July 1, 2024 • 48 mins
For this episode, former Scotland Yard detective inspector, Steve Keogh explores the question, why do people kill? His answer is simpler than you may think.
If you enjoy these podcasts, you may wish to join the online community at https://steve-keogh.thinkific.com/pages/landing-page where you can meet and talk with fellow authors, take part in regular Q&As with Steve Keogh and make use of the online courses, all designed to help you achieve authenticity in your storytelling.
You can learn more about all of Steve's work at https://stevekeogh.com/ and find out about the two books Steve has published and his TV series, Secrets of a Murder Detective.
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Episode Transcript
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Steve Keogh (00:02):
Welcome to murder investigation for crime Writers, the podcast where we delve
into the dark world of murder to help bringauthenticity to your stories.
I'm your host, Steve Keogh, a former ScotlandYard detective inspector.
So grab your notebook, sharpen your pencils,and prepare to embark on a journey into a
world few get to see.
This is murder investigation for crime
(00:23):
writers.
Hello and welcome to episode nine of murder
investigation for crime writers.
My name's Steve Keogh.
I'm your host.
I'm a former police officer.
I spent twelve years investigating murder, andsince I left the police, everything I do is
(00:43):
about murder.
I can't let it go.
One of the things I've done is I've created anonline membership course for crime writers,
and if you're not a member already, I'dencourage you to join up.
For 15 pounds a month, you will get access tome all the time.
Not quite 24/7 but not far off.
You can put your questions in there about your
storylines, questions you've got aboutanything to do with murder investigation, and
(01:07):
I'll be there to answer them.
And also, we have a monthly live q and A, and
the guests you hear on the podcast will comeon and have live q and A's with them.
So it's a fantastic place to really drill downinto the authenticity of your writing.
Let's make it as good as we can.
Today's episode, I'm going to be looking at
why people kill, and I think it's a reallyimportant subject if you're going to be
(01:32):
writing about murder investigation, if you'regoing to be writing about murders, if you're
going to be writing about killers, you shouldunderstand what's going on, why they're doing
it, what is their motivation for them to kill?I had a bit of a light bulb moment a little
while ago in my first book, Motorinvestigation team, how killers are really
(01:54):
caught.
When I was putting it together, I went to a
Facebook group, a couple of Facebook groupsfor true crime fans.
I introduced myself and explained the fact Iwas writing this book about murder
investigation.
And I asked the question, what would you like
to know about how murders investigated ormurders in general?
Far and away?The number one question was, why do people
(02:17):
kill?So I thought I'd better address it.
I better look at that.
I looked at the murders I'd investigated, I
looked at murders in general, and I tried tosee if there was a pattern.
Is there any kind of pattern to murders andwhy they're carried out?
I was really struggling to be honest withtrying to see that.
(02:39):
But then I decided to come at it a differentangle.
Rather than just thinking about why peoplekill, I decided to look at, well, why do
people do anything in life in general?What motivates human beings to act?
And it was when I came at it at that anglethat I had that lightbulb moment.
(03:00):
And what I realised was that as human beings,we are motivated to act by one of only three
things, just three things that drive us tochoose to do something.
And they are how we feel, how we want to feel,and the benefit we see.
So if I explain that in terms of an everydayactivity that many of us do, and that's
(03:25):
exercise, why do people exercise?If you think about it, it will only come down
to one of those three reasons, how we feel andhow we want to feel, and the benefit would
get.
So with exercise, how we feel.
So I feel overweight, I feel lethargic, I feelinspired by watching the Olympics or Wimbledon
(03:46):
or whatever.
I feel fat, I feel ugly.
Whatever it is, there's something within methat's making me think I really want to
exercise because of how I'm feeling, or how Iwant to feel.
When I exercise, I know that I get a rush ofendorphins, I get a glow, I get a sense of
achievement, I just get that buzz from beatingmy personal best.
(04:10):
There's something.
I know that by going to the gym, by going for
a run, whatever it is at the end of it orduring it, I'm going to feel something.
And it's that feeling that I'm chasing, that'swhy I'm exercising.
Or the benefit we see.
I go to the gym, I go for a run, I play tennis
because I want to lose weight, I want thatbeach body, I want to live longer, I just want
(04:34):
to be healthier.
The benefit I seek from exercising is that.
And that will be the same for whateveractivity we choose to do.
We're motivated by how we're feeling, how wewant to feel, or the benefit we seek.
If we relate that to murder, it's exactly thesame, 100% the same.
(04:55):
So if we think about how we feel, when we lookat crimes that involve jealousy, anger,
humiliation, revenge, disrespect, they are allfeelings I'm describing feelings, I'm
describing emotions.
And all of these would have been triggered by
(05:15):
something.
If I'm feeling jealous, it's because of
somebody else's actions have made me feel likethat.
If I'm angry, something's triggered that angerinside of me.
Humiliation.
Someone's done something that I feel
humiliated by.
If I feel like I need to seek revenge, it's
because of what somebody else has done.
(05:36):
Disrespect.
I feel disrespected by what somebody else hasdone.
There's a trigger.
And I strongly believe that what we do is we
feel more comfortable placing a label onemotion.
If I was just to say I felt emotion, the firstquestion is, well, what emotion?
(05:58):
What emotion are you feeling?I think we feel more comfortable by labelling
it.
That then just becomes an exercise in
semantics.
Any situation that has created, jealousy,
anger, humiliation, all these emotions,intense feelings, really strong feelings, have
come from a triggered event.
(06:19):
Something has happened that has made me feel
this emotion, this really strong feeling.
And because of this, I've then gone on to hurt
somebody.
It might not be my intention to kill, but I
certainly intended to hurt them, at the veryleast, and they died.
May have intended to kill, but at the veryleast, I've intended to really hurt someone
(06:41):
because of those feelings.
Those feelings have driven me to it.
That feeling of anger, jealousy, it's pushedme that that emotion inside of me has pushed
me to hurt somebody as a result of thistriggered emotion.
Now, all of these acts, I classify this as apush of emotion.
So all murders are all killing that come underthese acts where somebody's been driven by
(07:07):
what they're feeling inside of them.
It's been triggered.
I call that a push of emotion.
And that's where a person kills as a result of
triggered emotion.
So that's the definition, the title of these
murders is push of emotion.
And the definition is where a person kills the
result of a triggered emotion.
And that will encompass all of those murders
(07:29):
that fall into this category, wheresomething's happened that has really made
someone inside rage or as, or has sparked anemotion inside someone.
But this is different to somebody who's in anemotional state.
So if we think about revenge, somebody mayseek revenge.
(07:51):
And they're not.
They're not acting emotionally.
They're not.
They're not in an emotional state when they're
doing it.
It may be some days, weeks, months,
potentially even years later.
I've dealt with murders that when we actually
drill down into it and we look at the reasonwhy it was triggered, it was something that
happened a long time ago.
So, for instance, I investigated a murder
(08:14):
where somebody was coming out of their placeof work.
And when they came out, they were an ex gangmember who's got their life back on track.
And they had a job working for sainsbury's.
And they came out of their place of work.
It seems, from what we can make out, justcoincidentally, that he bumped into some rival
(08:38):
gang members from a couple of years before.
They hadn't had any interaction for a couple
of years, but two years ago, he had stabbedone of these other gang members.
On seeing him, they attacked him.
They attacked him and they killed him purely
because of what had gone on before.
There was no interaction between them.
(08:58):
It was revenge.
Revenge for what happened before.
Now, they weren't carrying around two yearsworth of emotion that they were seeking him
out and trying to find him.
But that revenge, as soon as they saw him, it
sparked those emotions inside of them,remembering what he did to them, attacked and
(09:19):
they killed him for something that happenedtwo years ago.
So the trigger and the act don't have to bevery close to each other, and the emotion
doesn't have to be constant throughout.
But when you drill down into why this murder
or this killing happened and you track itback, there will be a trigger there.
(09:39):
Now, it might not always be easy to find,certainly, as investigators, it might not be
easy to find.
But for you, as crime writers, you're creating
this world, you're creating the trigger,you're creating everything that follows.
So if you're writing about a crime thatinvolves jealousy, anger, etcetera, there will
be a trigger.
(10:00):
And then we look at killing, where it results
from what I want to feel.
So I'm doing it.
I'm carrying out this act.
I'm hurting somebody, because I know by doing
that, it's going to make me feel something.
What sort of things is it going to make
somebody feel in this scenario?Power, control, sexual gratification,
(10:23):
enjoyment.
Just a buzz of doing it.
Whatever it is, the perpetrator knows that byhurting somebody else, they're going to feel
one of these emotions.
Power, control, sexual gratification,
enjoyment, whatever it is, that act is goingto allow me to feel that.
(10:46):
But again, I think we can get caught up intrying to label that.
So if we think about serial killers.
So I wrote a book about Jack the Ripper.
Now, there is no doubt whatsoever that Jackthe Ripper, when he was carrying out his
crimes, he was doing so because of how hewanted to feel.
(11:06):
He was targeting women, killing them, carryingout mutilations of their body, because it made
him feel something.
Now, was it because it made him feel like he
had power and control over these women?Was it sexually motivated?
Did he get some sort of sexual kick out of it?Did he just enjoy it?
(11:27):
Well, the honest answer is we'll never know,will we?
And also as well.
If we were in a position to be able to sit
down with his killer, and he was being honestwith us, and we said to him, why were you
doing it?Why were you killing these women?
He would try and label what the feeling wasinside of him.
(11:49):
But again, it will come down to semantics.
Now, he might use the word, I just enjoyed it,
or it made me feel good, or I enjoyed thepower over them, whatever it is.
But he's describing, you're asking him todescribe, using his.
His clumsy words, probably, to describe thatstrong emotion inside of him that was driving
(12:11):
him.
And this is what is driving most serial
killers.
It's that inner desire to feel something.
And it's so strong.
It's so strong that I know I have to go and
hurt somebody, kill somebody, mutilate theirbody, do whatever it is that sparks that
feeling inside of me.
That's what's driving me to kill, and that's
(12:33):
what most serial killers do.
I equate it to adrenaline junkies.
If you think about those people that are stoodat the top of the Grand Canyon wearing one of
those wing suits like lunatics, jumping outinto the abyss and not falling like a stone,
but floating out and flying down andsurviving.
(12:54):
They didn't just wake up one morning and say,do you know what I'm going to do?
I'm going to take myself to the top of amountain, put on a bit of cloth, and throw
myself off and see if I don't hit the floor.
It doesn't work like that, does it?
They're building themselves up.
If you follow their journey, they probably
started off doing something likeskateboarding.
They would have progressed to riding down theside of a mountain on a bike or snowboarding
(13:17):
or skiing.
And then they might have progressed to
skydiving or whatever it is these adrenalinejunkies do.
But what they're always doing, they're chasinga fear lid.
So when they first started skateboarding andthey were going along the pavement fast,
within them, there was something that wasbeing released chemically, be it adrenaline or
(13:41):
something within them, that was making themenjoy that thrill of going fast along the
pavement.
But then after a while, that wears off and
they need to push themselves.
And that's where you see that progression,
that progression through the activitiesbecoming more dangerous, more exciting that
they need to do in order to release that samefeeling.
(14:04):
Because if you do the same activity over andover again, well, by the fourth or fifth time,
it's not as exciting, is it?That started to wear off.
So that's where they're pushing themselves todo more and more.
And that's where I think a lot of serialkillers come in.
They're not starting off one morning, theywake up and think, do you know what I'm going
(14:27):
to do?If I'm going to kill someone, then I'm going
to peel their skin off and I'm going to wearit, or I'm going to kill someone and I'm going
to mutilate the body, take the body parts outand then cook them and eat them.
They don't just wake up one morning and dothat.
There would have been a build up to that.
There is no timeline that you can assign all
(14:47):
serial killers, no blueprint, but there almostcertainly would have been a buildup in them,
be it hurting animals or looking at things onthe Internet or carrying out more minor
offences.
So, for instance, if we're talking about a
sexual predator, classically, they might startoff as a flasher and they might start touching
(15:10):
women, moving on to more serious sexualassaults or rape, eventually to the point
where they're killing women in the process ofthose sexual assaults.
And it aligns closely with that adrenalinejunkie, doesn't it?
Where they're pushing themselves.
I'm getting a thrill out of stealing knickers
off a washing line.
(15:31):
But then that wears off, then I have to go
trying to look through somebody's bedroomwindow to see them naked.
And then, oh, that's wearing off now.
Maybe I need to touch someone, maybe I need to
do some more, more and more.
And it builds up to that point where they're
killing somebody in that sexually motivatedmurder.
And it's all about how I want to feel.
(15:52):
And I call this pull of emotion with the
definition being where a person kills in thepursuit of experiencing emotion.
So the pull of emotion where a person kills inthe pursuit of experiencing emotion, I'm doing
it because of how I want to feel.
Now, it's not just serial killers that would
fall under this category.
(16:13):
You've also got murders that are related to
domestic violence.
And that's because domestic violence mostly,
almost entirely stems from one partner's needto exert power and control over the other.
And unfortunately, the escalation in that canquite often lead to one partner being killed.
(16:37):
In the UK, for every four women that arekilled by a partner or ex partner, there will
be one man that's killed by a partner or expartner.
So it's not always women, but it's mostlywomen that would be victim of this and one of
the most vulnerable times in a volatile andviolent relationship is during a separation.
(17:00):
Statistically, it shows that if a woman is inthe process of leaving or trying to leave
their partner, there is an increased,statistically increased chance of greater
violence.
And that boils down to the power and control
that is slipping away.
I'm losing control.
I'm losing control of this person.
(17:21):
I have to up the game.
I have to up my game.
And sadly, often that will lead to an increase
in violence, which in turn will lead to death,will lead to that partner being killed by the
controlling partner.
Most murders that fall under this category,
it's not about the victim, it's about what'sgoing on inside of the killer.
(17:47):
So if we, if we go back to serial killers andJacklyn Ripper and Yorkshire Ripper and Harold
Shipman, all of these crimes were carried outbecause of what was going on inside of the
killer.
Nothing to do with the victim.
The victims are a vessel for the killer.
In order for them to be able to feel that
emotion inside of them.
(18:09):
The women that were targeted by Jack the
Ripper probably didn't even know who theywere.
It was nothing to do with them.
It was all to do with him and the emotion and
feeling that he was seeking by killing themand then mutilating their bodies afterwards.
So all of these crimes will fall under thesame category of that being pulled by that
(18:31):
emotion, by seeking out that feeling that Iknow I'm going to get, by hurting you, by
killing you, by doing whatever I do to yourbody afterwards.
That's what's driving the killers in thiscategory.
And then the third reason why we go to the gymis the benefit we seek.
And if we relate that to murder and killing, Icall it gain.
(18:53):
And it's where a person kills for a beneficialgain to them or others.
Gain person kills for a beneficial gain tothem or others.
Now, the kinds of murders that will fall underthis are robbery, a killer for hire, so a
hitman, crimes involving the drugs trade,where they're trying to chase the associated
(19:16):
profits that come with drugs.
Terrorism is another one.
So when terrorists carry out their act,they're doing so in order to further their
cause.
So these murders are being carried out because
if I hurt you or if I kill you, I'm doing sobecause there's a benefit in me doing it.
(19:37):
Because I get your money off of you, because Iget paid for killing you, me and my gang get a
bigger slice of the money that's slushingaround in the drugs trademark.
My terrorist organisation will achieve theirultimate goals.
So all these murders will fall under that.
So when we look at murders, when we look at
(19:58):
crimes that involve killing, it will alwaysfall under one of these three categories,
apart from one, which I'll talk about in amoment.
But if you just think about it, if you createany scenario in your mind and just think about
what is driving the killer, or if you thinkabout any crime that you're aware of and you
(20:21):
know any details of, just think about what ismotivating the killer.
And I defy you to not come back to one ofthese three things.
Apart from.
Apart from the one.
I'm going to talk around a minute, but I defyyou to not come back to one of those three
reasons that the person is carrying out thatact.
They're choosing, they're choosing to hurtsomebody.
(20:42):
They're choosing to kill somebody, and they'redoing so because of how they feel, how they
want to feel, or the benefit they seek.
No matter what it is, it will always come back
to one of those three.
And that's why I call it like a light bulb
moment.
And I think, now looking back and I look at
it, I think, wow, we really do overcomplicatewhy people kill, because it just does boil
(21:07):
back to one of those three things.
And it's as simple as why we do anything.
And if you look at it like that, then you can,then you can cut through all the, all the
noise that's associated with murder.
And I think, personally, I believe that we're
a little bit uncomfortable with it being sosimple because of the legal and moral
(21:32):
ramifications with murder defects.
It's so wrong.
It's so, so wrong.
And most of us would never, ever choose to do
it, that it shouldn't be that simple, shouldit?
There must be much more going on than theexact reasons why we would go to the gym or
why we would give to charity or why we woulddo anything in our lives.
We must be motivated by something more thanthat.
(21:54):
But we're not.
When you actually strip it back and you look
at what's going on and you forget about thesemantics around it, you forget trying to
label emotions, you end up coming back toexactly the same things all the time.
It's because of how somebody feels, it'sbecause of how somebody wants to feel, or it's
because of the benefit that we get at the endof it.
(22:16):
Is it really as simple as that?When it comes to emotions, do we, does it,
does it matter?Does it matter what emotions we're talking
about?Well, let's think of a scenario.
Imagine a scenario where somebody comes homeand they find their partner in bed with
another person.
They go upstairs, creep upstairs, and they're
(22:37):
in the bed is their partner with somebodyelse?
And this triggers an immense rage inside ofthem.
And as a result, they get a knife, they comeback to them and they stab both.
They stab their partner and they stab theirpartner's lover to death.
(22:57):
And they do so because of this intense ragethat's inside of them that was triggered by
seeing their partner in bed with somebodyelse.
So we're talking about a push of emotion,aren't we?
Where somebody's act as a result of atriggered emotion, and that emotion has been
triggered by seeing a partner in bed withsomebody else.
(23:18):
What is that emotion?Is it.
Is it anger?Is it jealousy?
Is it humiliation?How do we know?
And does it matter?So, first off, how do we know?
How do we know what is going on?How can we label that emotion?
It's so subjective, isn't it?What I consider what that emotion is will
(23:42):
differ from what you describe it as.
And it will almost certainly differ from what
the person who carried out the act woulddescribe it as.
Now, if we were to sit that person down in aninterview room and they were being honest with
us, and they didn't have a solicitor andsaying no comment, if they were being honest
with us and we said to them, so why did you doit?
Why did you kill them both?I came home, I went upstairs, I saw them and I
(24:08):
just.
I just felt a rage.
A rage that drove me to go and get a knife andI stabbed them.
And it was all in this rage.
A rage of what?
What were you feeling?And this is where it's going to come down to
semantics, isn't it?So what they're going to say I was angry,
probably a good, good answer.
(24:28):
Or I just felt completely humiliated.
I felt jealous.
All we're doing there is labelling this really
intense emotion that was triggered by seeingtheir partner in bed with somebody else.
And this is why I call it semantics, becausethey're just guessing, really, aren't they?
They're just trying to label this reallystrong emotion that they were feeling inside
(24:53):
of them.
And really we're only doing that to make
ourselves feel better.
It's almost like we need to label this
emotion.
It needs to have a name when in actual fact,
it doesn't, does it?We know what's happened.
We know what triggered this emotion.
Why do we need to label it?
And are we labelling it correctly?How can we possibly label it.
(25:15):
We're just using words, aren't we?And this is what I see in all of these crimes,
that it's an emotion that we're trying tolabel.
And what's the difference between anger andjealousy?
What is the difference between wanting to seekrevenge?
If I. If I feel a sense of revenge, I'mprobably angry.
And if it involves a lover, I'm probably a bitjealous as well, and probably feeling a bit
(25:40):
humiliated.
But which is the overriding one?
Which is the.
Which is the emotion that's driving me?
Or. Or are they different or are they all one?This is the point for me.
It doesn't matter.
We're just trying to make ourselves feel
better by trying to label this intense emotionthat's driven somebody.
So let's forget about that.
Let's try.
Let's forget about trying to label it.
(26:01):
And when we do that, all of these crimes that
fall under this all just fall under that samebracket.
We forget about trying to label the emotion,forget about giving it a name, and it will
come back to emotion and emotion being areally strong feeling, a really strong feeling
that has driven us to act, and that act hasresulted in us killing somebody.
(26:24):
Push of emotion.
And as I said earlier, involving the serial
killers, we can carry out the same exercisefor a pull of emotion.
Forget about what the label of the emotion is.
It doesn't matter.
We'll get it wrong.
We're just guessing.
Somebody's acting because of that feeling thatthey want to feel inside of them.
(26:46):
Call it what you want.
It's a really strong emotion.
I want to feel.
And my need to feel it is more important than
this person's life because I'm going to takethat person's life just to feel this.
That's how important it is to me to feel this,to quench this need I've got for this emotion.
I'm being driven by this need to feel thisemotion.
(27:08):
And that need is so strong because the emotionis so strong and the person's life just
doesn't matter at the end of the day.
So why are we trying to label that?
How can we label that?And again, if we were to sit down and ask the
person being driven by it, can they label it?Well, I'd probably give it a go, but again,
they'll just be guessing and it comes down tosemantics.
(27:31):
So the one proviso that I mentioned earlier tothis is those killings, those murders that
involve serious mental illness.
So if somebody is hearing voices in the head,
telling them, you've got to kill this person.
You've got to kill this person.
If you don't kill them, they're going to killyou.
Or if you have a case where somebody feelsthat they're killing an alien because they're
(27:56):
hallucinating, or they're in a really badpsychosis, if somebody's not in control of
their feelings, not in control of theiractions, their judgement is so badly impaired
that they then go on to kill.
I don't think you can really label that as
(28:16):
them choosing to do an act because of how theyfeel or how they want to feel, what a benefit
they get.
Now, that's not to say that somebody who isn't
suffering from some kind of mental illnessisn't going to kill because of one of these
three feelings they do.
But those scenarios where somebody is
completely and utterly out of control of theirmind wouldn't fall under one of these
(28:38):
categories.
So what about things like psychopathy or
childhood trauma?Are they reasons people kill?
Well, let's just think about that.
Look at that.
Is somebody going to kill purely becausethey're a psychopath?
Well, I think.
(28:58):
No, they're not.
I don't think that's the reason why peoplekill.
That's not in motivation.
But there's no doubt people suffering from
psychopathy may be more likely to resort toviolence, and that's because some of the
traits that are associated with psychopathy,such as lack of empathy, lack of remorse, a
(29:19):
lack of guilt, if somebody has these things,it might be that they are more likely to react
to those strong emotions.
Because I don't have any empathy, because I
don't think about the consequences of what I'mdoing may make me more likely to use violence
(29:41):
as a result of a triggered emotion.
I may be more likely to use violence in order
to feel an emotion because of that lack ofempathy.
And then if we combine that with factors suchas substance abuse, underlying mental illness
or childhood trauma, it may lead an individualdeveloping violent tendencies.
(30:04):
And if so, though violent tendencies combinedwith a lack of remorse may make that
individual more likely to kill due to how theyfeel, how they want to feel, or the benefit
they seek.
And what about childhood trauma?
That's the same with psychopathy.
If a person has suffered childhood trauma,
(30:25):
that does not mean that they will later becomeviolent.
However, there is no doubt such trauma canhave a profound effect on an individual.
And some of the associated issues withchildhood trauma could include mental health
problems such as PTSD, anxiety or depression.
(30:50):
And if untreated, they can influence
behaviour.
It could lead to disrupted attachment making
it difficult to form relationships and controlemotions.
And if we're talking about murders thatinvolve emotions, if you can't control your
emotions as well, it's no surprise that peoplecould go on to use violence.
(31:11):
And if they were a victim of violent abusethemselves, it may lead to what's known as
modelling behaviour, meaning they go on toshow the same tendencies.
And violent behaviour could be used as acoping mechanism to deal with emotional pain
that's caused by the abuse in their childhood.
(31:32):
So again, somebody is not going to go out
killing somebody because they had childhoodtrauma, because many people have suffered
childhood trauma who don't go on to becomeviolent.
But when we're talking about murders thatinvolve emotion, if you struggle to control
(31:52):
your emotions, you may be more susceptible toacting upon them.
You may be more susceptible to be acting uponthem in a violent way.
And if you're acting violent, you've got morechance of hurting somebody and killing them.
So for both of these, no, they're not thereasons people kill.
But if you google it, you're going to come upwith that.
(32:15):
People are going to say psychopathy orchildhood trauma.
That's not the reasons people kill, they're anaggravating factor.
They may make somebody more susceptible toacting on the emotions or potentially more
likely to use violence, but those underlyingfactors are not the reason they aggravate what
(32:35):
goes on in terms of that triggered emotion,seeking emotion or the gain.
The same is for substance abuse.
So if somebody is high on drugs or they're
drunk, they're not killing because they'rehigh on drugs or they're drunk, they're doing
it because of the side effects of thissubstance abuse.
And that could be side effects such asimpaired judgement or disinhibition.
(32:59):
Again, it comes back to acting on emotions.
If they were in that exact same situation,
without the drugs or the drink, they probablywouldn't act on that emotion as when they are.
But it's that triggered emotion, that's thedriver.
It's not the drink or the drugs.
It just means that they're more susceptible to
(33:20):
act on that emotion.
And this will be the same for any aggravating
factor that's introduced as to a reason whypeople kill.
It's not.
It is just that, an aggravating factor.
It might make somebody more likely to act onemotion or not think about the consequences of
their actions, etcetera, but that's not thedriver.
(33:42):
So that's my theory on why people kill.
It's for me, it's that simple.
There are only three reasons people kill, andthat's because of how they're feeling, how
they want to feel, or the benefit they seek atthe end of it.
And all of the labels we attach to it aresimply that, the labels describing that
(34:03):
emotion that's triggered that emotion theyseek or the benefit they seek.
So how does that affect you in your writing?When you're setting up your story?
When you're setting up your murder, you shouldknow beforehand which category your murder is
going to fall under, if it's to do withbecause of somebody wishing to seek revenge,
(34:29):
or they're angry or they're jealous.
The important element that you need to
introduce your story and have in mind is thattrigger.
So when you're planning your story, plan thetrigger, and that's that trigger that's going
to be central to whatever what happensafterwards.
It is the reason why the murder happened.
(34:50):
It's that trigger.
So that trigger would have to have happened.
So you write that into your story at the very
beginning.
You understand, even if you don't introduce it
at the beginning, at some point that triggerhas to be there.
And in your mind, the pull of emotion yourperpetrator is acting because of how they feel
inside.
So if you're writing about that, remember,
(35:11):
they've been on a journey.
And it might not be that that journey is part
of your story, but have it on your mind thatmy killer, they've got to where they've got
via skateboarding, snowboarding, skydiving,before they're jumping off the Grand Canyon in
a winged suit.
(35:31):
Or if it's gain understanding, this murder's
happened because of the benefit they seek.
You're probably doing this already.
You probably have this in your mind, becausewhat I'm describing isn't groundbreaking, is
it?I'm not reinventing the will.
We all know this.
But what we tend to do is overcomplicate this.
I'm just simplifying it so it's clear in yourmind when you're writing your stories, my
(35:58):
murder, or if I have multiple murders, but mymurder is going to stem from a triggered event
because of my killer's inner need to satisfytheir desire to feel something, or the benefit
they seek at the end of it.
And then what about your detective?
In the real world, detectives aren't taughtthis.
(36:19):
This is my theory.
And again, I'll always come back to this and
say, it's my theory.
I'm here to be proven wrong, but it's my
theory, but the police aren't taught it.
If I'm honest, I would love to have had this
clear in my mind when I was investigatingmurders because it would have made solving
them so much easier.
But in the world you create for your
(36:39):
detective, make it clear to them that this iswhat they're doing.
So how are they going to solve the murder?Well, depending on which one of the motivating
factors are.
But if they have their mind on all three at
the beginning, when they start theirinvestigations, they will know if they're
going to solve a murder where it's a result ofa triggered emotion.
(36:59):
If they identify the trigger, they go a longway to identifying the killer.
And if they're looking for a killer that'sacted out of the pull of emotion, look for
signs in people who are in and around thevictim that have displayed previously,
behaviour that's consistent with somebodyseeking an emotion.
(37:24):
Have they demonstrated in the past wherethey're seeking to exert power and control
over somebody?They've acted in a way that looks like it's
for their own enjoyment, for sexualgratification, look for people in and around
the victim that are demonstrating thesetraits.
And the third one, gain.
What could somebody gain from killing the
(37:47):
victim?I'm the detective, I'm looking at the victim's
life.
What could somebody gain from killing them?
Is it something financial?It generally is, isn't it?
But is there something else?Is there some benefit that somebody would get
from killing our victim?So you want to make your detectives look good,
don't you?That's, I mean, that's, that's part of your
story.
(38:07):
I mean, they may have flawed characters, but
ultimately they're good detectives and they'relooking to solve this murder by looking for
the trigger, looking for characteristics inpeople in and around the victim and looking at
what somebody could gain from killing thevictim.
They will be really focused in on theirinvestigation and will have a much better
(38:32):
chance of solving the crime.
Identifying the killer and solving the crime,
which is what your detectives there to do atthe end of the day, isn't it?
When you're setting up the trigger, there'ssomething that I just want you to bear in mind
that what you and I would consider a triggerthat would justify us hurting and killing
(38:55):
somebody is likely to be very different toothers and particularly those that do go on to
kill.
I've seen so many examples in my career of the
murders I investigated where, when youactually uncover what that trigger is, where
you identify it, you think, really you went tokill somebody for this?
(39:19):
That just doesn't make sense.
Why would you do that.
And a murder that I've spoken about before onthe podcast involved an arson attack on a
family home.
Really sad case, where someone poured petrol
through a letterbox and set fire to the house.
And sadly, two sisters in the house died.
(39:41):
One was only 15 and the other 21.
And we really, really struggled trying to
identify why the family were attacked, why thefamily were targeted.
We explored various different avenues,including the fact it might have been a
mistake, they might not have been the intendedtargets.
(40:02):
The family liaison officers who were athospital with the family reported back that
the 15 year old daughter who died hadbasically a playground type relationship with
a young boy, nothing more than that.
And she said she didn't want to see him
anymore.
We didn't really have anything stronger than
that to go on.
So decision made was that we would go and
(40:25):
arrest him.
And I went and arrested him, looked him in the
eye, and there was nothing in him that wouldsuggest to me that he would have carried out
such a horrendous attack to kill two peopleand seriously injure others.
We brought him back to the police station,interviewed him, and he denied any
(40:46):
involvement.
But in the process of arresting him, we'd
searched his house and we'd taken his laptop.
And on that we found that in his Internet
history.
The day before the arson attack, he had
googled, asking a question how to burnsomebody's house down.
It was him.
(41:06):
This 14 year old boy had set fire to a house,
killing two of the occupants because of thisplayground type relationship where a girl
didn't want to go out with him.
I mean, the two don't equate, do they, to
carry out that act because of that trigger.
But this is where I say that the triggers
(41:28):
don't necessarily have to be completelyobvious.
What the important part of the trigger isn't.
The trigger itself isn't what has happened,
it's the emotion.
So we remember that these crimes are driven by
that emotion that's been triggered.
Those really intense feelings and how intense
(41:49):
those feelings are and what somebody does as aresult of them is really subjective.
It would differ completely in person toperson.
For some, they would just.
Whatever the trigger is, in this case, a girl
in this school not wanting to go out with him,for most people, they would just brush it off.
(42:10):
They wouldn't act on it.
Some might act on it, but to a much lesser
extent than we saw.
Some might become angry, some might become a
bit nasty towards the girl because of thosefeelings that have been triggered inside.
Very, very few people are ever going to act inthis such an extreme way, but some will.
(42:36):
And it's that subjectivity of the emotion in aparticular person that means that when you're
writing about your triggers, you don't have todemonstrate one that is completely obvious,
that we all go, oh, actually, yeah, I can seethat.
I can see why somebody would act on that.
Because the reality is, I think the majority
(42:56):
of us would act at some point on a trigger ifthat emotion was strong enough.
And mostly that for us, that would be fear forourselves or fear for our loved ones.
If we or our loved ones lives were threatened,we would act in a much more extreme way than
generally we would by a triggered emotion.
(43:18):
There's a scale, though, isn't there?
Right at the bottom end, where I'd suggestthis is where somebody just didn't want to go
out with a boy, a 14 year old boy, to thatextreme end.
The emotion triggered in me is fear.
And the fear is for my safety, my life, or my
loved one's life.
(43:38):
They could end up with the same result.
So from the bottom end, we've got this boy.
On the top end, we've got fear for our loved
ones, but the result is the same.
That emotion has driven us to hurt somebody
because of it.
As I say, that trigger is so subjective that
when you're doing your writing, you don't needto be thinking about a trigger.
(43:59):
That is obvious to everybody.
The important thing is the emotion that's been
triggered by it, and it's that emotion thatwill result in somebody hurting somebody.
The trigger's there.
It's not a trigger that has led directly to
the killing.
It's the trigger that has led to the emotion
that has led to the killing.
This is where we don't need to get caught up
in how much of a trigger is.
(44:22):
It's how much of an emotion that is released
that's the important thing.
And very much like the push of emotion where I
was talking about the detective looking for atrigger and not trying to look for one that
would be obvious to everybody.
The same is true for gain.
The same scale can be used for gain out, as wewere talking about earlier on, for the push of
(44:48):
emotion, that scale is very subjective.
Again.
So if I were to ask you the question, wouldyou kill somebody for a sandwich?
I think you're probably almost certainly goingto say no. No, Steve, why not?
Would I kill somebody for a sandwich?If I were to ask you, would you kill somebody
for a sandwich?And that sandwich was for the person you love
(45:11):
most in this world.
And if I didn't eat it, they would die of
starvation.
There's a good chance you have a different
response, and it's because of the subjectivitythat's been placed on that sandwich, the
importance, the subjective importance that'sbeen placed on that sandwich.
So I've seen murders that have taken place foralmost pennies.
(45:36):
I mean, when you boil it down to, it's like afew pounds, somebody's been murdered for a few
pounds.
And if I were to ask you, would you kill for a
few pounds?You wouldn't even begin to entertain it, would
you?I dare say.
But if I say to you, would you kill for 100million pounds and you wouldn't get caught?
Now, I'm not saying you, but a lot of peoplewould start to think they might have some
(46:01):
thoughts about that.
They may even consider doing it, because it's
that scale, isn't it?That scale of where is it where it's important
to you.
Now, for most of us, a few pounds isn't that
important enough for us to even considerhurting somebody.
For, for others, it is.
There's that scale of a few pounds to 100
(46:21):
million pounds that would alter a lot ofpeople's feelings on whether or not they would
hurt somebody in order to achieve that.
So again, when your detective looking at gain,
it's not about a gain that would be obvious toeverybody, that would result in anybody going
to want to hurt somebody.
It's just enough subjectively for the killer
(46:42):
to have done it because of that gain.
So that's just something to have in mind when
you're planning your murder.
And if it is about gain, don't get caught up
in it has to be a gain that is completelyobvious to everybody.
It's just subjectively to the killer.
The benefit they would get from that actual
(47:04):
was enough for them, subjectively for them.
So those, for me, are the three reasons people
kill.
The push of emotion, the pull of emotion and
gain, which I think is a very simple solutionto a very complicated question as to why do
(47:24):
people kill?If you've got any questions about that and
you're a member of the online community, justpop them into the forum and I'll be glad to
answer them.
Or you can save your questions to the next
live Q and A, and I'll happily answer themthere.
So I've been your host, Steve Keogh, and I'llsee you on the next episode of Murder
Investigation for Crime Writers.
(47:47):
Thank you for joining me on another episode of
Murder Investigation for crime Writers.
I'm your host, Steve Keough.
And it's been a pleasure delving into theworld of murder investigation with you.
Authenticity is key for crime writers, and Ihope this podcast has provided you with
valuable insights and inspiration for yourstorytelling journey.
If you found value in what you've heard today,I encourage you to share this podcast with
(48:10):
your fellow authors.
Together, we can elevate the standards of
crime fiction and bring realism to theforefront.
If you have a moment, I'd also appreciate ifyou could leave a review on your favourite
podcast platform.
Your feedback helps others discover the
podcast podcast and join our community ofpassionate crime writers.
Thank you for listening.
Until next time, keep writing, keep
(48:30):
investigating, and keep bringing your storiesto life.
I've been Steve Keough.
Welcome to murder investigation for crime Writers, the podcast where we delve
into the dark world of murder to help bringauthenticity to your stories.
I'm your host, Steve Keogh, a former ScotlandYard detective inspector.
So grab your notebook, sharpen your pencils,and prepare to embark on a journey into a
world few get to see.
This is murder investigation for crime
(00:23):
writers.
Hello and welcome to episode nine of murder
investigation for crime writers.
My name's Steve Keogh.
I'm your host.
I'm a former police officer.
I spent twelve years investigating murder, andsince I left the police, everything I do is
(00:43):
about murder.
I can't let it go.
One of the things I've done is I've created anonline membership course for crime writers,
and if you're not a member already, I'dencourage you to join up.
For 15 pounds a month, you will get access tome all the time.
Not quite 24/7 but not far off.
You can put your questions in there about your
storylines, questions you've got aboutanything to do with murder investigation, and
(01:07):
I'll be there to answer them.
And also, we have a monthly live q and A, and
the guests you hear on the podcast will comeon and have live q and A's with them.
So it's a fantastic place to really drill downinto the authenticity of your writing.
Let's make it as good as we can.
Today's episode, I'm going to be looking at
why people kill, and I think it's a reallyimportant subject if you're going to be
(01:32):
writing about murder investigation, if you'regoing to be writing about murders, if you're
going to be writing about killers, you shouldunderstand what's going on, why they're doing
it, what is their motivation for them to kill?I had a bit of a light bulb moment a little
while ago in my first book, Motorinvestigation team, how killers are really
(01:54):
caught.
When I was putting it together, I went to a
Facebook group, a couple of Facebook groupsfor true crime fans.
I introduced myself and explained the fact Iwas writing this book about murder
investigation.
And I asked the question, what would you like
to know about how murders investigated ormurders in general?
Far and away?The number one question was, why do people
(02:17):
kill?So I thought I'd better address it.
I better look at that.
I looked at the murders I'd investigated, I
looked at murders in general, and I tried tosee if there was a pattern.
Is there any kind of pattern to murders andwhy they're carried out?
I was really struggling to be honest withtrying to see that.
(02:39):
But then I decided to come at it a differentangle.
Rather than just thinking about why peoplekill, I decided to look at, well, why do
people do anything in life in general?What motivates human beings to act?
And it was when I came at it at that anglethat I had that lightbulb moment.
(03:00):
And what I realised was that as human beings,we are motivated to act by one of only three
things, just three things that drive us tochoose to do something.
And they are how we feel, how we want to feel,and the benefit we see.
So if I explain that in terms of an everydayactivity that many of us do, and that's
(03:25):
exercise, why do people exercise?If you think about it, it will only come down
to one of those three reasons, how we feel andhow we want to feel, and the benefit would
get.
So with exercise, how we feel.
So I feel overweight, I feel lethargic, I feelinspired by watching the Olympics or Wimbledon
(03:46):
or whatever.
I feel fat, I feel ugly.
Whatever it is, there's something within methat's making me think I really want to
exercise because of how I'm feeling, or how Iwant to feel.
When I exercise, I know that I get a rush ofendorphins, I get a glow, I get a sense of
achievement, I just get that buzz from beatingmy personal best.
(04:10):
There's something.
I know that by going to the gym, by going for
a run, whatever it is at the end of it orduring it, I'm going to feel something.
And it's that feeling that I'm chasing, that'swhy I'm exercising.
Or the benefit we see.
I go to the gym, I go for a run, I play tennis
because I want to lose weight, I want thatbeach body, I want to live longer, I just want
(04:34):
to be healthier.
The benefit I seek from exercising is that.
And that will be the same for whateveractivity we choose to do.
We're motivated by how we're feeling, how wewant to feel, or the benefit we seek.
If we relate that to murder, it's exactly thesame, 100% the same.
(04:55):
So if we think about how we feel, when we lookat crimes that involve jealousy, anger,
humiliation, revenge, disrespect, they are allfeelings I'm describing feelings, I'm
describing emotions.
And all of these would have been triggered by
(05:15):
something.
If I'm feeling jealous, it's because of
somebody else's actions have made me feel likethat.
If I'm angry, something's triggered that angerinside of me.
Humiliation.
Someone's done something that I feel
humiliated by.
If I feel like I need to seek revenge, it's
because of what somebody else has done.
(05:36):
Disrespect.
I feel disrespected by what somebody else hasdone.
There's a trigger.
And I strongly believe that what we do is we
feel more comfortable placing a label onemotion.
If I was just to say I felt emotion, the firstquestion is, well, what emotion?
(05:58):
What emotion are you feeling?I think we feel more comfortable by labelling
it.
That then just becomes an exercise in
semantics.
Any situation that has created, jealousy,
anger, humiliation, all these emotions,intense feelings, really strong feelings, have
come from a triggered event.
(06:19):
Something has happened that has made me feel
this emotion, this really strong feeling.
And because of this, I've then gone on to hurt
somebody.
It might not be my intention to kill, but I
certainly intended to hurt them, at the veryleast, and they died.
May have intended to kill, but at the veryleast, I've intended to really hurt someone
(06:41):
because of those feelings.
Those feelings have driven me to it.
That feeling of anger, jealousy, it's pushedme that that emotion inside of me has pushed
me to hurt somebody as a result of thistriggered emotion.
Now, all of these acts, I classify this as apush of emotion.
So all murders are all killing that come underthese acts where somebody's been driven by
(07:07):
what they're feeling inside of them.
It's been triggered.
I call that a push of emotion.
And that's where a person kills as a result of
triggered emotion.
So that's the definition, the title of these
murders is push of emotion.
And the definition is where a person kills the
result of a triggered emotion.
And that will encompass all of those murders
(07:29):
that fall into this category, wheresomething's happened that has really made
someone inside rage or as, or has sparked anemotion inside someone.
But this is different to somebody who's in anemotional state.
So if we think about revenge, somebody mayseek revenge.
(07:51):
And they're not.
They're not acting emotionally.
They're not.
They're not in an emotional state when they're
doing it.
It may be some days, weeks, months,
potentially even years later.
I've dealt with murders that when we actually
drill down into it and we look at the reasonwhy it was triggered, it was something that
happened a long time ago.
So, for instance, I investigated a murder
(08:14):
where somebody was coming out of their placeof work.
And when they came out, they were an ex gangmember who's got their life back on track.
And they had a job working for sainsbury's.
And they came out of their place of work.
It seems, from what we can make out, justcoincidentally, that he bumped into some rival
(08:38):
gang members from a couple of years before.
They hadn't had any interaction for a couple
of years, but two years ago, he had stabbedone of these other gang members.
On seeing him, they attacked him.
They attacked him and they killed him purely
because of what had gone on before.
There was no interaction between them.
(08:58):
It was revenge.
Revenge for what happened before.
Now, they weren't carrying around two yearsworth of emotion that they were seeking him
out and trying to find him.
But that revenge, as soon as they saw him, it
sparked those emotions inside of them,remembering what he did to them, attacked and
(09:19):
they killed him for something that happenedtwo years ago.
So the trigger and the act don't have to bevery close to each other, and the emotion
doesn't have to be constant throughout.
But when you drill down into why this murder
or this killing happened and you track itback, there will be a trigger there.
(09:39):
Now, it might not always be easy to find,certainly, as investigators, it might not be
easy to find.
But for you, as crime writers, you're creating
this world, you're creating the trigger,you're creating everything that follows.
So if you're writing about a crime thatinvolves jealousy, anger, etcetera, there will
be a trigger.
(10:00):
And then we look at killing, where it results
from what I want to feel.
So I'm doing it.
I'm carrying out this act.
I'm hurting somebody, because I know by doing
that, it's going to make me feel something.
What sort of things is it going to make
somebody feel in this scenario?Power, control, sexual gratification,
(10:23):
enjoyment.
Just a buzz of doing it.
Whatever it is, the perpetrator knows that byhurting somebody else, they're going to feel
one of these emotions.
Power, control, sexual gratification,
enjoyment, whatever it is, that act is goingto allow me to feel that.
(10:46):
But again, I think we can get caught up intrying to label that.
So if we think about serial killers.
So I wrote a book about Jack the Ripper.
Now, there is no doubt whatsoever that Jackthe Ripper, when he was carrying out his
crimes, he was doing so because of how hewanted to feel.
(11:06):
He was targeting women, killing them, carryingout mutilations of their body, because it made
him feel something.
Now, was it because it made him feel like he
had power and control over these women?Was it sexually motivated?
Did he get some sort of sexual kick out of it?Did he just enjoy it?
(11:27):
Well, the honest answer is we'll never know,will we?
And also as well.
If we were in a position to be able to sit
down with his killer, and he was being honestwith us, and we said to him, why were you
doing it?Why were you killing these women?
He would try and label what the feeling wasinside of him.
(11:49):
But again, it will come down to semantics.
Now, he might use the word, I just enjoyed it,
or it made me feel good, or I enjoyed thepower over them, whatever it is.
But he's describing, you're asking him todescribe, using his.
His clumsy words, probably, to describe thatstrong emotion inside of him that was driving
(12:11):
him.
And this is what is driving most serial
killers.
It's that inner desire to feel something.
And it's so strong.
It's so strong that I know I have to go and
hurt somebody, kill somebody, mutilate theirbody, do whatever it is that sparks that
feeling inside of me.
That's what's driving me to kill, and that's
(12:33):
what most serial killers do.
I equate it to adrenaline junkies.
If you think about those people that are stoodat the top of the Grand Canyon wearing one of
those wing suits like lunatics, jumping outinto the abyss and not falling like a stone,
but floating out and flying down andsurviving.
(12:54):
They didn't just wake up one morning and say,do you know what I'm going to do?
I'm going to take myself to the top of amountain, put on a bit of cloth, and throw
myself off and see if I don't hit the floor.
It doesn't work like that, does it?
They're building themselves up.
If you follow their journey, they probably
started off doing something likeskateboarding.
They would have progressed to riding down theside of a mountain on a bike or snowboarding
(13:17):
or skiing.
And then they might have progressed to
skydiving or whatever it is these adrenalinejunkies do.
But what they're always doing, they're chasinga fear lid.
So when they first started skateboarding andthey were going along the pavement fast,
within them, there was something that wasbeing released chemically, be it adrenaline or
(13:41):
something within them, that was making themenjoy that thrill of going fast along the
pavement.
But then after a while, that wears off and
they need to push themselves.
And that's where you see that progression,
that progression through the activitiesbecoming more dangerous, more exciting that
they need to do in order to release that samefeeling.
(14:04):
Because if you do the same activity over andover again, well, by the fourth or fifth time,
it's not as exciting, is it?That started to wear off.
So that's where they're pushing themselves todo more and more.
And that's where I think a lot of serialkillers come in.
They're not starting off one morning, theywake up and think, do you know what I'm going
(14:27):
to do?If I'm going to kill someone, then I'm going
to peel their skin off and I'm going to wearit, or I'm going to kill someone and I'm going
to mutilate the body, take the body parts outand then cook them and eat them.
They don't just wake up one morning and dothat.
There would have been a build up to that.
There is no timeline that you can assign all
(14:47):
serial killers, no blueprint, but there almostcertainly would have been a buildup in them,
be it hurting animals or looking at things onthe Internet or carrying out more minor
offences.
So, for instance, if we're talking about a
sexual predator, classically, they might startoff as a flasher and they might start touching
(15:10):
women, moving on to more serious sexualassaults or rape, eventually to the point
where they're killing women in the process ofthose sexual assaults.
And it aligns closely with that adrenalinejunkie, doesn't it?
Where they're pushing themselves.
I'm getting a thrill out of stealing knickers
off a washing line.
(15:31):
But then that wears off, then I have to go
trying to look through somebody's bedroomwindow to see them naked.
And then, oh, that's wearing off now.
Maybe I need to touch someone, maybe I need to
do some more, more and more.
And it builds up to that point where they're
killing somebody in that sexually motivatedmurder.
And it's all about how I want to feel.
(15:52):
And I call this pull of emotion with the
definition being where a person kills in thepursuit of experiencing emotion.
So the pull of emotion where a person kills inthe pursuit of experiencing emotion, I'm doing
it because of how I want to feel.
Now, it's not just serial killers that would
fall under this category.
(16:13):
You've also got murders that are related to
domestic violence.
And that's because domestic violence mostly,
almost entirely stems from one partner's needto exert power and control over the other.
And unfortunately, the escalation in that canquite often lead to one partner being killed.
(16:37):
In the UK, for every four women that arekilled by a partner or ex partner, there will
be one man that's killed by a partner or expartner.
So it's not always women, but it's mostlywomen that would be victim of this and one of
the most vulnerable times in a volatile andviolent relationship is during a separation.
(17:00):
Statistically, it shows that if a woman is inthe process of leaving or trying to leave
their partner, there is an increased,statistically increased chance of greater
violence.
And that boils down to the power and control
that is slipping away.
I'm losing control.
I'm losing control of this person.
(17:21):
I have to up the game.
I have to up my game.
And sadly, often that will lead to an increase
in violence, which in turn will lead to death,will lead to that partner being killed by the
controlling partner.
Most murders that fall under this category,
it's not about the victim, it's about what'sgoing on inside of the killer.
(17:47):
So if we, if we go back to serial killers andJacklyn Ripper and Yorkshire Ripper and Harold
Shipman, all of these crimes were carried outbecause of what was going on inside of the
killer.
Nothing to do with the victim.
The victims are a vessel for the killer.
In order for them to be able to feel that
emotion inside of them.
(18:09):
The women that were targeted by Jack the
Ripper probably didn't even know who theywere.
It was nothing to do with them.
It was all to do with him and the emotion and
feeling that he was seeking by killing themand then mutilating their bodies afterwards.
So all of these crimes will fall under thesame category of that being pulled by that
(18:31):
emotion, by seeking out that feeling that Iknow I'm going to get, by hurting you, by
killing you, by doing whatever I do to yourbody afterwards.
That's what's driving the killers in thiscategory.
And then the third reason why we go to the gymis the benefit we seek.
And if we relate that to murder and killing, Icall it gain.
(18:53):
And it's where a person kills for a beneficialgain to them or others.
Gain person kills for a beneficial gain tothem or others.
Now, the kinds of murders that will fall underthis are robbery, a killer for hire, so a
hitman, crimes involving the drugs trade,where they're trying to chase the associated
(19:16):
profits that come with drugs.
Terrorism is another one.
So when terrorists carry out their act,they're doing so in order to further their
cause.
So these murders are being carried out because
if I hurt you or if I kill you, I'm doing sobecause there's a benefit in me doing it.
(19:37):
Because I get your money off of you, because Iget paid for killing you, me and my gang get a
bigger slice of the money that's slushingaround in the drugs trademark.
My terrorist organisation will achieve theirultimate goals.
So all these murders will fall under that.
So when we look at murders, when we look at
(19:58):
crimes that involve killing, it will alwaysfall under one of these three categories,
apart from one, which I'll talk about in amoment.
But if you just think about it, if you createany scenario in your mind and just think about
what is driving the killer, or if you thinkabout any crime that you're aware of and you
(20:21):
know any details of, just think about what ismotivating the killer.
And I defy you to not come back to one ofthese three things.
Apart from.
Apart from the one.
I'm going to talk around a minute, but I defyyou to not come back to one of those three
reasons that the person is carrying out thatact.
They're choosing, they're choosing to hurtsomebody.
(20:42):
They're choosing to kill somebody, and they'redoing so because of how they feel, how they
want to feel, or the benefit they seek.
No matter what it is, it will always come back
to one of those three.
And that's why I call it like a light bulb
moment.
And I think, now looking back and I look at
it, I think, wow, we really do overcomplicatewhy people kill, because it just does boil
(21:07):
back to one of those three things.
And it's as simple as why we do anything.
And if you look at it like that, then you can,then you can cut through all the, all the
noise that's associated with murder.
And I think, personally, I believe that we're
a little bit uncomfortable with it being sosimple because of the legal and moral
(21:32):
ramifications with murder defects.
It's so wrong.
It's so, so wrong.
And most of us would never, ever choose to do
it, that it shouldn't be that simple, shouldit?
There must be much more going on than theexact reasons why we would go to the gym or
why we would give to charity or why we woulddo anything in our lives.
We must be motivated by something more thanthat.
(21:54):
But we're not.
When you actually strip it back and you look
at what's going on and you forget about thesemantics around it, you forget trying to
label emotions, you end up coming back toexactly the same things all the time.
It's because of how somebody feels, it'sbecause of how somebody wants to feel, or it's
because of the benefit that we get at the endof it.
(22:16):
Is it really as simple as that?When it comes to emotions, do we, does it,
does it matter?Does it matter what emotions we're talking
about?Well, let's think of a scenario.
Imagine a scenario where somebody comes homeand they find their partner in bed with
another person.
They go upstairs, creep upstairs, and they're
(22:37):
in the bed is their partner with somebodyelse?
And this triggers an immense rage inside ofthem.
And as a result, they get a knife, they comeback to them and they stab both.
They stab their partner and they stab theirpartner's lover to death.
(22:57):
And they do so because of this intense ragethat's inside of them that was triggered by
seeing their partner in bed with somebodyelse.
So we're talking about a push of emotion,aren't we?
Where somebody's act as a result of atriggered emotion, and that emotion has been
triggered by seeing a partner in bed withsomebody else.
(23:18):
What is that emotion?Is it.
Is it anger?Is it jealousy?
Is it humiliation?How do we know?
And does it matter?So, first off, how do we know?
How do we know what is going on?How can we label that emotion?
It's so subjective, isn't it?What I consider what that emotion is will
(23:42):
differ from what you describe it as.
And it will almost certainly differ from what
the person who carried out the act woulddescribe it as.
Now, if we were to sit that person down in aninterview room and they were being honest with
us, and they didn't have a solicitor andsaying no comment, if they were being honest
with us and we said to them, so why did you doit?
Why did you kill them both?I came home, I went upstairs, I saw them and I
(24:08):
just.
I just felt a rage.
A rage that drove me to go and get a knife andI stabbed them.
And it was all in this rage.
A rage of what?
What were you feeling?And this is where it's going to come down to
semantics, isn't it?So what they're going to say I was angry,
probably a good, good answer.
(24:28):
Or I just felt completely humiliated.
I felt jealous.
All we're doing there is labelling this really
intense emotion that was triggered by seeingtheir partner in bed with somebody else.
And this is why I call it semantics, becausethey're just guessing, really, aren't they?
They're just trying to label this reallystrong emotion that they were feeling inside
(24:53):
of them.
And really we're only doing that to make
ourselves feel better.
It's almost like we need to label this
emotion.
It needs to have a name when in actual fact,
it doesn't, does it?We know what's happened.
We know what triggered this emotion.
Why do we need to label it?
And are we labelling it correctly?How can we possibly label it.
(25:15):
We're just using words, aren't we?And this is what I see in all of these crimes,
that it's an emotion that we're trying tolabel.
And what's the difference between anger andjealousy?
What is the difference between wanting to seekrevenge?
If I. If I feel a sense of revenge, I'mprobably angry.
And if it involves a lover, I'm probably a bitjealous as well, and probably feeling a bit
(25:40):
humiliated.
But which is the overriding one?
Which is the.
Which is the emotion that's driving me?
Or. Or are they different or are they all one?This is the point for me.
It doesn't matter.
We're just trying to make ourselves feel
better by trying to label this intense emotionthat's driven somebody.
So let's forget about that.
Let's try.
Let's forget about trying to label it.
(26:01):
And when we do that, all of these crimes that
fall under this all just fall under that samebracket.
We forget about trying to label the emotion,forget about giving it a name, and it will
come back to emotion and emotion being areally strong feeling, a really strong feeling
that has driven us to act, and that act hasresulted in us killing somebody.
(26:24):
Push of emotion.
And as I said earlier, involving the serial
killers, we can carry out the same exercisefor a pull of emotion.
Forget about what the label of the emotion is.
It doesn't matter.
We'll get it wrong.
We're just guessing.
Somebody's acting because of that feeling thatthey want to feel inside of them.
(26:46):
Call it what you want.
It's a really strong emotion.
I want to feel.
And my need to feel it is more important than
this person's life because I'm going to takethat person's life just to feel this.
That's how important it is to me to feel this,to quench this need I've got for this emotion.
I'm being driven by this need to feel thisemotion.
(27:08):
And that need is so strong because the emotionis so strong and the person's life just
doesn't matter at the end of the day.
So why are we trying to label that?
How can we label that?And again, if we were to sit down and ask the
person being driven by it, can they label it?Well, I'd probably give it a go, but again,
they'll just be guessing and it comes down tosemantics.
(27:31):
So the one proviso that I mentioned earlier tothis is those killings, those murders that
involve serious mental illness.
So if somebody is hearing voices in the head,
telling them, you've got to kill this person.
You've got to kill this person.
If you don't kill them, they're going to killyou.
Or if you have a case where somebody feelsthat they're killing an alien because they're
(27:56):
hallucinating, or they're in a really badpsychosis, if somebody's not in control of
their feelings, not in control of theiractions, their judgement is so badly impaired
that they then go on to kill.
I don't think you can really label that as
(28:16):
them choosing to do an act because of how theyfeel or how they want to feel, what a benefit
they get.
Now, that's not to say that somebody who isn't
suffering from some kind of mental illnessisn't going to kill because of one of these
three feelings they do.
But those scenarios where somebody is
completely and utterly out of control of theirmind wouldn't fall under one of these
(28:38):
categories.
So what about things like psychopathy or
childhood trauma?Are they reasons people kill?
Well, let's just think about that.
Look at that.
Is somebody going to kill purely becausethey're a psychopath?
Well, I think.
(28:58):
No, they're not.
I don't think that's the reason why peoplekill.
That's not in motivation.
But there's no doubt people suffering from
psychopathy may be more likely to resort toviolence, and that's because some of the
traits that are associated with psychopathy,such as lack of empathy, lack of remorse, a
(29:19):
lack of guilt, if somebody has these things,it might be that they are more likely to react
to those strong emotions.
Because I don't have any empathy, because I
don't think about the consequences of what I'mdoing may make me more likely to use violence
(29:41):
as a result of a triggered emotion.
I may be more likely to use violence in order
to feel an emotion because of that lack ofempathy.
And then if we combine that with factors suchas substance abuse, underlying mental illness
or childhood trauma, it may lead an individualdeveloping violent tendencies.
(30:04):
And if so, though violent tendencies combinedwith a lack of remorse may make that
individual more likely to kill due to how theyfeel, how they want to feel, or the benefit
they seek.
And what about childhood trauma?
That's the same with psychopathy.
If a person has suffered childhood trauma,
(30:25):
that does not mean that they will later becomeviolent.
However, there is no doubt such trauma canhave a profound effect on an individual.
And some of the associated issues withchildhood trauma could include mental health
problems such as PTSD, anxiety or depression.
(30:50):
And if untreated, they can influence
behaviour.
It could lead to disrupted attachment making
it difficult to form relationships and controlemotions.
And if we're talking about murders thatinvolve emotions, if you can't control your
emotions as well, it's no surprise that peoplecould go on to use violence.
(31:11):
And if they were a victim of violent abusethemselves, it may lead to what's known as
modelling behaviour, meaning they go on toshow the same tendencies.
And violent behaviour could be used as acoping mechanism to deal with emotional pain
that's caused by the abuse in their childhood.
(31:32):
So again, somebody is not going to go out
killing somebody because they had childhoodtrauma, because many people have suffered
childhood trauma who don't go on to becomeviolent.
But when we're talking about murders thatinvolve emotion, if you struggle to control
(31:52):
your emotions, you may be more susceptible toacting upon them.
You may be more susceptible to be acting uponthem in a violent way.
And if you're acting violent, you've got morechance of hurting somebody and killing them.
So for both of these, no, they're not thereasons people kill.
But if you google it, you're going to come upwith that.
(32:15):
People are going to say psychopathy orchildhood trauma.
That's not the reasons people kill, they're anaggravating factor.
They may make somebody more susceptible toacting on the emotions or potentially more
likely to use violence, but those underlyingfactors are not the reason they aggravate what
(32:35):
goes on in terms of that triggered emotion,seeking emotion or the gain.
The same is for substance abuse.
So if somebody is high on drugs or they're
drunk, they're not killing because they'rehigh on drugs or they're drunk, they're doing
it because of the side effects of thissubstance abuse.
And that could be side effects such asimpaired judgement or disinhibition.
(32:59):
Again, it comes back to acting on emotions.
If they were in that exact same situation,
without the drugs or the drink, they probablywouldn't act on that emotion as when they are.
But it's that triggered emotion, that's thedriver.
It's not the drink or the drugs.
It just means that they're more susceptible to
(33:20):
act on that emotion.
And this will be the same for any aggravating
factor that's introduced as to a reason whypeople kill.
It's not.
It is just that, an aggravating factor.
It might make somebody more likely to act onemotion or not think about the consequences of
their actions, etcetera, but that's not thedriver.
(33:42):
So that's my theory on why people kill.
It's for me, it's that simple.
There are only three reasons people kill, andthat's because of how they're feeling, how
they want to feel, or the benefit they seek atthe end of it.
And all of the labels we attach to it aresimply that, the labels describing that
(34:03):
emotion that's triggered that emotion theyseek or the benefit they seek.
So how does that affect you in your writing?When you're setting up your story?
When you're setting up your murder, you shouldknow beforehand which category your murder is
going to fall under, if it's to do withbecause of somebody wishing to seek revenge,
(34:29):
or they're angry or they're jealous.
The important element that you need to
introduce your story and have in mind is thattrigger.
So when you're planning your story, plan thetrigger, and that's that trigger that's going
to be central to whatever what happensafterwards.
It is the reason why the murder happened.
(34:50):
It's that trigger.
So that trigger would have to have happened.
So you write that into your story at the very
beginning.
You understand, even if you don't introduce it
at the beginning, at some point that triggerhas to be there.
And in your mind, the pull of emotion yourperpetrator is acting because of how they feel
inside.
So if you're writing about that, remember,
(35:11):
they've been on a journey.
And it might not be that that journey is part
of your story, but have it on your mind thatmy killer, they've got to where they've got
via skateboarding, snowboarding, skydiving,before they're jumping off the Grand Canyon in
a winged suit.
(35:31):
Or if it's gain understanding, this murder's
happened because of the benefit they seek.
You're probably doing this already.
You probably have this in your mind, becausewhat I'm describing isn't groundbreaking, is
it?I'm not reinventing the will.
We all know this.
But what we tend to do is overcomplicate this.
I'm just simplifying it so it's clear in yourmind when you're writing your stories, my
(35:58):
murder, or if I have multiple murders, but mymurder is going to stem from a triggered event
because of my killer's inner need to satisfytheir desire to feel something, or the benefit
they seek at the end of it.
And then what about your detective?
In the real world, detectives aren't taughtthis.
(36:19):
This is my theory.
And again, I'll always come back to this and
say, it's my theory.
I'm here to be proven wrong, but it's my
theory, but the police aren't taught it.
If I'm honest, I would love to have had this
clear in my mind when I was investigatingmurders because it would have made solving
them so much easier.
But in the world you create for your
(36:39):
detective, make it clear to them that this iswhat they're doing.
So how are they going to solve the murder?Well, depending on which one of the motivating
factors are.
But if they have their mind on all three at
the beginning, when they start theirinvestigations, they will know if they're
going to solve a murder where it's a result ofa triggered emotion.
(36:59):
If they identify the trigger, they go a longway to identifying the killer.
And if they're looking for a killer that'sacted out of the pull of emotion, look for
signs in people who are in and around thevictim that have displayed previously,
behaviour that's consistent with somebodyseeking an emotion.
(37:24):
Have they demonstrated in the past wherethey're seeking to exert power and control
over somebody?They've acted in a way that looks like it's
for their own enjoyment, for sexualgratification, look for people in and around
the victim that are demonstrating thesetraits.
And the third one, gain.
What could somebody gain from killing the
(37:47):
victim?I'm the detective, I'm looking at the victim's
life.
What could somebody gain from killing them?
Is it something financial?It generally is, isn't it?
But is there something else?Is there some benefit that somebody would get
from killing our victim?So you want to make your detectives look good,
don't you?That's, I mean, that's, that's part of your
story.
(38:07):
I mean, they may have flawed characters, but
ultimately they're good detectives and they'relooking to solve this murder by looking for
the trigger, looking for characteristics inpeople in and around the victim and looking at
what somebody could gain from killing thevictim.
They will be really focused in on theirinvestigation and will have a much better
(38:32):
chance of solving the crime.
Identifying the killer and solving the crime,
which is what your detectives there to do atthe end of the day, isn't it?
When you're setting up the trigger, there'ssomething that I just want you to bear in mind
that what you and I would consider a triggerthat would justify us hurting and killing
(38:55):
somebody is likely to be very different toothers and particularly those that do go on to
kill.
I've seen so many examples in my career of the
murders I investigated where, when youactually uncover what that trigger is, where
you identify it, you think, really you went tokill somebody for this?
(39:19):
That just doesn't make sense.
Why would you do that.
And a murder that I've spoken about before onthe podcast involved an arson attack on a
family home.
Really sad case, where someone poured petrol
through a letterbox and set fire to the house.
And sadly, two sisters in the house died.
(39:41):
One was only 15 and the other 21.
And we really, really struggled trying to
identify why the family were attacked, why thefamily were targeted.
We explored various different avenues,including the fact it might have been a
mistake, they might not have been the intendedtargets.
(40:02):
The family liaison officers who were athospital with the family reported back that
the 15 year old daughter who died hadbasically a playground type relationship with
a young boy, nothing more than that.
And she said she didn't want to see him
anymore.
We didn't really have anything stronger than
that to go on.
So decision made was that we would go and
(40:25):
arrest him.
And I went and arrested him, looked him in the
eye, and there was nothing in him that wouldsuggest to me that he would have carried out
such a horrendous attack to kill two peopleand seriously injure others.
We brought him back to the police station,interviewed him, and he denied any
(40:46):
involvement.
But in the process of arresting him, we'd
searched his house and we'd taken his laptop.
And on that we found that in his Internet
history.
The day before the arson attack, he had
googled, asking a question how to burnsomebody's house down.
It was him.
(41:06):
This 14 year old boy had set fire to a house,
killing two of the occupants because of thisplayground type relationship where a girl
didn't want to go out with him.
I mean, the two don't equate, do they, to
carry out that act because of that trigger.
But this is where I say that the triggers
(41:28):
don't necessarily have to be completelyobvious.
What the important part of the trigger isn't.
The trigger itself isn't what has happened,
it's the emotion.
So we remember that these crimes are driven by
that emotion that's been triggered.
Those really intense feelings and how intense
(41:49):
those feelings are and what somebody does as aresult of them is really subjective.
It would differ completely in person toperson.
For some, they would just.
Whatever the trigger is, in this case, a girl
in this school not wanting to go out with him,for most people, they would just brush it off.
(42:10):
They wouldn't act on it.
Some might act on it, but to a much lesser
extent than we saw.
Some might become angry, some might become a
bit nasty towards the girl because of thosefeelings that have been triggered inside.
Very, very few people are ever going to act inthis such an extreme way, but some will.
(42:36):
And it's that subjectivity of the emotion in aparticular person that means that when you're
writing about your triggers, you don't have todemonstrate one that is completely obvious,
that we all go, oh, actually, yeah, I can seethat.
I can see why somebody would act on that.
Because the reality is, I think the majority
(42:56):
of us would act at some point on a trigger ifthat emotion was strong enough.
And mostly that for us, that would be fear forourselves or fear for our loved ones.
If we or our loved ones lives were threatened,we would act in a much more extreme way than
generally we would by a triggered emotion.
(43:18):
There's a scale, though, isn't there?
Right at the bottom end, where I'd suggestthis is where somebody just didn't want to go
out with a boy, a 14 year old boy, to thatextreme end.
The emotion triggered in me is fear.
And the fear is for my safety, my life, or my
loved one's life.
(43:38):
They could end up with the same result.
So from the bottom end, we've got this boy.
On the top end, we've got fear for our loved
ones, but the result is the same.
That emotion has driven us to hurt somebody
because of it.
As I say, that trigger is so subjective that
when you're doing your writing, you don't needto be thinking about a trigger.
(43:59):
That is obvious to everybody.
The important thing is the emotion that's been
triggered by it, and it's that emotion thatwill result in somebody hurting somebody.
The trigger's there.
It's not a trigger that has led directly to
the killing.
It's the trigger that has led to the emotion
that has led to the killing.
This is where we don't need to get caught up
in how much of a trigger is.
(44:22):
It's how much of an emotion that is released
that's the important thing.
And very much like the push of emotion where I
was talking about the detective looking for atrigger and not trying to look for one that
would be obvious to everybody.
The same is true for gain.
The same scale can be used for gain out, as wewere talking about earlier on, for the push of
(44:48):
emotion, that scale is very subjective.
Again.
So if I were to ask you the question, wouldyou kill somebody for a sandwich?
I think you're probably almost certainly goingto say no. No, Steve, why not?
Would I kill somebody for a sandwich?If I were to ask you, would you kill somebody
for a sandwich?And that sandwich was for the person you love
(45:11):
most in this world.
And if I didn't eat it, they would die of
starvation.
There's a good chance you have a different
response, and it's because of the subjectivitythat's been placed on that sandwich, the
importance, the subjective importance that'sbeen placed on that sandwich.
So I've seen murders that have taken place foralmost pennies.
(45:36):
I mean, when you boil it down to, it's like afew pounds, somebody's been murdered for a few
pounds.
And if I were to ask you, would you kill for a
few pounds?You wouldn't even begin to entertain it, would
you?I dare say.
But if I say to you, would you kill for 100million pounds and you wouldn't get caught?
Now, I'm not saying you, but a lot of peoplewould start to think they might have some
(46:01):
thoughts about that.
They may even consider doing it, because it's
that scale, isn't it?That scale of where is it where it's important
to you.
Now, for most of us, a few pounds isn't that
important enough for us to even considerhurting somebody.
For, for others, it is.
There's that scale of a few pounds to 100
(46:21):
million pounds that would alter a lot ofpeople's feelings on whether or not they would
hurt somebody in order to achieve that.
So again, when your detective looking at gain,
it's not about a gain that would be obvious toeverybody, that would result in anybody going
to want to hurt somebody.
It's just enough subjectively for the killer
(46:42):
to have done it because of that gain.
So that's just something to have in mind when
you're planning your murder.
And if it is about gain, don't get caught up
in it has to be a gain that is completelyobvious to everybody.
It's just subjectively to the killer.
The benefit they would get from that actual
(47:04):
was enough for them, subjectively for them.
So those, for me, are the three reasons people
kill.
The push of emotion, the pull of emotion and
gain, which I think is a very simple solutionto a very complicated question as to why do
(47:24):
people kill?If you've got any questions about that and
you're a member of the online community, justpop them into the forum and I'll be glad to
answer them.
Or you can save your questions to the next
live Q and A, and I'll happily answer themthere.
So I've been your host, Steve Keogh, and I'llsee you on the next episode of Murder
Investigation for Crime Writers.
(47:47):
Thank you for joining me on another episode of
Murder Investigation for crime Writers.
I'm your host, Steve Keough.
And it's been a pleasure delving into theworld of murder investigation with you.
Authenticity is key for crime writers, and Ihope this podcast has provided you with
valuable insights and inspiration for yourstorytelling journey.
If you found value in what you've heard today,I encourage you to share this podcast with
(48:10):
your fellow authors.
Together, we can elevate the standards of
crime fiction and bring realism to theforefront.
If you have a moment, I'd also appreciate ifyou could leave a review on your favourite
podcast platform.
Your feedback helps others discover the
podcast podcast and join our community ofpassionate crime writers.
Thank you for listening.
Until next time, keep writing, keep
(48:30):
investigating, and keep bringing your storiesto life.
I've been Steve Keough.
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