Serial Killer Psychology Quotes

Love is pain. Real love – the one not spewed in poetry – is agony. It tears at your soul, strips you bare, drives you mad and demands the veracity of our existence. Love is madness.

Psychologist: "This, ah, is a new sort of, ah, psychopathology that we're only now beginning to, ah, understand. These, ah, super-serial killers have no, ah, 'type' but, ah, rather consider everyone to be their 'type.'" Gramma: "Did you hear that? Your daddy's a superhero!

Not all demons are born to the dark. And not all angels seek the light. Sometimes our circumstance demands a fusion of both. There is no good and evil. Only the time spent between both heaven and hell, where we find our peace. And love. Even the vilest of monsters deserve to be loved.

It makes perfect sense that if human beings are raised in warm, loving households; if they are brought up to believe that the world is a secure and decent place, then they will grow up with a healthy relationship toward themselves and other people. - able to give love freely and receive it in return. Conversely, if a person is severely mistreated from his earliest years, subjected to constant psychological and physical abuse, he or she will grow up with a malignant view of life. To such a person, the world is a hateful place where all human relationships are based, not on love and respect, but on power, suffering, and humiliation.

It was a soulless gaze, burning with a wild hatred that shouldn’t be there in anyone who could call themselves a parent.

Drug addicts had their drugs. Alcoholics had their bottles. Serial killers had their murders.

I realised from quite early on in my childhood that I saw things differently from other people,' he wrote. 'But, more than not, it's helped me in my life. Psychopathy(if that's what you call it) is like a medicine for modern times. If you take it in moderation it can prove extremely beneficial. It can alleviate a lot of existential ailments that we would otherwise fall victim to because our fragile psychological immune systems just aren't up to the job of protecting us. But if you take too much of it, if you overdose on it, then there can, as is the case with all medicines, be some rather unpleasant side effects.

I familiarize myself with every detail of their crimes and loathe what they did. At the same time, I may feel tremendous empathy and sorrow for what they went through in their young lives that contributed to their adult behavior

You’re mine, London. We can dance this violent dance until we bleed each other dry, or we can surrender. Your choice. But I will have you.

Within just about every serial predator, there are two warring elements: A feeling of grandiosity, specialness, and entitlement, together with deep-seated feelings of inadequacy and powerlessness and a sense that they have not gotten the breaks in life that they should

SWAT? For me?" Still trembling, one hand clung to the ambulance gurney, the other held a massive sterilised cotton wool wad under my nose. "Tactical Support was busy. You got Dennis and Arlo," said Harry, speed-reading the papers he'd snatched from inside my jacket. Closest his hands had been to my chest in a long time. "Which one broke my nose?" "That'd be Dennis.

Definitions vary, but the most useful comes from the National Institute of Justice, which describes it as a “series of two or more murders, committed as separate events, usually . . . by one offender acting alone. The crimes may occur over a period of time, ranging from hours to years. Quite often, the motive is psychological, and the offender’s behavior and the physical evidence observed at the crime scenes will reflect sadistic, sexual overtones.

Usually we're on the same page. Other times I'm in a whole other book" ~ Arika Wolly

My focus is on understanding why people commit violent and predatory acts, not to help them become better, more law-abiding citizens, but to aid in catching them, prosecuting them, and putting them away

Psychology often presents individuals as if they are frozen in time and space, describing their score on an intelligence or personality test, how they remember or what their inner conflicts are. All imply that people are fixed and that a description of them at one point in time will inevitably be true of them at another.

Apparently, we're all in the frame," I heard Harry murmur somewhere behind me. And I whirled back to him. Innate, irrational anger surged. Then stopped, dead - as I suddenly took in Handsome, Robert and Doc. They were all staring at me. They were concentrating, all resolute, all a tad furrow-browed… upon my face. Self-consciousness burgeoned. I gingerly fingered my and lips and my chin, "Am I drooling?" "Your arse is hanging out," said Harry, not looking up from the forensics he was scanning. And so it was. Handsome, Robert and Doc averted their eyes as I, wishing I'd merely been dribbling, grabbed the back flaps of my breezy hospital gown, fully placed my back against the wall. Then, thinking better of it, dived hurriedly, carefully, back into bed. If Chinese Lady'd been here, she could've, would've, told me. I missed her already.

Most serial killers and criminals study psychology at some point. It's easier to spot them that way,

Just about everyone I've ever interviewed has told me that by doing something or other--recovering from cancer, climbing a mountain, playing the part of a serial killer in a movie--they have learned something about themselves. And I always nod and smile thoughtfully, when really I want to pin them down: What did you learn from the cancer, actually? That you don't like being sick? That you don't want to die? That wigs make your scalp itch? Come on, be specific. I suspect it's something they tell themselves in order to turn the experience into something that might appear valuable, rather than a complete and utter waste of time. In the last few months, I have been to prison, lost every last molecule of self-respect, become estranged from my children, and thought very seriously about killing myself. I mean, that little lot has got to be the psychological equivalent of cancer, right? And it's certainly a bigger deal than acting in a bloody film. So how come I've learned absolutley bugger all? What was I supposed to learn? I've found out that prison and poverty aren't really me. But, you know, I could have had a wild stab in the dark about both of those things beforehand. Call me literal-minded, but I suspect people might learn more about themselves if they didn't get cancer. They'd have more time, and a lot more energy.

But what my colleagues and I have found and have tried desperately to get across to others in the business of correction and forensic psychology is that dangerousness is situational. If you can keep someone in a well-ordered environment where he doesn’t have choices to make, he may be fine. But put him back in the environment in which he did badly before, his behavior can quickly change.

Oosthuizen's red spot is a classic example of what's known in sports psychology as a process goal--a technique by which the athlete is required to focus on something, however minor, to prevent them from thinking about other things: in Oosthuizen's case, all the ways he could possibly screw up the shot.

He didn’t even attempt to guess at what that delusion might be. He knew at the heart of it there was nothing poetic or metaphorical about it. The core motivation for all serial killers was the same: they got sexual release from rape, torture, pain, and murder. There was no other “why.” Trying to wrap it up in some elaborate psychological package was less than useless. Aloud he continued, “Also it’s notable

In attempting to create a psychological profile of an unknown serial killer, investigators try to distinguish between the perpetrator’s “signature”—the seemingly gratuitous acts of excessive violence or sadistic cruelty he commits for his own depraved pleasure—and his MO or modus operandi. Technically speaking, the latter term refers to the killer’s preferred method of committing his crimes without getting caught: how he selects, snares, subdues, and dispatches his victims, then makes his getaway.

Well before she became famous — or infamous, depending on where you cast your vote — Loftus's findings on memory distortion were clearly commodifiable. In the 1970s and 1980s she provided assistance to defense attorneys eager to prove to juries that eyewitness accounts are not the same as camcorders. "I've helped a lot of people," she says. Some of those people: the Hillside Strangler, the Menendez brothers, Oliver North, Ted Bundy. "Ted Bundy?" I ask, when she tells this to me. Loftus laughs. "This was before we knew he was Bundy. He hadn't been accused of murder yet." "How can you be so confident the people you're representing are really innocent?" I ask. She doesn't directly answer. She says, "In court, I go by the evidence.... Outside of court, I'm human and entitled to my human feelings. "What, I wonder are her human feelings about the letter from a child-abuse survivor who wrote, "Let me tell you what false memory syndrome does to people like me, as if you care. It makes us into liars. False memory syndrome is so much more chic than child abuse.... But there are children who tonight while you sleep are being raped, and beaten. These children may never tell because 'no one will believe them.'" "Plenty of "Plenty of people will believe them," says Loftus. Pshaw! She has a raucous laugh and a voice with a bit of wheedle in it. She is strange, I think, a little loose inside. She veers between the professional and the personal with an alarming alacrity," she could easily have been talking about herself.

One final note here: you’ve probably noticed that whenever I mention serial killers, I always refer to them as “he.” This isn’t just a matter of form or syntactical convenience. For reasons we only partially understand, virtually all multiple killers are male. There’s been a lot of research and speculation into it. Part of it is probably as simple as the fact that people with higher levels of testosterone (i.e., men) tend to be more aggressive than people with lower levels (i.e., women). On a psychological level, our research seems to show that while men from abusive backgrounds often come out of the experience hostile and abusive to others, women from similar backgrounds tend to direct the rage and abusiveness inward and punish themselves rather than others. While a man might kill, hurt, or rape others as a way of dealing with his rage, a woman is more likely to channel it into something that would hurt primarily herself, such as drug or alcohol abuse, prostitution, or suicide attempts. I can’t think of a single case of a woman acting out a sexualized murder on her own. The one exception to this generality, the one place we do occasionally see women involved in multiple murders, is in a hospital or nursing home situation. A woman is unlikely to kill repeatedly with a gun or knife. It does happen with something “clean” like drugs. These often fall into the category of either “mercy homicide,” in which the killer believes he or she is relieving great suffering, or the “hero homicide,” in which the death is the unintentional result of causing the victim distress so he can be revived by the offender, who is then declared a hero. And, of course, we’ve all been horrified by the cases of mothers, such as the highly publicized Susan Smith case in South Carolina, killing their own children. There is generally a particular set of motivations for this most unnatural of all crimes, which we’ll get into later on. But for the most part, the profile of the serial killer or repeat violent offender begins with “male.” Without that designation, my colleagues and I would all be happily out of a job.

Philosophers and many proponents of cognitive psychology hold that moral judgments are within our control, and thus people who choose to commit crimes, barring delusions, know what they are doing and that it is wrong. The legal system depends on this notion. However, recent research suggests that damage to an area of the brain just behind the eyes can transform the way people make moral decisions. The results indicate that the ventromedial prefrontal cortex, implicated in the feeling of compassion, may be the foundation for moral regulations, assisting us in inhibiting (or not) harmful treatment of others. Failure in its development, or damage to it, might alter the way a person perceives the moral landscape, which will thus affect his or her actions. If juries include information of this kind in their deliberations, it could mitigate the harshness of the sentences they impose on convicted criminals. While more research must be done, other types of brain scans are being entered as evidence in the trials of some heinous crimes to show that the perpetrator could not help what he did.

a serious contender for my book of year. I can't believe I only discovered Chris Carter a year ago and I now consider him to be one of my favourite crime authors of all time. For that reason this is a difficult review to write because I really want to show just how fantastic this book is. It's a huge departure from what we are used to from Chris, this book is very different from the books that came before. That said it could not have been more successful in my opinion. After five books of Hunter trying to capture a serial killer it makes sense to shake things up a bit and Chris has done that in best possible way. By allowing us to get inside the head of one of the most evil characters I've ever read about. It is also the first book based on real facts and events from Chris's criminal psychology days and that makes it all the more shocking and fascinating. Chris Carter's imagination knows no bounds and I love it. The scenes, the characters, whatever he comes up with is both original and mind blowing and that has never been more so than with this book. I feel like I can't even mention the plot even just a little bit. This is a book that should be read in the same way that I read it: with my heart in my mouth, my eyes unblinking and in a state of complete obliviousness to the world around me while I was well and truly hooked on this book. This is addictive reading at its absolute best and I was devastated when I turned the very last page. Robert Hunter, after the events of the last few books is looking forward to a much needed break in Hawaii. Before he can escape however his Captain calls him to her office. Arriving, Hunter recognises someone - one of the most senior members of the FBI who needs his help. They have in custody one of the strangest individuals they have ever come across, a man who is more machine than human and who for days has uttered not a single word. Until one morning he utters seven: 'I will only speak to Robert Hunter'. The man is Hunter's roommate and best friend from college, Lucien Folter, and found in the boot of his car are two severed and mutilated heads. Lucien cries innocence and Hunter, a man incredibly difficult to read or surprise is played just as much as the reader is by Lucien. There are a million and one things I want to say but I just can't. You really have to discover how this story unfolds for yourself. In this book we learn so much more about Hunter and get inside his head even further than we have before. There's a chapter that almost brought me to tears such is the talent of Chris to connect the reader with Hunter. This is a character like no other and he is now one of my favourite detectives of all time. We go back in time and learn more about Hunter when he was younger, and also when he was in college with Lucien. Lucien is evil. The scenes depicted in this book are some of the most graphic I've ever read and you know what, I loved it. After five books of some of the scariest and goriest scenes I've ever read I wondered whether Chris could come up with something even worse (in a good way), but trust me, he does. This book is horrifying, terrifying and near impossible to put down until you reach its conclusion. I spent my days like a zombie and my nights practically giving myself paper cuts turning the pages. If when reading this book you think you have an idea of where it will go, prepare to be wrong. I've learnt never to underestimate Chris, keeping readers on their toes he takes them on an absolute rollercoaster of a ride with the twistiest of turns and the biggest of drops you will finish this book reeling. I am on a serious book hangover, what book can I read next that can even compare to this? I have no idea but if you are planning on reading An Evil Mind I cannot reccommend it enough. Not only is this probably my book of the year it is probably the best crime fiction book I have ever read. An exaggeration you might say but my opinion is my own and this real

They didn't have psychology back then, so they just made up some crazy monster to explain it away

Thank you Bjork Peterson for a wonderful review of my new book "Why We Love Serial Killers" @readingghost

We're Killers On The Keyboard

We tend to think of psychopaths as serial killers, bomber, super villains, and people who are certifiably insane, and the danger here is that we forget that most psychopaths are just normal (at least by all appearances), and they can harm us in other ways. People who like starting fights, who disregard your emotions and those who consistently lie to you may turn out to be psychopaths.

Serial killers were defined as having at least three victims, with a chronological or psychological separation between each event.

The love of cruelty is a component of human psychology as old as the species itself.

In short, while brain damage is often present in the case histories of serial killers, other kinds of damage play a central role, too—especially the emotional and psychological damage inflicted by a shockingly abusive upbringing.

It bloomed in the bleak soil where her darkest dreams were born. Dire petals. Bloody thorns. An emotion perfectly cultivated. Sculpted with the violence she adored.

There are other girls out there just like Abby West. They don’t have someone to speak on their behalf. I tried to, in my own special way, but I think you’ll have a better chance than me to become the kind of change they really need. The world doesn’t need another Bloody Rose.

Be calm. Be clear. Your violence waits upon a whim.

I shan’t shed a tear. Life is full of shocks of all descriptions and they have to be faced.

Coined in 1877 by two French psychologists named Lasèque and Fabret, the term folie à deux has been translated in various ways: “insanity in pairs,” “double insanity,” “reciprocal insanity,” “collective insanity.” In its original meaning, it refers to a rare psychological phenomenon in which two or more closely associated people—often, though not always, family members—share the same psychotic delusion. In a well-known case reported in the 1930s, for example, two middle-aged sisters became convinced that they were being blackmailed by a popular radio personality who was sending coded threats to them in the songs he performed on the air.

The first psychiatrist to look closely at the more extreme forms of sadistic behavior was the eminent German physician Richard von Krafft-Ebing. Besides coining the term “masochism” (named after the Austrian writer Leopold von Sacher-Masoch, whose famous novel, Venus in Furs, deals with a man who craves humiliation), Krafft-Ebing made a major contribution to the literature of morbid psychology with his classic book, Psychopathia Sexualis—a massive compendium of every known perversion, illustrated with hundreds of detailed case histories. At the time of its initial publication in 1886, the book was considered so shocking that its author was nearly expelled from the prestigious British Medico-Psychological Association. Even today, it makes for deeply disturbing reading. Still, it is a significant work, one that clearly demonstrates there’s nothing new about serial murder. Of course, Krafft-Ebing doesn’t use the term “serial murder,” which wouldn’t enter the language for another hundred years. The term he uses is the German word lustmord or “lust-murder.” The essence of this crime is extreme sadistic violence against the victim. The lust-murderer doesn’t just kill his victims. His ultimate pleasure comes from savaging their bodies: disemboweling them, cutting out their genitals, etc. For such blood-crazed sadists, violence is a substitute for sex.

A serial killer is a soul who has been driven to the most unspeakable of crimes, not just once, and not just in a fit of rage–but gradually, over a period of time, at least two to three times, driven by a need, be it sexual, rage-fuelled, power-based, or constructed around the thrill of some perverse psychological gratification.

Since mass and spree murder are essentially two manifestations of the same psychological phenomenon, a new term has recently been proposed that covers both kinds of crime. In a series of articles published shortly before the first anniversary of the Columbine massacre, The New York Times refers to figures like Dylan Klebold, Charles Whitman, and others as rampage killers—a highly expressive phrase that pinpoints the essential difference between these types of offenders and serial killers.

There are two types of serial killers.Those who want to get caught and those who really want to get caught

Nocturnal enuresis (bedwetting) is a common trait of many serial killers. It isn't a psychological or physical illness but a developmental delay.

Murderers can use multiple sites from the moment they capture their victims. However, the main scene is where death occurs. It’s usually where more psychological and physical evidence is found. (...) Modus operandi: It is the killer’s method to carry out their crimes. It describes the techniques and choices they make. This evaluation can reveal psychological characteristics of great importance.

As with my other targets, I had been observing Dr. Solovaar for a few days. And something in me told me that I should first meet him. One day, I decided to meet him at his university office. I acted as a jolly yet earnest psychology student who was desperate to start her Ph.D. under him. I went in with fake student getup, mark sheets, recommendations, and the whole shebang. But the moment I met him, the moment I gazed into his empty eyes, I realized that man had no soul. And the worst part is he realized it about me too.

Fortunately, a detective is always present to take over when I break the surface. The psychological work has been done and it is up to the detectives to process the legal side regarding confessions and the trial. The relationship between us is one of utter trust. The detectives have to trust me to do my work but I can understand that it is very difficult for them not to interrupt. I trust them to catch us when we surface and to take over.

To draw up a profile one needs extensive knowledge of the social sciences, including psychology, criminology and ethnology, as well as experience and a gut feeling.

he identified with the aggressor and took on the active role while the boys represented himself and became the passive victims. In my opinion, Simons committed suicide on a psychological level every time he killed one of those boys.

Serial killers are differentiated from other murderers by motive. They have a deep psychological motive, whereas passion, greed, revenge or some other identifiable motive is present in other killers.

On 1 April 1996 there was another wonderful happening. My unit, Investigative Psychology, doubled its manpower, or should I say, woman power. We were now two. Elmarie Myburgh, a psychologist from the SAPS Institute for Behavioural Sciences where I had worked before, joined me. Elmarie had completed honours degrees in psychology and criminology. Her perfectionism compensated for my disorderliness. She started by organising the chaos in my office. Elmarie was 26 years old and had her head screwed firmly on her shoulders. She was strong-willed and eager to learn. I decided to take her with me on Ressler’s course in order to introduce her to the detectives. If they accepted her, she would be in. I could not afford to work with someone who did not get on with the detectives. Elmarie had grown up on a farm and had a no-nonsense attitude, although she could be quite moody if she wanted to be. I thought she would be able to handle the detectives and hoped they would be able to handle her.

As soon as the adult serial killer’s fragile ego and self-esteem are threatened by any form of rejection or pain, the original childhood agony is triggered and he feels the irresistible urge to act out this powerful fantasy, which is the only way he perceives to restore the psychological imbalance.

the person’s ego needs to feel threatened by some event which causes a psychological imbalance. The psychological gain he receives from the murder is the restoration of the mental homeostasis, and of course most of them also experience sexual gratification.

He realises that he has a problem, he knows right from wrong, but the psychological gain and, of course, the sexual gratification are so great that he refuses to give it up and seek another, more humane, manner of addressing his pain.

Satanists will commit murder in honour of the Devil, but serial killers commit murder for their own subconscious psychological gain. Satanists operate in cults, serial killers mainly work alone.

Sociopaths, psychopaths, serial killers. Who sees our side of things, truly? Criminal psychology teaches you how to catch them. It doesn't teach you to truly understand them

I’ve devoured every serial killer-based film and series I can, read the biographies, listened to hours of true crime podcasts, watched intensely questionable YouTube videos and every new Netflix true crime documentary. I’ve rewatched The Silence of the Lambs every year, as my own sort of holiday classic, and if stressed out, I’ll turn to Zodiac as my comfort blanket movie. I see it as a safe peek inside a psychology so far removed from my life, so totally inconceivable morally, that it’s the cinematic equivalent of bungee jumping.

We execute prisoners and send them to death, but we never stopped to ask what led them to commit those hideous crimes. You have a lot to learn. Serial killers show signs of psychological disorders such as psychopathy, antisocial personality disorder, or narcissistic personality disorder. Are they not sick? Is this not a proof of genetic and neurological mutation? Do they deserve death? The answer is No.