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ZorbaTHut  2yr ago (text post)   35661 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of September 26, 2022

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The relevant part of the Wikipedia article on this:

When defining serial killers, researchers generally use "three or more murders" as the baseline,[1] considering it sufficient to provide a pattern without being overly restrictive.[16] Independent of the number of murders, they need to have been committed at different times, and are usually committed in different places.[17] 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 a "cooling-off period".[18] 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".[13]

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 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.[19]

The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) defines serial killing as "a series of two or more murders, committed as separate events, usually, but not always, by one offender acting alone".[20] In 2005, the FBI hosted a multi-disciplinary symposium in San Antonio, Texas, which brought together 135 experts on serial murder from 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".[18] The definition does not consider the motivation for killing nor define a cooling-off period.

So it seems the definition is broad enough for 2000+ serial killers to be possibly present in the US. That being said, I don't really understand what this sentence is supposed to mean:

With the clarification that "[this does not mean that] there are 2000 active serial killers but that there are at least 2000 who have gone unrecognized as being serial killers."

I'd guess it means that it's not that there are 2000 serial killers continuously at the prowl for victims at the moment but 2000 people who have done serial killing at some point and haven't been caught?

Or perhaps were caught for one murder and not linked to their others. There could be 5 unsolved murders where the perpetrator is in jail for his 6th.

Or in jail for something other than murder. Makes sense, thanks.

If we use the definition of "serial killer" the author also probably uses, it's a big stretch to say that serial killers are "continuously at the prowl for victims".

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