To think that serial killers can’t exist these days?

[Snooks1971]

Or actually get away with murder enough to become a serial killer maybe I should say. Just finished Night Stalker on Netflix, which made me think about this, although I’ve thought along these lines before. Have always been fascinated with Jack The Ripper after visiting Madame Tussaud’s as a young teen (late 40s now).

I haven’t googled any facts and I’m just an armchair observer, but surely with mobile phones, cctv, forensic developments, tech interfaces actually talking to each other this wouldn’t be possible now.

Then I wonder how many serial killers from the past that we have never of who must have got away with it. Makes my mind boggle a bit.

@MrsLuciferMorningstar

There’s got to be serial killers, no doubt about it. What freaks me out though is the number of one off killers just walking amongst us. I’m talking people who may have knocked someone over in a country lane and driven off or someone who maybe punched someone one time and got away with it. Creepy. In fact, I know someone who was left for dead in a country lane and woke up in a hospital with a broken leg after a jogger found her. She’d been hit by a car and was unconscious so that person was happy to drive off not knowing if they’d killed someone. Strange mentality.

My father actually did this.

He knocked someone over and killed them while drunk driving in the 60s or 70s.

He then moved to Saudi Arabia for several years - the police looked for him at the time when they suspected him but he was already away.

After he returned to the UK in the late 70s he drove without a licence or insurance because he was worried that would flag him up.

He was never arrested. I went no contact with him from 10 years old (because he was abusive) and don't know enough about when/who he killed to help.

On the upside he died about five years ago and it was a very drawn out, painful and lonely death so karma got him in the end.

I sometimes wonder if there are tit for tat arrangements made to kill somebody else's wife or husband, because if you have NO connection to somebody then you're not on the list to be questioned, it's hard to bring you in. Say you're Ireland but if somebody in the UK wanted their spouse dead, ...... as long as they got away from the initial scene of the crime there'd be no connection to that person, no DNA on record in the uk, no ''priors''.
Then six months later the one in the UK returns the favour.

Have I read too many crime books?

I think this kind of thing happens more than we think.

No PMs please.
I'm fully booked up atm.

@WiseOwlRelaxing

No PMs please. I'm fully booked up atm.

In all but name we have a serial killer as Prime Minister. His neglect and not acting in a reasonable time in March and especially after SAGEs recommendations in September has led to thousands of deaths that could and should have been avoided.

ah, come on. It was an unprecedented situation and there are different trains of thought, different bodies of advice. And sweden did very little and their deaths are a lot higher so that is a serious stretch.

their deaths are NOT a lot higher I mean

@umpteennamechanges re dna the exciting development is the rise of family history dna tests.
There's a well known website Gedmatch where you can upload your dna data from sites such as Ancestry and make it freely available.
Iirc about 60 criminals have been caught through relatives doing this the most famous being the Golden State Killer.
All the police need to do is upload a killers dna to the website and wait for a match. Once they have that they can build a family tree and start eliminating members to narrow down the suspects.

[quote GrimDamnFanjo]@umpteennamechanges re dna the exciting development is the rise of family history dna tests.
There's a well known website Gedmatch where you can upload your dna data from sites such as Ancestry and make it freely available.
Iirc about 60 criminals have been caught through relatives doing this the most famous being the Golden State Killer.
All the police need to do is upload a killers dna to the website and wait for a match. Once they have that they can build a family tree and start eliminating members to narrow down the suspects.[/quote]

Yes, I loved how they caught GSK this way!

I was listening to a lot of true crime podcasts at the time (I forget the name, but the one narrated by an anonymous Ozzie guy) and he was so excited when the news came in that GSK had been caught!

The best thing about it is that it can use family members who may not even know the killer, like second cousins or whatever so it doesn't rely on the killer being stupid enough to do an Ancestry DNA test

@umpteennamechanges yes family history is my main hobby and it's so interesting that as dna techniques develop there will be fewer and fewer places to hide.
Not related to crime but my fathers dna revealed his grandfather was someone else - everyone closely involved has long since died but the secret has been revealed over a 100 years later...

I think a canny murderer can get away with things for longer than someone killing in the heat of the moment; on a documentary I watched about Peter Sutcliffe, the point was made that the police were misled by thinking his victims were all sex workers, thus missing connections and patterns. But earlier victims were not, and some survived because they were attacked in an area where kicking up a fuss would draw attention - so Sutcliffe switched for a long time to "red light" areas where a ruckus was more likely to be ignored.
I'm a Londoner, so constantly reminded of the presence of people who would not be missed for a while, easy prey for the likes of Dennis Nielsen.......some of them may even be under the radar because that is where they wish to be. And I think it's probably a mistake to place too much faith in evidence-gathering. DNA evidence doesn't stack up if somebody pressed "Delete" when making a human error.

I think there are others like Shipman. A lot more governance, so maybe not same use of opioids but look at Paterson inquiry report. He may not have directly killed but some of his patients died because of his actions, nevertheless.
He is imprisoned, but not for murder or manslaughter.

Can't we have ONE thread that doesn't result in covid being mentioned?

Look up Israel Keyes OP, fascinating and horrific case. He made sure to travel to different areas and use different methods of murder to avoid having an MO the police would recognise easily. Still got caught, thank god, but he has 3 confirmed murders and a further 8 the police believe he also committed.

Nah as established, they still can, and do. We dont have surveillance everywhere, and fingerprints and stuff are pointless for people who have never had their fingerprints taken too..unless they have them taken at some stage in the future, which apparently gets a lot of criminals caught out. In for burglary,m then find matching prints at a multiple murder scene 25 years back or whatever.

I think every generation thinks that because it has state of the art technology, some aspects of human nature will be stamped out. But the fact is, whatever technology we have, humans are always the same. Always smart enough to get round the obstacles, but not smart enough to stop themselves.

Thats a great way of putting it.

I totally believe the canal thing, why wouldn't you?

I totally believe the canal thing, why wouldn't you?

I wonder if there's much cctv along the Manchester canal?

My daughter sent her dna off to one of those websites a while ago. She hasn't heard back yet.

Can you imagine somebody contacting you to ask what male relatives you have

There's a free podcast about the golden state killer on audible, haven't listened to it yet. The way they closed in on him was fascinating.

@covetingthepreciousthings

Has anyone ever read or looking into the case of the Croydon cat killer? Who was believed to have killed over 500 cats & other animals. I think the police since dropped the case and said it was foxes or they were killed by cars. But the whole case was very worrying, and it just didn't seem to add up to all being cars or foxes (considering foxes were also amongst the victims).

There's no cctv footage though.

I always thought whoever was responsible for that would go on to become a serial killer though.

Maybe three were just a keen gardener who was fed up with people’s cats shitting in their veg patch? Don’t want your cat murdered? Cat-proof your own garden and let it shit in there.

@covetingthepreciousthings - nope. Very little CCTV around the canals. It's way too dark under most of the tunnels for it to be effective really. Sheer sides with no banks / ladders to climb out, some parts are really quite deep (over 8 metres in parts) and almost always very cold even in summer. The towpaths are fairly slippy & not well maintained either.

That's the reason for the debate between 'The Pusher' and random people falling in drunk and not being able to get out or call for help.

Plenty of places on the planet where there sill still be active serial killers undetected. Russia east of the Urals, developing nations with huge homicide rates where yet another corpse is a non-event. Columbia, Mexico etc

Maybe three were just a keen gardener who was fed up with people’s cats shitting in their veg patch? Don’t want your cat murdered? Cat-proof your own garden and let it shit in there.

Don't be ridiculous. Killing & mutilating cats is fine if you like gardening?

Colombia, sorry

@MaskingForIt Maybe three were just a keen gardener who was fed up with people’s cats shitting in their veg patch? Don’t want your cat murdered? Cat-proof your own garden and let it shit in there.

You're being quite specific there, you scary-sounding weirdo.