ramirez, who was waiting for Okazaki to peek over the counter, shot her once in the forehead, killing her instantly. Within an hour of the Rosemead attack, Ramirez pulled 30-year-old Tsai-Lian "Veronica" Yu out of her car in Monterey Park , shot her twice with a .22 caliber handgun and fled. She was pronounced dead upon arrival at the hospital. The two murders, and an attempted third, in
4200-472: A lower mean IQ than organized serial killers, at 89.4. Mixed serial killers, with both organized and disorganized traits, have an average IQ of 100.9, but a low sample size. Some people with a pathological interest in the power of life and death tend to be attracted to medical professions or acquiring such a job. These kinds of killers are sometimes referred to as "angels of death" or angels of mercy. Medical professionals will kill their patients for money, for
4350-683: A more severe epilepsy. Mechanisms related to neuronal loss incompletely account for temporal lobe epilepsy as temporal lobe epilepsy may occur with only minimal neuronal cell loss. This KCC2 mutation prevents subicular neurons from potassium and chloride ion extrusion, leading to intracellular chloride accumulation, and positive γ-Aminobutyric acid (GABA) mediated currents. Accumulated chloride efflux through GABA receptors leads to neuronal depolarization , increased neuronal excitability and ultimately seizures. Persons with this mutation have mesial temporal lobe epilepsy with hippocampal sclerosis. Dentate gyrus granule cell dispersion refers to
4500-609: A murderer from South America, killed a minimum of 110 young girls between 1969 and 1980. However, he claims that the number is over 300. He was released from a mental facility in 1998 and his whereabouts are still unknown. He is commonly nicknamed the "Monster of the Andes". An additional non-American serial killer is Luis Garavito from Colombia. Garavito would kill and torture boys using various disguises. He murdered around 140 boys ranging in ages from 8 to 16. He would dump his victims' bodies in mass graves. The serial killing phenomenon in
4650-468: A nine-year-old Chinese-American girl, in the basement of his apartment building in the Tenderloin district of San Francisco. Leung was with her eight-year-old brother and looking for a lost one-dollar bill when Ramirez approached the girl and told her to follow him into the basement to find it. Once they were in the basement, Ramirez beat, strangled and raped Leung before stabbing her to death with
Richard Ramirez - Misplaced Pages Continue
4800-419: A pair of Avia sneakers in the flower beds, which the police photographed and cast. Bullets found at the scene were matched to those found at previous attacks, and the police determined that a serial killer was at large. On May 14, 1985, Ramirez returned to Monterey Park and entered the home of 66-year-old Bill Doi and his disabled wife, 56-year-old Lillian Doi. Surprising Doi in his bedroom, Ramirez shot him in
4950-509: A parent has a drug or alcohol problem, the attention in the household is on the parents rather than the child. This neglect of the child leads to the lowering of their self-esteem and helps develop a fantasy world in which they are in control. Hickey's Trauma Control Model supports how parental neglect can facilitate deviant behavior, especially if the child sees substance abuse in action. This then leads to disposition (the inability to attach), which can further lead to homicidal behavior, unless
5100-455: A problem that afflicts the whole society." Lorenzo Carcaterra, author of Gangster (2001), explains how potential criminals are labeled by society , which can then lead to their offspring also developing in the same way through the cycle of violence . The ability for serial killers to appreciate the mental life of others is severely compromised, presumably leading to their dehumanization of others. This process may be considered an expression of
5250-404: A random weapon available at the time, and usually do not attempt to hide the body. They are likely to be unemployed, a loner, or both, with very few friends. They often turn out to have a history of mental illness, and their modus operandi (M.O.) or lack thereof is often marked by excessive violence and sometimes necrophilia or sexual violence. Disorganized serial killers have been found to have
5400-410: A rustling noise. Assuming it was an animal, James went to investigate but did not notice anything out of the ordinary. James then went into his garage to begin working on his minibike before hearing Ramirez' footsteps outside the house. Thinking there was a prowler, James, after observing Ramirez through his bedroom window, went to wake his parents, and Ramirez fled the scene. James raced outside and noted
5550-559: A sense of sadistic pleasure, for a belief that they are "easing" the patient's pain, or simply "because they can". Perhaps the most prolific of these was the British doctor Harold Shipman . Another such killer was nurse Jane Toppan , who admitted during her murder trial that she was sexually aroused by death . She would administer a drug mixture to patients she chose as her victims, lie in bed with them and hold them close to her body as they died. Another medical professional serial killer
5700-564: A shoe store in Los Angeles, it was evident that the one pair of its size and kind in the state of California then belonged to the perpetrator. When it was discovered that the ballistics and shoe print evidence from the Los Angeles crime scenes matched the Pan crime scene, San Francisco's then- mayor Dianne Feinstein divulged the information, including the gun caliber, in a televised press conference. This leak infuriated detectives, as they knew
5850-422: A single day attracted extensive coverage from news media, who dubbed the attacker, described as curly-haired with bulging eyes and wide-spaced, rotting teeth, the "Walk-In Killer" and the "Valley Intruder." One week later, at approximately 2 a.m. on March 27, 1985, Ramirez entered a home that he had burglarized a year earlier just outside of Whittier and killed 64-year-old Vincent Charles Zazzara in his sleep with
6000-406: A societal ill. Temporal lobe epilepsy In the field of neurology, temporal lobe epilepsy is an enduring brain disorder that causes unprovoked seizures from the temporal lobe . Temporal lobe epilepsy is the most common type of focal onset epilepsy among adults. Seizure symptoms and behavior distinguish seizures arising from the medial temporal lobe from seizures arising from
6150-526: A spouse and sustain a family including children. Among serial killers, those of this type are in the event of their capture most likely to be described by acquaintances as kind and unlikely to hurt anyone. Ted Bundy and John Wayne Gacy are examples of organized serial killers. In general, the IQs of organized serial killers tend to be normal range, with a mean of 98.7. Disorganized serial killers are usually far more impulsive, often committing their murders with
Richard Ramirez - Misplaced Pages Continue
6300-459: A stolen Toyota to Glendale . He chose the home of 66-year-old Lela Kneiding and her husband, 68-year-old Maxon Kneiding. He burst into the sleeping couple's bedroom and hacked them with the machete, then killed them with shots to the head from a .22 caliber handgun. He further mutilated their bodies with the machete before robbing the house of valuables. After quickly fencing the stolen items, Ramirez drove to Sun Valley, Los Angeles , and broke into
6450-454: A stolen orange Toyota , to Mission Viejo . That night, he arrived at the home of 45-year-old James Romero Jr., who had just returned from a family vacation to Rosarito Beach in Mexico. Romero's son, 13-year-old James Romero III, happened to be awake. While his family was asleep, James went outside of his house to retrieve a pillow inside a truck, which was locked. When he was outside, he heard
6600-422: A study has shown that a similar pattern of granule cell dispersion may occur in persons without epilepsy. Focal cortical dysplasia is a brain malformation that may cause temporal lobe epilepsy. This malformation may cause abnormal cortical layers ( dyslamination ), occur with abnormal neurons ( dysmorphic neurons, balloon cells ) and may occur with a brain tumor or vascular malformation. An abnormality of
6750-425: A variety of personality disorders . Most are often not adjudicated as insane under the law. Although a serial killer is a distinct classification that differs from that of a mass murderer , spree killer , or contract killer , there are overlaps between them. The English term and concept of serial killer are commonly attributed to former Federal Bureau of Investigation special agent Robert Ressler , who used
6900-457: A variety of fields and specialties with the goal of identifying the commonalities of knowledge regarding serial murder. The group also settled on a definition of serial murder which FBI investigators widely accept as their standard: "The unlawful killing of two or more victims by the same offender(s) in separate events". Serial homicide researcher Enzo Yaksic found that the FBI was justified in lowering
7050-682: Is Genene Jones . It is believed she killed 11 to 46 infants and children while working at Bexar County Medical Center Hospital in San Antonio, Texas, United States. She is currently serving a 99-year sentence for the murder of Chelsea McClellan and the attempted murder of Rolando Santos, and became eligible for parole in 2017 due to a law in Texas at the time of her sentencing to reduce prison overcrowding . A similar case occurred in Britain in 1991, where nurse Beverley Allitt killed four children at
7200-512: Is major depressive disorder . Other disorders include post-traumatic stress disorder , general anxiety disorder , psychosis , obsessive-compulsive disorder , schizophrenia , bipolar disorder , substance use disorder and a ~9% prevalence of suicide . Geschwind syndrome is a syndrome of altered sexuality (most often hyposexuality), religiosity , and compulsive or extensive writing and drawing occurring in persons with temporal lobe epilepsy. However, subsequent studies did not support
7350-450: Is advised for those with evidence of focal epilepsy such as temporal lobe epilepsy. Abnormalities identified by MRI scan include hippocampal sclerosis, focal cortical dysplasia, other cortical developmental brain malformations, developmental and low-grade tumors, cavernous hemangioma , hypoxic-ischemic brain injury , traumatic brain injury and encephalitis. F-fluorodeoxyglucose ( F-FDG) brain positron emission tomography (PET) may show
7500-508: Is akin to a male serial killer's collecting of totems (souvenirs) from the victim as a way of exerting continued control over the victim and reliving it. By contrast, Hickey states that although popular perception sees "black widow" female serial killers as something of the Victorian past, in his statistical study of female serial killer cases reported in the United States since 1826, approximately 75% occurred since 1950. Elizabeth Báthory
7650-488: Is alleged that many of these photos depicted women being tied to trees or wooden posts both before and after they were sexually assaulted and killed by Valles. Ramirez would later state while incarcerated that he was fascinated, rather than repulsed, by the images and stories Mike shared with him. Mike taught his young cousin some of his military skills, including stealth and kill tactics. Around this time, Ramirez began to seek escape from his father's violent temper by sleeping in
SECTION 50
#17327868250867800-415: Is an unnatural stiffening of one arm occurring during a seizure. A dystonic posture on one side of the body commonly indicates seizure onset from the opposite side of the brain e.g. right arm dystonic posture arising from a left temporal lobe seizure. Impaired language function ( dysphasia ) during or soon following a seizure is more likely to occur when seizures arise from the language dominant side of
7950-457: Is instigated to seek approval from parents, sexual partners, or others." This need for approval is what influences children to attempt to develop social relationships with their family and peers. "The quality of their attachments to parents and other members of the family is critical to how these children relate to and value other members of society." Wilson and Seaman (1990) conducted a study on incarcerated serial killers, and what they concluded
8100-461: Is retarded because the child's emotional and social development occurs within his self-centered fantasies. A person can do no wrong in his own world and the pain of others is of no consequence when the purpose of the fantasy world is to satisfy the needs of one person" (Garrison, 1996). Boundaries between fantasy and reality are lost and fantasies turn to dominance, control, sexual conquest, and violence, eventually leading to murder. Fantasy can lead to
8250-479: Is sometimes cited as the most prolific female serial killer in all of history. Formally countess Elizabeth Báthory de Ecsed (Báthory Erzsébet in Hungarian , August 7, 1560 – August 21, 1614), she was a countess from the renowned Báthory family . Before her husband's death, Elizabeth took great pleasure in torturing the staff, by jamming pins under the servant's fingernails or stripping servants and throwing them into
8400-456: Is worse when medications fail to control seizures. Mesial temporal lobe epilepsy arising from the language dominant hemisphere impairs verbal memory , and mesial temporal lobe epilepsy arising from the language non-dominant hemisphere impairs nonverbal memory . Psychiatric disorders are more common among those with epilepsy, and the highest prevalence occurs among those with temporal lobe epilepsy. The most common psychiatric comorbidity
8550-539: The lateral (neocortical) temporal lobe . Memory and psychiatric comorbidities may occur. Diagnosis relies on electroencephalographic (EEG) and neuroimaging studies. Anticonvulsant medications , epilepsy surgery and dietary treatments may improve seizure control. Under the International League Against Epilepsy (ILAE) 2017 classification of the epilepsies , focal onset epilepsy occurs from seizures arising from
8700-529: The Han Emperor Jing , was made Prince of Jidong in the sixth year of the middle period of Jing's reign (144 BC). According to the Chinese historian Sima Qian , he would "go out on marauding expeditions with 20 or 30 slaves or with young men who were in hiding from the law, murdering people and seizing their belongings for sheer sport". Although many of his subjects knew about these murders, it
8850-487: The Hungarian aristocrat Elizabeth Báthory , born into one of the wealthiest families in Transylvania , allegedly tortured and killed as many as 650 girls and young women before her arrest in 1610. Between 1564 and 1589, German farmer Peter Stumpp killed 14 children, including his own son. He also murdered two pregnant women and had an incestuous relationship with his daughter. Stumpp claimed to have been granted
9000-579: The MTOR pathway leads to hyperexcitable glutamate mediated neurons leading to seizures. The temporal lobe epileptiform discharge is a pattern seen on the electroencephalgram (EEG) test; temporal lobe epileptiform discharges occur between seizures and confirm the diagnosis of temporal lobe epilepsy. Long-term video-EEG monitoring may record the behavior and EEG during a seizure. Magnetoencephalography may diagnose temporal lobe epilepsy by recording epileptiform discharges or seizure patterns arising from
9150-512: The NHS ). He was considered a pillar of the local community; he even won a professional award for a children's asthma clinic and was interviewed by Granada Television 's World in Action on ITV . Dennis Nilsen was an ex-soldier turned civil servant and trade unionist who had no previous criminal record when arrested. Neither was known to have exhibited many of the tell-tale signs. Vlado Taneski ,
SECTION 60
#17327868250869300-639: The Vietnam War were preventing California from experiencing the Big One . As the war wound down, Mullin claimed his father instructed him via telepathy to raise the number of "human sacrifices to nature" to delay a catastrophic earthquake that would plunge California into the ocean. David Berkowitz ("Son of Sam") may also be an example of a visionary serial killer, having claimed a demon transmitted orders through his neighbor's dog and instructed him to commit murder. Berkowitz later described those claims as
9450-448: The intersubjectivity associated with a cognitive deficit regarding the capability to make sharp distinctions between other people and inanimate objects. For these individuals, objects can appear to possess animistic or humanistic power while people are perceived as objects. Before he was executed, serial killer Ted Bundy stated media violence and pornography had stimulated and increased his need to commit homicide, although this statement
9600-606: The penalty phase of the trial on November 7, 1989, he was sentenced to death in California's gas chamber . He stated to reporters after the death sentences, "Big deal. Death always went with the territory. See you in Disneyland ." The trial cost $ 1.8 million, which at the time made it the most expensive murder trial in the history of California until it was surpassed by the O. J. Simpson case in 1994. While awaiting trial, Ramirez reportedly met actor Sean Penn . Penn, who
9750-459: The power to control the mistreatment they suffer sometimes create a new reality to which they can escape. This new reality becomes their fantasy that they have total control of and becomes part of their daily existence. In this fantasy world, their emotional development is guided and maintained. According to Garrison (1996), "the child becomes sociopathic because the normal development of the concepts of right and wrong and empathy towards others
9900-446: The 1980s, the term was used again in the pages of The New York Times , one of the major national news publications of the United States, on 233 occasions. By the end of the 1990s, the use of the term had increased to 2,514 instances in the paper. When defining serial killers, researchers generally use "three or more murders" as the baseline, considering it sufficient to provide a pattern without being overly restrictive. Independent of
10050-400: The 1990s include increased incarceration in the United States , the end of the crack epidemic in the United States , and decreased lead exposure in early childhood. Some commonly found characteristics of serial killers include the following: There are exceptions to these criteria, however. For example, Harold Shipman was a successful professional (a General Practitioner working for
10200-559: The Islamic Calendar), "a strangler from Baghdad was apprehended. He had murdered a number of women and buried them in the house where he was living." The majority of documented serial killers were active in the United States. In one study of serial homicide in South Africa, many patterns were similar to established patterns in the U.S., with some exceptions: no offenders were female, offenders were lower educated than in
10350-486: The U.S., and both victims and offenders were predominantly black. In the 15th century, one of the wealthiest men in Europe and a former companion-in-arms of Joan of Arc , Gilles de Rais , was alleged to have sexually assaulted and killed peasant children, mainly boys, whom he had abducted from the surrounding villages and had taken to his castle. It is estimated that his victims numbered between 140 and 800. Similarly,
10500-475: The United States since that time. The decline in serial killers has no known single cause but is attributed to a number of factors. Mike Aamodt , emeritus professor at Radford University in Virginia, attributes the decline in number of serial killings to less frequent use of parole , improved forensic technology , and people behaving more cautiously. Causes for the general reduction in violent crime following
10650-480: The United States between 1800 and 2004 (64 females from a total of 416 known offenders), or that around 15% of U.S. serial killers have been women, with a collective number of victims between 427 and 612. The authors of Lethal Ladies , Amanda L. Farrell, Robert D. Keppel, and Victoria B. Titterington, state that "the Justice Department indicated 36 female serial killers have been active over the course of
10800-517: The United States indicated that sexual activity was one of several motives in 10% of the cases, enjoyment in 11% and control in 14% and that 51% of all U.S. female serial killers murdered at least one woman and 31% murdered at least one child. In other cases, women have been involved as an accomplice with a male serial killer as a part of a serial killing team. A 2015 study published in The Journal of Forensic Psychiatry & Psychology found that
10950-434: The United States was especially prominent from 1970 to 2000, which has been described as the "golden age of serial murder". The cause of the spike in serial killings has been attributed to urbanization , which put people in close proximity and offered anonymity. The number of active serial killers in the United States peaked in 1989 and has been steadily trending downward since, coinciding with an overall decrease in crime in
11100-426: The United States. According to a 2016 study, since the year 2000, African Americans accounted for roughly 60% of all serial killers in the United States. Anthony Walsh found that the prevalence of non-white serial killers has typically been drastically underestimated in both professional research literature and the mass media. Black males were over-represented among serial killers by a factor of 2. Walsh argues that
11250-700: The ability to turn into a werewolf by the Devil. As punishment for his crimes, Stumpp was put on a torture wheel and executed. His head was later severed and put on a pole next to the figure of a wolf to scare other people away from claiming themselves werewolves too. Members of the Thuggee cult in India may have murdered a million people between 1740 and 1840. Thug Behram , a member of the cult, may have murdered as many as 931 victims. In his 1886 book, Psychopathia Sexualis , psychiatrist Richard von Krafft-Ebing noted
11400-515: The abnormal brain tissue that causes seizures. Neurostimulation may also improve seizure control. The vagus nerve stimulator (VNS) is surgically implanted in the chest, and delivers programmed electrical stimulation to the vagus nerve in the neck. The responsive neurostimulation device is implanted in the skull, monitors electrical brain activity for seizures, and responds to seizures with programmed electrical stimulation to one or two brain areas. Programmed deep brain stimulation of
11550-595: The afternoon, leading to him being dubbed the Night Stalker , the Walk-In Killer , and the Valley Intruder . He was convicted and sentenced to death in 1989 and died while awaiting execution in 2013. Ramirez's crimes were heavily influenced by a troubled childhood. Frequently abused by his father, he developed brain damage and started abusing drugs at the age of 10. He began developing macabre interests in his early and mid-teens from his older cousin,
11700-536: The age of 22, Ramirez began to frequently use cocaine . He would often commit burglaries to support his drug addiction, many of which were later frequently accompanied by murders, attempted murders , rapes , attempted rapes, and battery . The murder spree terrorized the residents of Greater Los Angeles and later the San Francisco Bay Area over the course of fourteen months. However, his first known murder occurred as early as April 1984; this crime
11850-602: The association of these behavioral traits with temporal lobe epilepsy. There are reports of religious behaviors occurring in persons with temporal lobe epilepsy. Hippocampal sclerosis , brain tumor , traumatic brain injury , cerebral vascular malformation , neuronal migration disorders , infections such as encephalitis and meningitis , autoimmune disease ( limbic encephalitis ) and genetic disorders may cause temporal lobe epilepsy. Many persons with uncontrolled temporal lobe epilepsy had childhood febrile seizures . A brief febrile seizure only slightly increases
12000-540: The behavior. While juvenile serial killers are rare, the youngest felon on death row is a juvenile serial killer named Harvey Miguel Robinson who was 17 at the time of his crimes and 18 at the time of his arrest. There is a myth that most serial killers are white males. However, according to the FBI, based on percentages of the U.S. population, white males are not more likely than other races to be serial killers. White males are actually greatly under-represented among serial killers in proportion to their overall numbers in
12150-508: The brain. The common auras from seizures arising from primary auditory cortex include vertigo , humming sound, ringing sound, buzzing sound, hearing a song, hearing voices or altered hearing sensation. Lateral temporal lobe seizures arising from the temporal- parietal lobe junction may cause complex visual hallucinations. In comparison to medial temporal lobe seizures, lateral temporal lobe seizures are briefer duration seizures, occur with earlier loss of awareness, and are more likely become
12300-404: The car clean of his prints. The print was positively identified as belonging to Ramirez, who was described by police as a 25-year-old drifter from Texas, with a long rap sheet that included many arrests for traffic and illegal drug violations. The identification of Ramirez's print was described as a "near miracle" as the system used to identify him was recently installed, as well as the fact that
12450-432: The case of psychological decompensation or overconfidence due to having evaded capture. Organized serial killers often plan their crimes methodically, usually abducting victims, killing them in one place and disposing of them in another. They often lure the victims with ploys appealing to their sense of sympathy. Others specifically target prostitutes, who are likely to go voluntarily with a stranger. These killers maintain
12600-399: The categories of the black widow or team killer. Although motivations for female serial killers can include attention seeking, addiction, or the result of psychopathological behavioral factors, female serial killers are commonly categorized as murdering men for material gain, usually being emotionally close to their victims, and generally needing to have a relationship with the victim, hence
12750-528: The cell loss pattern of temporal lobe epilepsy in humans. Repetitive seizures irreversibly damage interneurons leading to persistent loss of recurrent inhibition . Damage of GABAergic interneurons lead to loss of inhibition, uncontrolled neuronal firing , leading to seizures. The secondary epileptogenesis hypothesis is that repetitive seizures lead to interneuron loss, loss of glutamatergic principal neurons , axonal sprouting, and formation of new recurrent glutamatergic excitatory circuits leading to
12900-448: The child finds a way to develop substantial relationships and fight the label they receive. If a child receives no support from anyone, then they are unlikely to recover from the traumatic event in a positive way. As stated by E. E. Maccoby, "the family has continued to be seen as a major—perhaps the major—arena for socialization". There have been studies looking into the possibility that an abnormality with one's chromosomes could be
13050-426: The child up for deviant behavior in adulthood; the child's environment (either their parents or society) is the dominant factor determining whether or not the child's behavior escalates into homicidal activity. Family, or lack thereof, is the most prominent part of a child's development because it is what the child can identify with on a regular basis. "The serial killer is no different from any other individual who
13200-479: The color, make, and style of the car, as well as a partial license plate number. Romero contacted the police with this information, believing James had chased away a thief. With his attack on the Romero residence aborted, Ramirez broke into the home of 30-year-old Bill Carns and his fiancée, 29-year-old Inez Erickson, through a back door. Ramirez entered the sleeping couple's bedroom and awakened Carns when he cocked his .25 caliber handgun. He shot Carns three times in
13350-523: The cord, and when his victim began to breathe he fled the house believing that Jesus Christ had intervened to save her. Bennett survived the attack, although 478 stitches were required to close the lacerations to her scalp. On July 7, Ramirez burglarized the home of 60-year-old Joyce Lucille Nelson in Monterey Park. Finding her asleep on her living room couch, he beat her to death by stomping on her face repeatedly. A shoe print from an Avia sneaker
13500-665: The early 1890s. The case was one of the first involving a serial murderer that gained widespread notoriety and publicity through sensationalized accounts in William Randolph Hearst 's newspapers. However, at the same time of the Holmes case, in France, Joseph Vacher became known as "The French Ripper" after killing and mutilating 11 women and children. He was executed in 1898 after confessing to his crimes. Another notable non-American serial killer is Pedro Lopez ,
13650-640: The elderly". Other studies indicate that since 1975, increasingly strangers are marginally the most preferred victim of female serial killers, or that only 26% of female serial killers kill for material gain only. Sources state that each killer will have her own proclivities, needs and triggers. A review of the published literature on female serial murder stated that "sexual or sadistic motives are believed to be extremely rare in female serial murderers, and psychopathic traits and histories of childhood abuse have been consistently reported in these women." A study by Eric W. Hickey (2010) of 64 female serial killers in
13800-421: The face with a .22 caliber handgun after she pulled into her garage. She survived when the bullet ricocheted off the keys she held in her hands as she lifted them to protect herself. Hernandez played dead until Ramirez left the scene. Inside the house, her roommate, 34-year-old Dayle Yoshie Okazaki, heard the gunshot and ducked behind a counter when she saw Ramirez enter the kitchen. When she raised her head to get
13950-400: The face with a .22 semi-automatic pistol as Doi went for his own handgun. After beating the mortally wounded man into unconsciousness, Ramirez entered Lillian's bedroom, bound her with thumbcuffs , then raped her after he had ransacked the home for valuables. Bill died of his injuries while in the hospital. Two weeks later, on May 29, Ramirez drove a stolen car to Monrovia and stopped at
14100-418: The first step in the process of a dissociative state, which, in the words of Stephen Giannangelo, "allows the serial killer to leave the stream of consciousness for what is, to him, a better place". Criminologist Jose Sanchez reports, "The young criminal you see today is more detached from his victim, more ready to hurt or kill. The lack of empathy for their victims among young criminals is just one symptom of
14250-408: The head before turning his attention to Erickson. Ramirez identified himself as the "Night Stalker" and forced her to swear she loved Satan as he beat her with his fists and bound her with neckties from the closet. After stealing what he could find, Ramirez dragged Erickson to another room before raping her. He then demanded cash and jewelry and made her "swear on Satan" there was no more. Before leaving
14400-455: The home of 66-year-old Peter Pan and 62-year-old Barbara Pan. He shot the sleeping Peter in the temple with a .25 caliber handgun, killing him instantly. He then beat and sexually assaulted Barbara before shooting her in the head and leaving her for dead. At the crime scene, Ramirez used lipstick to scrawl a pentagram and the phrase "Jack the Knife" on the bedroom wall. He again left a shoe print at
14550-479: The home of the Khovananth family. He shot the sleeping 32-year-old Chainarong Khovananth in the head with a .22 caliber handgun, killing him instantly, then repeatedly raped and beat 32-year-old Somkid Khovananth. He bound the couple's 8-year-old son before dragging Somkid around the house to reveal the location of any valuable items, which he stole. During his assault, he demanded that she "swear to Satan" that she
14700-547: The home, he told Erickson, "Tell them the Night Stalker was here." Erickson untied herself and went to a neighbor's house for help. Surgeons removed two of the three bullets from Carns's head, and he survived his injuries. On the night of June 27, 1985, 32-year-old Patty Elaine Higgins was murdered in her Arcadia home. The crime was not discovered until July 2, when she failed to show up for work. Her attacker had sodomized her, strangled her, and slashed her throat. Ramirez
14850-542: The hospital from her injuries on July 15. Lang died in August. The next day, Ramirez drove the same car to Burbank and snuck into the home of 42-year-old Carol Kyle. At gunpoint, he bound Kyle and her 11-year-old son with handcuffs before ransacking the house. He released Kyle to direct him to where the family's valuables were; he then raped her repeatedly. Ramirez also repeatedly ordered her not to look at him, telling her at one point that he would "cut her eyes out." He fled
15000-547: The hospital where she worked, attempted to kill three more, and injured a further six over the course of two months. A 21st-century example is Canadian nurse Elizabeth Wettlaufer , who murdered elderly patients in the nursing homes where she worked. William George Davis is another hospital nurse who was sentenced to death in Texas for the murder of four patients. Female serial killers are rare compared to their male counterparts. Sources suggest that female serial killers represented less than one in every six known serial murderers in
15150-406: The hotel, but he was never reported or prosecuted for this act. His employment ended abruptly after Ramirez attempted to rape a woman in her hotel room and was caught in the act by the victim's husband. Although the husband beat Ramirez at the scene, criminal charges were dropped when the couple, who lived out of state, declined to return to Texas to testify against him. At the age of 15, Ramirez
15300-546: The house of Mabel "Ma" Bell, age 83, and her disabled sister, 81-year-old Florence "Nettie" Lang. Finding a hammer in the kitchen, he bludgeoned and bound Lang in her bedroom, then bound and bludgeoned Bell before using an electrical cord to shock the woman. After raping Lang, he used Bell's lipstick to draw the Satanic pentagram symbol on her thigh as well as on the walls of both bedrooms. The women were found two days later, alive but comatose and critically injured. Bell died in
15450-483: The killer would be following news coverage, which gave him the opportunity to destroy crucial forensic evidence . Ramirez, who had indeed been watching the press, dropped his sneakers over the side of the Golden Gate Bridge that night. He remained in the area for a few more days before heading back to the Los Angeles area. On August 24, 1985, Ramirez traveled 76 miles (122 km) south of Los Angeles, in
15600-399: The killing acts for days or weeks" while the "methods of murder and types of victims vary". Andrew Cunanan is given as an example of spree killing, while Charles Whitman is mentioned in connection with mass murder, and Jeffrey Dahmer with serial killing. In 2005, the FBI hosted a multi-disciplinary symposium in San Antonio, Texas, which brought together 135 experts on serial murder from
15750-505: The last century." According to The Journal of Forensic Psychiatry & Psychology , there is evidence that 16% of all serial killers are women. Michael D. Kelleher and C. L. Kelleher created several categories to describe female serial killers. They used the classifications of black widow , angel of death , sexual predator , revenge , profit or crime , team killer , question of sanity , unexplained , and unsolved . In using these categories, they observed that most women fell into
15900-507: The locations of the family's jewelry, and then brutally raped her. He repeatedly demanded that she "swear on Satan" that she would not scream during his assaults. When the couple's 3-year-old son entered the bedroom, Ramirez tied the child up and then continued to rape Sakina. After he left the house, Sakina untied her son and sent him to the neighbors for help. Ramirez, who had been closely following news coverage of his crimes, left Los Angeles and headed to San Francisco. On August 18, he entered
16050-437: The magnetic fields of neural electrical currents. Neuroimaging tests may identify the cause for seizures and the seizure focus , the brain location where seizures begin. In newly diagnosed epilepsy, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) can detect brain lesion in up to 12 to 14% of persons with epilepsy. However, for those with chronic epilepsy, MRI can detect brain lesion in 80% of the persons with epilepsy. 3-Tesla MRI scan
16200-422: The midst of the wealth of London focused the media's attention on the plight of the urban poor and gained coverage worldwide. Jack the Ripper has also been called the most infamous serial killer of all time, and his legend has spawned hundreds of theories on his real identity and many works of fiction . H. H. Holmes was a serial killer in the United States, responsible for the death of at least nine victims in
16350-835: The misconceptions concerning female criminality. In the article, Perri and Lichtenwald analyze the current research regarding female psychopathy, including case studies of female psychopathic killers featuring Munchausen syndrome by proxy , cesarean section homicide, fraud detection homicide, female kill teams, and a female serial killer. Juvenile serial killers are rare. There are three main categories that juvenile serial killers can fit into: primary, maturing, and secondary killers. There have been studies done to compare and contrast these three groups and to discover similarities and differences between them. Although these types of serial killers are less common, oftentimes adult serial killers may make their debut at an early age and it can be an opportunity for researchers to study what factors brought about
16500-545: The most common motive for female serial killers was for financial gain and almost 40% of them had experienced some sort of mental illness. Peter Vronsky in Female Serial Killers (2007) maintains that female serial killers today often kill for the same reason males do: as a means of expressing rage and control. He suggests that sometimes the theft of the victims' property by the female "black widow" type serial killer appears to be for material gain, but really
16650-508: The motives of any given killer may display considerable overlap among these categories. Visionary serial killers suffer from psychotic breaks with reality, sometimes believing they are another person or are compelled to murder by entities such as the Devil or God. The two most common subgroups are "demon mandated" and "God mandated". Herbert Mullin believed the American casualties in
16800-406: The number of murders, they need to have been committed at different times, and are usually committed in different places. The lack of a cooling-off period (a significant break between the murders) marks the difference between a spree killer and a serial killer. The category has, however, been found to be of no real value to law enforcement, because of definitional problems relating to the concept of
16950-434: The outer ( lateral ) temporal lobe. The ILAE 2017 classification distinguishes focal aware from focal impaired seizures. A focal aware temporal lobe seizure occurs if a person remains aware of what occurs during the entire seizure; awareness may be retained even if impaired responsiveness occurs during the seizure. A focal impaired awareness temporal lobe seizure occurs if a person becomes unaware during any part of
17100-418: The popular media ignores black serial killers because of a fear of allegations of racism, and that this may enable black serial killers to operate more effectively, as their crimes do not get the same media attention as the crimes of non-black serial killers. The motives of serial killers are generally placed into four categories: visionary , mission-oriented , hedonistic , and power or control ; however,
17250-544: The prosecutor with a gun, which he intended to have smuggled into the courtroom. Consequently, a metal detector was installed outside and intensive searches were conducted on people entering. On August 14, the trial was interrupted because one of the jurors, Phyllis Singletary, did not arrive at the courtroom. Later that day, she was found shot to death in her apartment. The jury was terrified, wondering if Ramirez had somehow directed this event from inside his prison cell, and whether or not he could reach other jurors. However, it
17400-553: The risk for developing afebrile seizures. However, the prolonged seizure of febrile status epilepticus leads to a 9% risk for developing epilepsy. There is no clear relationship between febrile seizures and development of hippocampal sclerosis. Hippocampal sclerosis occurs with severe CA1 and less severe CA3 and CA4 neuronal loss. Experimental research has shown that N-methyl-d-aspartate (NMDA) receptor activation causes neuronal cell loss, and electrical stimulation-induced animal models of temporal lobe epilepsy duplicate
17550-430: The scene after retrieving the child from the closet and binding the two together again with the handcuffs. On the night of July 2, 1985, Ramirez drove a stolen car to Arcadia and randomly selected the house of 75-year-old Mary Louise Cannon, a widowed grandmother. After quietly entering Cannon's home, he found her asleep in her bedroom. He bludgeoned her into unconsciousness with a lamp and then stabbed her to death using
17700-491: The scene that detectives discovered and matched to a specific pair of Avia shoes that was not common at the time. Lead detectives Frank Salerno and Gil Carrillo contacted the manufacturer of the shoes and were able to retrieve the soles. Upon the discovery of the make and distribution across the United States, only six of them existed in the men's size 11-1/2. With five of them shipped to locations in Arizona , and one shipped to
17850-749: The seizure. During a temporal lobe seizure, a person may experience a seizure aura ; an aura is an autonomic, cognitive, emotional or sensory experience that commonly occurs during the beginning part of a seizure. The common medial temporal lobe seizure auras include a rising epigastric feeling, abdominal discomfort, taste (gustatory), smell (olfactory), tingling (somatosensory), fear, déjà vu , jamais vu , flushing , or rapid heart rate ( tachycardia ). A person may then stare blankly, appear motionless ( behavioral arrest ) and lose awareness. Repeated stereotyped motor behaviors ( automatisms ) may occur such as repeated swallowing, lip smacking, picking, fumbling, patting or vocalizations. Dystonic posture
18000-569: The seizure; this reduced blood flow region may correspond to the seizure focus. Computed tomography (CT) scan is less sensitive than MRI scan for identifying small tumors, vascular malformations, cortical developmental brain malformations, and abnormalities in the medial temporal lobe. CT scan is advised in emergencies when the suspected cause of epilepsy may be intracerebral hemorrhage , brain abscess , large cerebral infarction or subdural empyema . A person who requires neuroimaging but cannot have an MRI scan due to implanted devices such as
18150-561: The snow. After her husband's death, she and four collaborators were accused of torturing and killing hundreds of girls and young women, with one witness attributing to them over 600 victims, though the number for which they were convicted was 80. Elizabeth herself was neither tried nor convicted. In 1610, however, she was imprisoned in the Csejte Castle, where she remained bricked in a set of rooms until her death four years later. A 2010 article by Perri and Lichtenwald addressed some of
18300-469: The struggle before Ramirez managed to escape. The couple survived their injuries. Two nights later, Ramirez drove a stolen car to Diamond Bar and chose the home of Sakina Abowath, age 27, and her husband 31-year-old Elyas Abowath. Sometime after 2:30 a.m. he entered the house and went into the master bedroom. He instantly killed the sleeping Elyas with a shot to the head from a .25 caliber handgun. He then handcuffed and beat Sakina while forcing her to reveal
18450-463: The suspect, described as being a juvenile at the time, and have not brought charges due to the lack of evidence. On June 28, 1984, 79-year-old Jennie Vincow was found murdered in her apartment in Glassell Park, Los Angeles . She had been stabbed repeatedly in the head, neck and chest while asleep in her bed, and her throat slashed so deeply that she was nearly decapitated. Ramirez's fingerprint
18600-438: The system contained the fingerprints of criminals born after January 1, 1960, only two months before Ramirez was born. On August 29, 1985, law enforcement officials decided to release a mug shot of Ramirez from a 1984 arrest for auto theft to the media. At the police press conference, it was announced: "We know who you are now, and soon everyone else will. There will be no place you can hide." On August 30, 1985, Ramirez took
18750-992: The temporal lobe, for treatment of mesial temporal lobe epilepsy in 1950. In a prospective randomized controlled trial comparing anterior temporal lobectomy to medical therapy for pharmacoresistant temporal lobe epilepsy, surgery was more effective than medical therapy with 1-year seizure free outcome occurring in 58% of persons with anterior temporal lobectomy compared to 8% of persons with drug treatment. Among those with intractable mesial temporal lobe epilepsy and hippocampal sclerosis, about 70% become seizure-free after epilepsy surgery. Studies show that language dominant anterior temporal lobectomy may lead to verbal memory decline. However, study outcomes are more variable on language non-dominant anterior temporal lobectomy leading to nonverbal memory decline. Magnetic resonance-guided laser interstitial thermal therapy , stereotactic radiosurgery , and stereotactic radiofrequency ablation are surgical methods that treat epilepsy by destroying
18900-703: The term serial homicide in 1974 in a lecture at Police Staff College, in Bramshill , Hampshire , England. Author Ann Rule postulates in her 2004 book Kiss Me, Kill Me , that the English-language credit for coining the term goes to Los Angeles Police Department detective Pierce Brooks, who created the Violent Criminal Apprehension Program (ViCAP) system in 1985. The German term and concept were coined by criminologist Ernst Gennat , who described Peter Kürten as
19050-403: The traditional cultural image of the "black widow". The methods that female serial killers use for murder are frequently covert or low-profile, such as murder by poison (the preferred choice for killing). Other methods used by female serial killers include shootings (used by 20%), suffocation (16%), stabbing (11%), and drowning (5%). They commit killings in specific places, such as their home or
19200-610: The trigger for serial killers. Two serial killers, Bobby Joe Long and Richard Speck , came to attention for reported chromosomal abnormalities. Long had an extra X chromosome . Speck was erroneously reported to have an extra Y chromosome ; in fact, his karyotype was performed twice and was normal each time. While attempts have been made to link the XYY karyotype to violence, including serial murder, research has consistently found little or no association between violent criminal behaviour and an extra Y chromosome. Children who do not have
19350-439: The victim threshold from three to two victims given that serial murderers from these groups share similar pathologies. Historical criminologists suggest that there have been serial killers throughout history. Some sources suggest that legends such as werewolves and vampires were inspired by medieval serial killers. In Africa, there have been periodic outbreaks of murder by leopard men . Liu Pengli of China, nephew of
19500-426: The victims at different points during the murder process. The United States Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) states that the motives of serial killers can include anger, thrill-seeking , financial gain, and attention seeking , and killings may be executed as such . The victims tend to have things in common, such as demographic profile , appearance, gender, or race . As a group, serial killers suffer from
19650-924: Was executed . By the time of his death in 2013, Ramirez was engaged to a 23-year-old writer. On August 7, 2006, Ramirez's first round of state appeals ended unsuccessfully when the California Supreme Court upheld his convictions and death sentence. On September 7, 2006, the California Supreme Court denied his request for a rehearing. Ramirez had additional appeals pending until the time of his death. Ramirez died of complications secondary to B-cell lymphoma at Marin General Hospital in Greenbrae, California , on June 7, 2013. He had also been affected by "chronic substance abuse and chronic hepatitis C viral infection." His body
19800-509: Was born in El Paso , Texas on February 29, 1960, to Mexican immigrants Mercedes Muñoz and Julián Tapia Ramirez, the youngest of their five children. His father, a railway laborer, was an alcoholic who was prone to fits of anger that often resulted in physical abuse towards his wife and children. Ramirez was brought up a Catholic and began smoking marijuana and drinking alcohol at the age of 10. Psychiatrist Michael Stone describes Ramirez as
19950-580: Was charged with murder and burglary in relation to Higgins' death. However, these charges were eventually dropped due to a lack of concrete physical evidence linking Higgins to the other murders. Based on a statement Ramirez made to an investigator, he is also a suspect in the San Francisco double murder of 58-year-old Christina Caldwell and 70-year-old Mary Caldwell. The sisters were found stabbed to death in their Telegraph Hill apartment on February 20, 1985. While incarcerated, Ramirez openly bragged to
20100-427: Was collected and suspects were identified and traced. Police surgeon Thomas Bond assembled one of the earliest character profiles of the offender . The Ripper murders also marked an important watershed in the treatment of crime by journalists. While not the first serial killer in history, Jack the Ripper's case was the first to create a worldwide media frenzy. The dramatic murders of financially destitute women in
20250-455: Was during this period that Ramirez began to cultivate an interest in Satanism and the occult . When he reached adolescence , Ramirez began to meld his burgeoning sexual fantasies with graphic violence, including forced bondage , murder, mutilation, and rape. While still in school, he took a job at a local Holiday Inn and used his master key to rob sleeping patrons. On at least one occasion, Ramirez molested two children in an elevator at
20400-528: Was found on a mesh screen he removed to gain access through an open window. This, his second known murder, established his pattern of breaking into homes , committing particularly vicious murders, and frequently burglarizing his victims either before or after killing them, which was mainly to support his drug addiction and pay his rent. Nine months later, on March 17, 1985, Ramirez attacked 22-year-old Maria Hernandez outside her home in Rosemead , shooting her in
20550-719: Was jailed for 33 days in 1987 for reckless driving and assault of an extra on Colors (1988), claimed to receive a letter from Ramirez as a fellow inmate, to which he wrote back telling Ramirez he had no sympathy and hoped he died in the gas chamber. By the time of the trial, Ramirez had fans who were writing him letters and paying him visits. Beginning in 1985, Doreen Lioy wrote Ramirez nearly seventy-five letters during his incarceration. In 1988 he proposed to Lioy, and on October 3, 1996, they were married in California's San Quentin State Prison . For many years before Ramirez' death, Lioy stated that she would commit suicide when Ramirez
20700-516: Was later found not guilty of Jesse's murder by reason of insanity , with the shooting attributed to post-traumatic stress disorder from his military service. After his elder cousin's murder of his second wife, Ramirez dropped out of Jefferson High School in the ninth grade, shortly before the school year ended in 1975. Shortly after the shooting, Ramirez moved in with his older sister, Ruth, and her husband, Roberto, an obsessive peeping tom who took Ramirez along on his nocturnal exploits. After Mike
20850-416: Was left imprinted on her face. After cruising two other neighborhoods, he returned to Monterey Park and chose the home of Sophie Dickman, age 63. Ramirez assaulted and handcuffed Dickman at gunpoint, attempted to rape her, and stole her jewelry; when she swore to him that he had taken everything of value, he told her to "swear on Satan." Two weeks later, on July 20, Ramirez purchased a machete before driving
21000-553: Was made during last-ditch efforts to appeal his death sentence. In the 1970s and 1980s, FBI profilers instigated a simple division of serial killers into "organized" and "disorganized"; that is, those who plan their crimes, and those who act on impulse. The FBI's Crime Classification Manual now places serial killers into three categories: organized , disorganized , and mixed (i.e., offenders who exhibit organized and disorganized characteristics). Some killers descend from organized to disorganized as their killings continue, as in
21150-448: Was not claimed, so it was cremated . Serial killer Note: Varies by jurisdiction Note: Varies by jurisdiction A serial killer (also called a serial murderer ) is a person who murders three or more people, with the killings taking place over a significant period of time in separate events. Their psychological gratification is the motivation for the killings, and many serial murders involve sexual contact with
21300-426: Was not connected to Ramirez, nor was it known to be his doing, until 2009. Ramirez used a wide variety of weapons, including handguns , various types of knives, a machete , a tire iron and a claw hammer . He punched, pistol whipped , and strangled many of his victims, both with his hands and in one instance a ligature ; stomped at least one victim to death in her sleep; and tortured another by shocking her with
21450-405: Was not hiding any money from him. On August 6, 1985, Ramirez drove to Northridge and broke into the home of 30-year-old Chris Peterson and Virginia Peterson, age 27. He crept into the bedroom, startled Virginia and shot her in the face with a .25 caliber semi-automatic handgun. He then shot Chris in the neck and attempted to flee; Chris fought back while avoiding being hit by two more shots during
21600-399: Was not until the 29th year of his reign that the son of one of his victims finally sent a report to the emperor. Eventually, it was discovered that he had murdered at least 100 people. The officials of the court requested that Liu Pengli be executed; however, the emperor could not bear to have his own nephew killed, so Liu Pengli was made a commoner and banished. In the 9th century (year 257 of
21750-517: Was present on May 4, 1975, when Mike fatally shot his second wife, 26-year-old Valles, in the face with a handgun during a domestic argument. Like the graphic photos and stories of his cousin's war crimes in Vietnam, Ramirez would later similarly remark that witnessing the murder was not traumatic for him in any traditional sense, but rather a subject of fascination. After the shooting, Ramirez became sullen and withdrawn from his family and peers. Mike
21900-566: Was pulled out by angry residents Faustino Pinon and Jose Burgoin. Ramirez ran across the street and attempted to take car keys from Angelina De La Torre. Her husband, Manuel De La Torre, witnessed the attempt and struck Ramirez over the head with a fence post in the pursuit. A group of over ten residents (including Jose Burgoin's sons) formed and chased Ramirez down Hubbard Street in Boyle Heights . They soon restrained Ramirez and relentlessly beat him. At around 8 a.m., police were called over
22050-672: Was released from the mental hospital in 1977, he sometimes accompanied Ramirez and Roberto on these voyeuristic walks, spying on women in the nearby areas through their windows. In 1982, at age 22, he moved to and settled permanently in California . It was around this time that Ramirez began to use cocaine , which quickly became his substance of choice, and began to commit theft and burglaries to procure money for sustaining his addiction. He lived nomadically between San Francisco and Los Angeles County during this time prior to his incarceration. On April 10, 1984, Ramirez murdered Mei Leung,
22200-453: Was taken under the wing of his older cousin, Miguel Angel "Mike" Valles (June 14, 1949 – April 8, 1995), a decorated Green Beret in the U.S. Army who himself had already become a serial killer and rapist during his service in the Vietnam War . Mike often boasted of committing gruesome war crimes in Vietnam, and shared Polaroid photos with Ramirez showing Vietnamese women whom he had raped, murdered, and dismembered or decapitated . It
22350-446: Was the most influential factor that contributed to their homicidal activity. Almost all of the serial killers in the study had experienced some sort of environmental problems during their childhood, such as a broken home caused by divorce, or a lack of a parental figure to discipline the child. Nearly half of the serial killers had experienced some type of physical or sexual abuse, and more of them had experienced emotional neglect. When
22500-460: Was ultimately determined that Ramirez was not responsible for Singletary's death, as she was shot and killed by her boyfriend, who later committed suicide with the same weapon in a hotel. The alternate juror who replaced Singletary was too frightened to return to her home. On September 20, 1989, Ramirez was convicted of all forty-three charges: thirteen counts of murder, five attempted murders , eleven sexual assaults, and fourteen burglaries. During
#85914