In the news media, we often hear about different types of killers. Terms such as serial killer and mass murderer and spree killer have, it seems, become a part of our vocabulary. However, do you know what the difference between them is? Ok, let's define them:
Ed Kemper was born and raised into a rather dysfunctional family in which his mother and father fought quite a bit until they eventually divorced. At some point after this, Ed started doing some pretty weird things. He tortured the family pet cat and dismembered it. He also played death ritual games with his sisters. Unable to cope with that sort of thing, his mother shipped him off to his father, but he ran away, returned to his mother, so his mother tried again, this time with his grandparents. After an argument with his grandmother (he wanted to go out into the field with his grandfather, but the grandmother wanted him to stay inside and help with household chores) he shot her with a .22 caliber riffle, and then stabbed her several times with a kitchen knife. When his grandfather came home, he shot him too, partly because he knew the old man would disapprove of what he had done, and partly (as he told officials later) because he wanted to know what "it would feel like to shoot Grandpa." At the time this happened, Ed Kemper was fourteen years old.
He was sent to the Atascadero Hospital for the Criminally Insane. He was released (against psychiatrist orders) and placed in his mother's custody when he was twenty-one years old. For two years, he held odd jobs, and had a strange habit of picking up female hitchhikers. On May 7, 1972 he picked up two ladies, drove them to a secluded area, stabbed them, and then took them home to his mother's house, where he dissected them. He then buried their bodies at several different locations.
In mid-September, he picked up another hitchhiker, killed her, had sex with her, and then brought her home for dissection. The next day, he had a meeting with state psychiatrists, who declared him mentally fit and had his childhood record sealed. Kemper enjoyed the fact that he could manipulate the system and could finally feel superior to it. After the meeting, he drove into the mountains to bury his latest victim's bodyparts. (Yes, they were in his car during his interview.)
In January of the next year, he picked up another student, shot her, brought it home so he could have sex with it, dissected it in the bathtub, and then buried the victims head in the backyard, face up, pointing toward his mother's window since she had said she liked it when people looked up to her. The rest of the victim was thrown off a cliff in plastic bags into the ocean. Less than a month later, he picked up two more coeds and pretty much did the same sort of thing he had done with his past victims. He buried them near San Francisco, where the bodied were found a week later.
On Easter Weekend, he killed his mother in a similar fashion he had the others, and fed her voice box into the garbage disposal because of all the times she was bitching at him and he just wanted her to shut up. He then called a friend of his mothers and invited her over for dinner. He killed her, put her in his bed, but went to sleep in his mothers bed.
All this while, news of the "Coed Killer" was filling the airwaves. He got into his car and just headed east until he reached southern Colorado. There, he called the authorities and confessed to being the Coed Killer. It took him some time to convince them he was telling the truth, but once he did, he waited there for the local police to pick him up. He was convicted of eight counts of first degree murder. During his sentencing he was asked what he thought would be an appropriate punishment, to which he replied, "Death by torture."
Ed Kemper fits the mold of the classic serial killer because he killed ten people over a long timespan. As is with most serial killers, there was also a sexual element (necrophalia). Quite often, the people who know serial killers say that they did not think he was the type of person to commit such crimes, which could lead into how he was able to convince state psychiatrists he was of sound mind while he had bodyparts of his latest victim in the back of his car. Kemper was considered antisocial and a loner as many serial killers are too.
Timothy McVeigh, the twenty-seven year old man who was convicted for the April 19, 1995 bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City and killing 168 people, wounding over 500, including twenty-one children under the age of five, is a good example of a mass murderer.
Like most mass murderers, Timothy McVeigh had a very strong personal motive for what he did. He wanted to teach a lesson to the Federal Government because he did not like what he perceived they had done in recent past. He chose the date carefully, being Patriot Day (the anniversary of the Revolutionary War at Concord - a day most militia groups celebrate foondly) and the second anniversary of the end of the standoff between Federal Agents and David Koresh at the Branch Davidian Complex at Waco, Texas.
McVeigh was arrested an hour and a half after the Oklahoma City Bombing in Billings, Oklahoma. A state trooper had pulled him over because the car he was driving had no licensee plates. He was arrested after the trooper had noticed some guns in the back seat of the car.
This story is also a prime example of a disorganized criminal. If the gun in the back seat of his car in plain view of state troopers wasn't enough of a clue, there is plenty more. The rental truck McVeigh had used was easily traced back to him. The clerks remembered the guy who had rented the van, and worked with sketch artists, the result of which was circulated throughout the area. The owner of a nearby motel recognized the individual in the sketch and gave the authorities McVeigh's name. When police ran McVeigh's name through the National Crime Information Computer system (NCIC) they learned McVeigh was about to be released on those other charges. When the clothing McVeigh was arrested in was tested, residue from the detonation cord were found on his shirt. Personality wise, he was a classic example of your standard angry, paranoid, asexual, asocial, underachiever from a broken home with pervasive feelings of inadequacy with a desire to get back at those who ignored him and who had to therefore prove himself.
Like other similar criminals, many people who knew McVeigh said he was normally a very pleasant person, and had never really known him to be one of the overly aggressive types. In fact, most of the people he had gone to school with (students and teachers alike) did not really even remember him. A bowling companion of his father did not even know the family had a son until he was arrested in conjunction with the Oklahoma City bombing.
Yet, that is not to say that there weren't any clues in his past. For example, McVeigh loved guns and had started a collection of them. For a brief while, he served as an armored car guard. He also served in the army for awhile, but never quite reached his goal of becoming a member of the Special Forces. It was when he was in the army that he met Terry Nichols and Michael Fortier - two asocial loner types who helped him make his bomb. In the army, he also first read The Turner Diaries, a book criticized by many people claiming it nothing more than a bomb making instruction book in the form of a novel. The similarities between what happened in the book and what McVeigh ultimately planned is too similar to be coincidence.
After leaving the army, McVeigh was known on many occasions to write letters to newspapers, television shows, and any other type of public media that he could on topics he felt strongly about - race relations, taxation, gun control, political corruption, crime... Without the structure of Army life, he needed to find a new venue.
Timothy McVeigh traveled to Waco Texas during the standoff between Federal Agents and David Koresh at the Branch Davidian Complex where he was seen selling bumper stickers with messages such as "Fear The Government That Fears Your Guns" and "A Man With A Gun Is A Citizen. A Man Without A Gun Is A Subject". He was also interviewed by a journalism student about his thoughts and feelings about the standoff.
This was the biggest trigger for McVeigh. One year later, he would detonate a bomb which would be considered by many to be the costliest and most devastating human act in American history.
Most of Andrew Cunanan's life is a rather large mystery. For example, according to Cunanan, his father was a strict disciplinarian and would often beat him to the point of bruising. However, according to his brothers, he was the "white sheep" of the family and severely pampered. His father told reporters from the Philippines that Andrew had never seen a day of violence at home. "That was never a part of his growing up years."
At age thirteen, he had his first gay encounter, an experience he later bragged about. Some say that he was proud of his sexuality, while others tell that he was self-absorbed and loved to be the center of attention. This later trait is one we see all too often in people who later become violently antisocial.
When he was fifteen years old, he looks older than he really is, and is frequently spotted in gay bars in the Hillcrest area of San Diego. Cunanan feels that his last name sounds too Filipino, so he comes up with names such as Andrew DeSilva or David Morales. At this time he starts dating older men who buy him expensive gifts and give him money when asked for it. Monogamy was not one of Andrew Cunanan's traits, and these relationships were often called off because of that. For awhile, he even became a (sometimes cross-dressing) prostitute, and many of his clients were members of San Diego's upper class.
One thing which is important to note is that at no point in his life has Andrew Cunanan held a long term, high paying job. Most of his money came from either his parents, his boyfriends, or prostitution.
At two points in his life, he joked or wrote about "targeting" celebrities. For example, he wanted to do in Madonna (most likely because he had met her at a party one night and she treated him as if he wasn't a celebrity) and Nicole Kidman (who was married to Tom Cruise, who Andrew idolized and said he wanted to date if it weren't for his marriage to Kidman [please note that Cruise says he is not gay, and there is no evidence the two of them had ever met]).
Perhaps the most mysterious topic in Andrew Cunanan's life was his health. In 1997 he got sick, and while the symptoms were not very bad, he just couldn't seem to get well again. Many people speculated that he had become HIV+. He never told anybody any definitive information on this topic. Months later, his appearance wasn't what it had been in the past, and again people speculated about his HIV status.
The final act in Cunanan's life began after he tells everybody that he is permanently moving to San Francisco, but instead travels to Minneapolis, where he meets David Madson (the friend of a friend) and the two hit it off. He invites an friend, Jeff Trail to dinner with them, even though Trail had a live-in lover and Cunanan had previously been totally infatuated him, but wanted only a platonic relationship with Cunanan. After dinner, they head back to Madson's apartment, and while the exact circumstances are not totally clear, according to neighbors the three people had a shouting match. Cunanan goes into the kitchen and returns with a claw hammer, which he uses to bludgeon Trail. The medical examiner's office counted over thirty blows. Apparently, Cunanan has started getting back at the people in his life who had snubbed him or who he believed caused him harm.
Cunanan then travels to Chicago, where he sleeps in Madson's jeep, mainly because he's almost out of money and his credit limit is shot. A few days later, Cunanan breaks into the house of one of Chicago's most wealthy businessmen. Even though we are not sure why he did this, the most accepted reason is because he thought that he could find some cash in the wealthy man's home. That night, he tortures the man with a screwdriver, garden sheers, and other things commonly found in most garages. He then gets into the man's Lexus, and drives over him several times while he lay dead on the garage floor. When he is finished, he enters the house and fixes himself some dinner before going to bed in the old man's room. (The businessman's wife was away at the time on business.) The next morning, he takes a large amount of cash, an expensive leather jacket, and heads out of town in the Lexus.
Another one of the mysteries here is why Cunanan exercised such a sense of overkill with someone he had never met before, which is extremely rare. Overkill like this usually means the victim and the attacker knew each other. While up until now, Cunanan fits more of a serial killer personality type, with the attack of the Chicago man, he has now become a spree killer. Speculation about why he killed the man in this way includes the ideas that somehow he must have represented things Cunanan strongly loathed. Authorities would have been baffled about who had killed the businessman had Cunanan not driven Madson's Jeep to the residence, had he not used his real name when pawning items found at the businessman's house, and made no attempt to conceal his identity. Unlike serial killers, the question is not who did it or why, with spree killers the next question is where and when are they going to strike next.
Andrew Cunanan next heads to Philadelphia, where he uses Madson's cell phone to call friends in California. However, when he learns that the police are trying to track him through the phone's signal, he throws the phone off a bridge into a river. On Friday, May 9, he shows up in New Jersey where he approaches a man, most likely under the pretext to ask for directions. He shoots the man using a gun he had taken from Jeff Trail, shooting the man execution style before he takes off in that man's truck. He leaves behind the Lexus with his passport in it, along with the screwdriver he used to kill the Chicago man. We believe he killed this man simply for the truck, mostly because there was no emotional evidence at this scene.
By now, Cunanan has made it onto the FBI's Ten Most Wanted List and has been featured on the television show America's Most Wanted. The general public is really starting to take notice of him. He has now gone from a homosexual grunge match into a spree killer who murders all types.
On may 10th, he checks into a run down Miami hotel using one of his old aliases, Andrew DeSilva. Cunanan makes several risky public appearances, spotted walking down some of Miami's main streets, and even in a few of the local gay bars. Whenever the police were called, by the time they would show up, he would be gone.
Around Eight Thirty, on the morning of July Fifteenth, popular fashion designer Gianni Versace walks to a nearby corner where he buys some coffee and magazines. When he returns home a few minutes later, Cunanan walks up from behind him and shoots him point blank. After Versace falls to the floor, his assassin stands over his head and shoots again before running off. A witness chases after him, but loses him in a nearby parking garage. In that garage, the police found the pickup truck stolen from Chicago. In the truck, they found the clothes Cunanan wore when he shot Versace, another passport, newspaper clippings on his killings, and a list of other celebrities he wanted to target. Madonna and Julio Iglesias were both on that list, and had homes near Versace's.
It is possible that Versace and Cunanan could have met each other. Security cameras at a gay bar Versace was known to frequent spotted Cunanan walking around, drinking inside. Versace, as a rule, never left his house alone like he did the morning he was shot, so it is believed that Cunanan may have called him before he left and tried to arrange a meeting.
Needless to say, the nation was starting to get terrified. Andrew Phillip Cunanan could strike anywhere, at any time. Andrew is transformed into a super-killer by the media, based on the seemingly randomness of his crimes, and the many disguises and aliases the man had.
On July 23, the seventy-one year old caretaker of a Miami houseboat notes an intruder. He thinks he hears a gunshot, so he calls police. After the swat team surrounds the houseboat, which is captured on national television, authorities enter to find Cunanan wearing only a pair of boxer shorts, shot through the mouth with the same gun he had used to shoot all the others. He was down to his last bullet. Evidence suggested that he had lived there for about a week, and there was no sort of suicide note.
Looking back over the saga, a few things can be noted. For instance, Cunanan seems to have killed for one of two reasons - either he needed something from them (such as the truck from Chicago) or he needed to be them. They each seemed to represent members of the upper class, which Andrew tried so desperately to fit into. Gianni Versace's murder is a perfect example of this later motive, since Versace was a very successful homosexual, a celebrity, rich and famous - all of which were traits Andrew Cunanan wished so desperately that he could have himself. A few interesting parallels can also be made between Andrew Cunanan and Mark David Chapman, the man who killed John Lennon, simply because he wanted to be Lennon.
© 1999; Corky McGraw