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Female Serial Killers Term Paper

Female Serial Killers Investigate criminal profiling used by the F.B.I. Of female serial killers and provide law enforcement with information on identifying them.

While it is a fact that a male serial killer would commit murders based on sex, in other words, sex related crimes, a female serial killer is a much more complicated and complex character, whose motivations in committing the crime of murder is manifold and range over a wide variety of reasons. In most cases, the female serial killer often goes unnoticed and goes on committing her crimes, undetected, over a great number of years. She is quiet, methodical, and is able to plan and execute with precision, so successful at remaining hidden that, in all the years of American history, there has only been a single female serial killer who was identified as a serial killer. In general, a female serial killer rarely, if ever, commits murder over some sexual motive, and her motives are generally subtler, and by their very nature, allow the killer to be hidden from the eyes and the arm of the law for many years. The female serial killer's victims are generally children or the elderly, since it is these people who can be overpowered easily by a single woman. (Kelleher; Kelleher, Female Serial Killers)

Within the age bracket of 14 to 55 years a female serial killer made her first killing. The archetypal female serial killer stated taking lives past the age of 25. The persons behind the killing those who were exclusively part of a team usually started with their deadly profession when they were less than the age of 25. The typical age of the serial killers was significantly different subject to her intention and procedure. Those women who were engaged as contract killers -Black Widow and Profit and Crime were in the killing for an amazingly extended period of time before they were held for killing that has been committed for certain other reason. The two types of Black Widow and Profit and Crime can be strongly linked. On the other end of the spectrum, a killer's professional long life was the categorization of sexual assertion. These executors of crime develop a propensity of killing over a small interval of time, usually took the life of their victims in a messy, and improperly thought manner. While women joined a man to be engaged in sexual homicide in the United States, the normal time-frame of execution was below two years. Outside the U.S., female associates of a homicide group were usually capable of evading arrest for an extended period of time. (Kelleher; Kelleher, Female Serial Killers)

In some cases, a female can take more females as partners, and the crimes will be asexual, or she can team up with a single man, in which case the crimes become sexual in nature. (Kelleher; Kelleher, Female Serial Killers) Female serial killers connive with their male accomplices in forty to forty-five percent of the cases, whereas in fifty-five to sixty percent cases they do it all by themselves. (Types of Serial Killers) Though killings at the hands of a female serial killer must have been going on from time immemorial, it is only from the year 1960 onwards that serious notice was taken of the phenomenon of the serial killer, when the number of murders began to rise at an alarming rate, and it was in the 1980's that the FBI began to think up a system of identifying and studying the psychology behind a serial killer. The 'Behavioral Science Unit' of the FBI came out with the Violent Criminal Apprehension Program, also known as the VICAP, which was, in effect, a program that linked the various ways and the manner in which the crimes were committed with the killer who committed them, and his feelings at the time of the crime, and was prepared from a large bank of data collected from interviews with victims of crimes and convicted serial killers. (Types of serial killers)

It is in this manner that a 'signature' is prepared and a crime can be linked to the criminal. However, the FBI cannot rely on this signature, as it may vary from crime to crime in some cases. The FBI's 'Crime Classification Manual' classifies serial crimes under the following categories: Organized Sexual Homicide, Disorganized Sexual Homicide, and the Mixed Sexual Homicide. The Organized sexual serial killer is more often than not a productive member of the society and is happily married with a family. This type of person is capable of planning...

When they set out to commit the crime, they will go well prepared with the tools needed, as well as important information about the investigative procedures that will be utilized by the police team, and this enables them to completely destroy any evidence that would point towards them. This is the type of people who are the most difficult to capture and be punished.
The disorganized serial killer can be defined as the total opposite of the organized killer, in that he or she has no set behavior patterns and has no organized plans to commit their crimes. This low intelligence level person is very spontaneous and chooses his victims at random, and is nevertheless extremely difficult to capture. The mixed serial killer combines the method of operation of both the other categories and is usually a drug abuser or somebody with a similar background. The 'visionary' killer is one who is severely psychotic and listens to his inner voice when he commits the crime, while the 'mission oriented' killer feels that it is his mission in life to rid the society of a particular kind of person and kills them, and the 'hedonistic' killer who indulge in acts that are related to the victim, like drinking his blood, etc. The 'power' or 'control' killer is the most common type, and this is the type that likes to feel a sense of power over the dead body of the victim and is sexually aroused by it. They use various means of torture to kill. (Types of serial killers)

Sexual Predator, Black Widow, Angels of Death, Revenge, Profit, and unsolved categories will be discussed.

Among the Sexual Predators who do it all by themselves are so exceptional that just one case has been reported in U.S. To their acclaim, the Kelleher's endeavor to make a link with incidents in different nations, but the issue is worth noting if the episode of Aileen Wuornos was just only the proverbial tip of the iceberg or a foreshadow of approaching events. This is just an assumption, however akin to their male associates, female sexual predators typically are aged around 30 years of age or middle-aged, and travel from one place to another, are caught in a dream to murder, and normally have killed 6 individuals at the minimum prior to being held at some point of time during their usual 3-year in the killing job. Sexual Predator Aileen Wuornos, 33 years of age and a long-time whore, murdered 7 men in Florida, with every encounter beginning as a usual solicitation for sex. (Female Serial Killers- http://faculty.ncwc.edu/toconnor/)

Subsequently, during different stages in the act of sex, she would feel the relationship as coming to a stage of being offensive, fish out a 22-caliber pistol, and open fire on her victims many times in the chest, or at times in the rear part of the head. Thereafter, she would steal all the dead man's possessions and conceal their corpses in the forests close to the I-95 corridor. Her first victim was a familiar rapist; two of the victims were retired or police officers belonging to the reserve police, one being a rodeo worker, the other being a missionary and the remaining were truck drivers or deliverymen. Police doubted her of 2 more murders, but the corpses could not be traced. She was caught with ease by the help of police drawings and the casual clues through which she was cracked down while pledging the property of her victims. She admitted having killed 6 people, but asserted that she had to commit the murders for her personal safety.

During the 1992 hearing, she was betrayed by her lesbian aficionado of six years who gave evidence against her, devastating her self-protection declaration. The adjudicators did not show any compassion for her record of childhood sexual and physical maltreatment. She was executed by electric chair for committing the 4 of the total killings. It is observed that the Black Widows generally start their criminal profession after attaining the age of 25 and thereafter they begin a decade or longer period of methodically murdering spouses, associates, family members, and in fact, anybody with whom they grow a personal bond. The usual sequence is 6-8 fatalities over a time frame of 10-15 years, however in places where law enforcement is slipshod; the number of fatalities might increase to 13. Toxic substances is the chosen arsenal, making…

Sources used in this document:
References

Ahn, Karen. "Dressed to Kill: the Modern-day Female Serial Killer" Retrieved from http://www.mysterynet.com/buchanan/dressedtokill.shtml Accessed on 27 September, 2004

"Fact, Fiction, Fantasy, Fallacy" Retrieved from http://www.crimelibrary.com/criminal_mind/profiling/profiling1/2.html?sect=20 Accessed on 27 September, 2004

"Female Serial Killers" (January 1, 2004) Retrieved from http://faculty.ncwc.edu/toconnor/428/428lect11.htm Accessed on 27 September, 2004

Kelleher, Michael D. Kelleher, C.L. "Female Serial Killers" Retrieved from http://www.angelfire.com/sc3/cjrp/femalekillers.html Accessed on 27 September, 2004
Ramsland, Katherine. (2003) "Psychological Detectives, Past and Present" Retrieved from http://lifeloom.com/Profiling.htm Accessed on 27 September, 2004
Ramsland, Katherine. "Bad Girls" Retrieved from http://www.crimelibrary.com/notorious_murders/women/women1/1.html Accessed on 27 September, 2004
"Serial Killers" Retrieved from http://www.karisable.com/crserial.htm Accessed on 27 September, 2004
"Types of Serial Killers" (March 21, 2004) Retrieved from http://www.mobmagazine.com/ManageArticle.asp?C=120&; A=7283 Accessed on 27 September, 2004
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