The Jeffrey Dahmer Story:An American Nightmare Book Review

The Jeffrey Dahmer Story is a true crime novel written by Don Davis. It was published in 1991 just after Dahmer was captured. If you don't know, Jeffrey Dahmer was a serial killer, cannibal and necrophiliac He stalked the streets of Milwaukee for years and he slaughter seventeen men, most of them young and black.
This book takes you from his childhood until his capture by police in 1991.

The book begins with the tragic story of 14 year old Konerak Sinthasomphone who was picked up by Dahmer. He drugged the boy, but he woke up and ran away out of Dahmer's apartment. He ran into two women who called the cops. The cops came and Dahmer managed to convince them that it was just a tiff between two gay men. Konerak had handcuffs attached to him and the cops went into Dahmer's apartment, but decided that it was harmless and left the young boy to his fate. Dahmer murdered Konerak just after the cops left. This is the beginning of the novel and you can only imagine what the young man endured after the cops had left him alone with Dahmer.

Dahmer grew up in Wisconsin with his parents, Joyce and Lionel Dahmer. He was an unusual young man and he liked to kill animals(a hallmark of most serial murderers). He liked the cut them open and see what their insides were like.He killed cats and dogs and took them up to his room to examine their dead bodies. His parents divorced and his mother left the family home. Jeffrey found himself living with his dad and his new stepmother. He became an alcoholic at a young age and before his parents split up, they tried to get him help.
Dahmer was alone in the family home when he picked up his first victim, a hitchhiker named Steven Hicks. He invited him to his house where he killed him and dismembered his body. He dissolved the body in acid and crushed the bones and scattered them around the yard of his home. This began his killing career which would last until 1991.

Dahmer was caught for indecent exposure in front of children and he was sentenced to probation. He had to see a probation officer and talk about his life etc. He got a job in a chocolate factory and then he got his own apartment. He lured and killed many more young men there and he dismembered and disposed of them. Well, most of them. He kept parts of his victims in his apartment. He kept the skulls of some of his victims and painted them and kept them as ornaments. He took pictures of his victims before and after death.
His neighbours began to notice a horrible odour from his apartment for all of the dead body parts. Dahmer became more out of control as time went on. His last intended victim was a young man called Tracy Edwards. He was lured to Dahmer's flat and Dahmer began his murder ritual.  He was going to take nude photos of Edwards and then kill him but Edwards played for time and punched Dahmer in the face before running out of the flat. He flagged down two cops and told them what had happened. They went up to Dahmer's flat and what they found there was enough to arrest Dahmer.

Dahmer was convicted of 16 murders and he was sentences to 16 life sentences so he was never getting out of prison. He was murdered in prison by an inmate  in 1994. The book doesn't have this included as it was written before that happened. This book was interesting in parts and not so interesting in others. The author tends to ramble on about topics that were irrelevant but I still enjoyed it. If you like true crime novels, then you will enjoy this one!

The Stranger Beside Me Book Review

The Stranger Beside Me is written by Ann Rule who is well known for her true crime books. It was written in 1980 and it revolves around the serial killer Ted Bundy. Ann Rule worked with him at a crisis centre and she knew him pretty well before she found out that he was a serial killer.

Ted Bundy(pictured above) was a handsome, intelligent, charming young man who was one of the most brutal serial killers in U.S. history. He was cold and calculating and he had no mercy for those women he killed. It is thought that he began his murdering career after his girlfriend jilted him because he was going nowhere. He was devastated and he worked his way up until he became a very successful person and he won her back. But, then he dumped her suddenly as revenge for her dumping him. Then he began to batter and rape and strangle women. He was clever though and he took the women with him and disposed of them elsewhere. Some of the bodies still haven't been recovered. He wanted young pretty women with their long hair parted in the middle as it reminded him of his first girlfriend who had hurt him. They were all smart and they all had a lot to live for.

Bundy  moved around from Washington to Utah to Colorado and to Florida where he committed his final crimes. Bundy had a girlfriend while he was killing women and he had a life away from his crimes. He picked up two women in the same day and neither of them were ever seen alive again. He continued on with his killing spree in Utah and more women disappeared. He would have kept killing if he had not been pulled over by a cop and questioned. The cop found the tools of his trade in the trunk. There was a ski mask, a crow bar, rope and handcuffs. He tried to explain away the find by saying that they were common household items but the cops were suspicious of him and he was kept under 24 hour surveillance after he was released. As Bundy had tried to kidnap a woman called Carol DaRonch, she was able to identify him from a line up. He was charged with the kidnapping. He was also charged with murder.

This began a trial which would last for a long time. While he was in custody, he escaped and jumped out of a window. He headed for Aspen but was soon recaptured. He escaped again a few months later and this time he headed to Florida. He went to the Chi Omega sorority house and he killed two girls and almost killed 2 others. Then he broke into the house of another girl and almost killed her two. A while later, he picked up and killed 12 year old Kimberly Leach and this would turn out to be his last murder.

He was caught once again and he was charged with the Florida murders. His trial dragged on for years and Bundy was representing himself. He loved the attention he got from the media and he was cocky, arrogant and he relished the details of his murders. He was sentenced to death by electric chair and he died in 1989.

The book deals with Ann Rule's(pictured above) relationship with Bundy and how it was hard for her to believe that he was a serial killer. She tells us all about her letters from him and how he felt about his crimes etc. It is a great crime book and it is a must for any true crime fan. It is interesting and well written. I enjoyed it a lot and I really recommend it. It is a great insight into the mind of a killer.

To Catch A Killer Movie Review 201

 To Catch A Killer is a 1992 made-for-TV movie about the serial killer John Wayne Gacy and it stars 

Brian Dennehy, Michael Riley, Margot Kidder and Meg Foster.

The movie starts with a young man called Chris Gant who disappears in 1978 at a local pharmacy after going outside to meet a guy who is offering him a job. His mother was waiting inside the store and she is very worried when he does not come back. The investigation is headed by Lieutenant Joe Konzenczak who suspects a local businessman and pillar of the society, John Wayne Gacy played by Dennehy. Gacy denies meeting the young man and there is no evidence that he did. The other cops think that the Lieutenant is clutching at straws as Gacy is so well respected but he perseveres with his case. He meets with Gant's parents and looks through his room. He finds a camera but not much else. The cops get a warrant to search Gacy's house, but they find nothing that would incriminate him, though he has men's underwear, dirty magazines, men's jewellery, handcuffs and they find a board with handcuffs attached to it and a pharmacy receipt for photographs.Konzenczak is disappointed there is no concrete evidence. Gacy is cocky, self- assured and very arrogant. He even plays Pogo the clown for kids in hospital! The cops even consult a psychic played by Margot Kidder and she gives them some clues.

The cops get information that Gacy sodomised a young boy and went to prison for it. They put surveillance guys on him and he teases them at every opportunity. He laughs and jokes with them and he is really cool about the whole thing which makes Konzenczak angry. To make it worse, Gacy brings a lawsuit against the Lieutenant for harassment. Things start to go wrong for Gacy when the cops talk to his pal. He tells them that Gacy liked young men and that he had them in his house on more than one occasion. He also tells them that the car he has was sold to him by Gacy and he doesn't know where Gacy got it. It happens to be identical to one belonging to a missing young man. Gacy is linked to missing young men and his world comes crumbling down. Konzenczak remembers the pharmacy receipt in Gacy's house and he talks to the young girl who was working there the night Gant disappeared. She tells him that she put it into the pocket of his jacket so he wouldn't forget it. That is proof that Gant was at Gacy's house and that links him to the murder.

The friend of Gacy's tells the cops that Gacy made him dig holes in the crawlspace under his house. He told him that it was for drainage. The cops get another search warrant for Gacy's house and this time they look in the crawlspace. They find human remains buried there. By the time they are finished digging, they have found 26 bodies and 3 more around his house. He killed others and disposed of them near the river, bringing his total murders to 33. They find Chris Gant's body and Konzenczak is finally happy to be able to bring the news to his parents. Now, they can bury their son. The movie ends with the cops unearthing more bodies in the crawlspace.

This was a very entertaining and well-acted movie. Dennehy is very good as the serial killer Gacy. He plays the part to perfection. He is arrogant, cocky and evil. It is a really great performance. Everyone in this movie was very good and it is faithful to the true story of Gacy. I would highly recommend this as it is suspenseful and interesting. I am going to give it an 8/10.

The I-5 Killer By Ann Rule

This book is based on a true story of the killer called 'The I-5 Killer'. It is written by veteran true-crime novelist Ann Rule. She wrote this book under the pseudonym Andy Stack. It was released in 1988. Ann Rule has also written books about serial killer Ted Bundy and the Green River Killer.

The I-5 Killer was a man called Randy Woodfield(pictured above). He is called The I-5 killer because his crimes were committed along the I-5 Highway running from Washington to California. Randy was a handsome guy and he was pretty popular at school. He was athletic too and he played football in school and college. But, underneath his perfect exterior was a young man with sexual desires which were not normal. He went out and exposed himself in public while he was still in school. He was lucky that he didn't get in trouble because he was such a good athlete. He also committed smaller crimes, but despite his arrests, he still managed to get onto the Green Bay Packers team in 1974. Eventually he got kicked off when his lewd behaviour caught up with him

That was the start of his real criminal life. After he was dropped from the team, he began to rob stores etc at knife point. He sexually assaulted young women and he always wore a band aid across his nose as someone had told him that it made it harder for people to see his face. He murdered women and he sexually assaulted many. He was caught when the police were investigating another shooting and his name came up. They searched his home and they found evidence that he was the man they were looking for in connection with dozens of assaults and murders. Randy Woodfield was sentenced to life in prison and another 165 years were added for other crimes. He is currently 58 years of age and he is serving his sentence in the Oregon State Penitentiary. He was linked to other crimes from years ago and he was suspected in many more.

This book was very interesting and detailed. It chronicles Woodfield's life from his childhood up until he was caught and it shows how he grew from a normal kid into a monster who used women for his own sexual desires and how he thought that he was smarter than the cops. He was a Romeo to many women and they could not believe that he was a killer. That was how he managed to elude the cops for so long. Ann Rule(pictured above) is a very good writer and the book is very well written. It is a must for any true-crime readers like myself and Jigsaw. I really recommend this book and I would say that it was very enjoyable.

Beyond Belief by Emlyn Williams

I found this book in a second hand book shop and I hadn't heard anything about it before, but I am interested in true crime so I wanted to read it. This book is based on The Moors Murders which happened in Manchester, England in the 1960's. The killers were a man, Ian Brady and a woman Myra Hindley and they killed five people, four of which were children. The murders sparked outrage in Manchester at the time and people hated the killers who killed innocent children. The author is Emlyn Williams(pictured at bottom of page) who wrote many plays and who died in 1987. Ian Brady was a loner and a strange child. He was interested in Nazi stuff and he listened to the speeches of Hitler. He read books which fed his lust for violence and sex. He wanted a submissive mate and then he met Myra Hindley when he was working at a firm and they became a couple. She was in love with him and she would do anything for him. She was besotted with him and he treated her like a servant. She would do anything to keep him, so she didn't disagree with him. On the other hand, she was a willing participant in what they would do together and she shared the blame for the horrific murders that they committed. Their victims were children who they lured to their car. In those days, it would be very easy to pick up children as people didn't realise that there were perverts and killers around. Children were allowed out late and they were allowed out on their own sometimes. It seems incredible in these times, but we are more in tune these days. They killed the children and buried their bodies up on a lonely moor. The bodies were recovered, except for one, who is still out on the moor somewhere. People would never have suspected a woman in murders and it is still unusual that Myra Hindley participated in these horrific acts. That was why they found it so easy to get away with the killings for so long. They lived a normal life, they had normal jobs and they were the perfect couple until they invited Myra's brother in law to participate in the final killing. He was appalled and he went straight to the police. This brought their killings to an end.The book is semi-fictional and I think that the author is assuming what the killers were thinking etc, but that doesn't take away from the book. I have to say that it was a great read and I felt sad for the families of the victims and I felt that I understood the minds of the killers more. They were both evil and horrible people who should have been executed, but hanging in England had gone by the time they were caught. Brady is in a mental institution for the rest of his life and Hindley died in 2002. The book has no mercy for the killers and I would think that nobody could have. I would recommend this to fans of true crime. It is an interesting and thought-provoking book.