The Serial Killer Podcast

A few of the abandoned men, their wills broken, staggered blindly after Boone and Burton once they finally realized the terrible deception. But in tragically little time, they were completely snow-blind and hopelessly lost, staggering aimlessly away from the faint path and each other as the relentless, creeping tendrils of hypothermia finally took hold of their core. Some paltry articles of their clothing w...

When the sun finally rose, he methodically availed himself of the dead's belongings, precisely as he always did, but for the first time, he could not bring himself to look directly at the body. Usually, he felt absolutely no sting of remorse or burning shame—he had successfully convinced himself that he was entirely immune to such weak human frailties—but now, a strange, heavy guilt sat like a cold stone deep in his ...

She fought him off when she could, her arms straining against his weight, her breath hitching as she prayed for him to collapse into a drunken stupor. On good nights, he’d pass out mid-act, his body slumping onto her like a felled oak, his breath hot and sour against her neck. She would shove him aside, her muscles trembling, and crawl to the edge of the bed, curling into herself to escape the memory of his touch. On bad nights, sh...

He’d deliberately pick fights with men leaving the tavern, a predator stalking his prey. Experience had honed his dangerous edge; he was now a skilled brawler, a calculated bully, and stronger than any man had a right to be. The young women of the town, caught in the romantic fantasy of taming a wild man, were drawn to him. But at home, the attention he received was far less flattering. His father refused to speak to him, fearing h...

The room fell silent, the other patrons—hard men with scarred hands and wary eyes—sensing the storm about to break.Dutch rose slowly, his shadow swallowing the light as he turned to face Boone. In his hand was a Bowie knife, its blade glinting like a sliver of moonlight. Boone, his revolver waving wildly, grinned—a crooked, feral slash that promised blood. The sight of Dutch, a mountain of a man, would have stopped most in their tr...

Within three hours of beginning the search, investigators found a three-ring notebook. Investigator Sachtleben later said of his findings, and I quote: “I also observed notebooks that contain what I recognize to be diagrams and notes that are consistent with the manufacture of destructive devices such as pipe bombs. Ten three-ring binders. These binders contain page after page of meticulous writings and sketches which I recognize t...

The lead agent called out to Ted, asking for help with a property line. Ted, wary, peered from the doorway, his frame gaunt from years of isolation. The agent stepped closer,

explaining the map issue. As Ted leaned forward, the agent grabbed his right arm, yanking him from the cabin. Another agent swiftly cuffed his left, snapping on handcuffs. Ted struggled briefly, his boots scuffing the dirt, but he was no match for the trained m...

The blast site was a slaughterhouse: blood on the walls, metal quills in the plaster, the air thick with the smell of explosives. Murray’s remains were barely recognizable, pieces collected in bags for analysis. The Unabomber’s early bombs left room for doubt—maim or kill? Sacramento settled it. Ted, the Unabomber, was out for blood,

targeting anyone pushing the boundaries of tech and biology. The feds combed the scene, bagging frag...

Smoke billowed through the house as Susan ran outside, shouting for help. Their elder daughter, alerted by her mother’s cries, also sought assistance. The blast came from a pipe bomb crafted by the Unabomber.Essex County Sheriff Armando Fontoura summoned the ATF, who sifted through the kitchen debris and identified parts consistent with the Unabomber’s previous devices. As always, the bomber used everyday items like nails, crafting...

Ted grappled with his own contradictions: “As you know, I have no respect for law or morality. Why have I never committed any crime? (of course, I’m not talking about something like shooting a grouse out of season now and then. I mean felony type stuff—burglary, arson, murder, etc.) Lack of motive? Hardly. As you know, I have a good deal of anger in me and there are lots of people I’d like to hurt. Risk? In some cases, yes. But the...

The Unabomber’s evolution was chilling. His early bombs, crude concoctions of smokeless powder and match heads, were child’s play compared to this. The device that maimed Hauser was a three-quarter-inch-diameter pipe, sealed with metal bar stock plugs and secured with pins. Nail fragments, lead, and double-pointed tacks served as shrapnel, designed to maximize suffering. Six D-cell batteries, their casings stripped, powered a metal...

The homemade green cylindrical box perched atop a can on the floor was studded with dials and gauges, or so the instructor said later. Angelakos saw wires—loop switches attached to the sides running up each upright shaft of a wooden handle. This in turn was attached to the wooden box that rested on top of the gallon can. Angelakos reached out for it tentatively, and this slight movement was enough to stretch the wires. The bomber h...

ATF experts analyzed the scattered remains: a nine-inch-long, one-inch-wide pipe encased in a wooden box, secured with nails, rubber bands, screws, epoxy, three-quarter-inch black plastic tape, and half-inch filament tape. The explosive was two types of smokeless powder packed in the pipe. The makeshift trigger resembled a child’s plaything: a nail tensed by several rubber bands. Opening the handcrafted wooden box released the nail...

Griffin would put the blame for our environmental problems on excessive individual freedoms. Actually, most of the problems are direct or indirect results of the activities of large organizations; namely corporations and governments. It is these organizations, after all, that control the structure and development of society. Perhaps the most unfortunate thing that has ever happened to individual Liberty was its being used as an exc...

They are then escorted into the gas chamber, often under heavy security, and secured to a chair with restraints around their wrists, ankles, waist, and chest to prevent movement. A stethoscope or other monitoring device is typically attached to their chest, extending outside the chamber so a physician can listen for the cessation of heartbeat or breathing, which signals death. Once the convict is secured, the chamber is sealed shut...

Tsutomu Miyazaki liked to taunt the parents of his victims with chillingly silent phone calls or postcards containing gloating messages. He left a box on the doorstep of the parents of his first victim, four-year-old Mari Konno. Inside were fragments of charred bone, ten baby teeth and photographs of the clothes their daughter had been wearing the day she disappeared. Typed on a single piece of paper were the chilling words ‘Mari. ...

Mullin didn’t fit the killer mold. This clean-cut ex-flower-child looked more like he’d stumble over a peace rally than a murder scene. Cops might’ve sneered at hippies, but they didn’t peg them—or guys like Mullin—for bloody rampages. At first, his calm vibe seemed like he’d play ball. They figured prying answers out of him about that day’s madness would be a breeze. That illusion shattered fast. Mullin bolted up from his chair, b...

The blade sliced her open, her flesh separating with a cold precision, skin and fat sliding apart as if they’d been primed to rupture all along. Blood saturated everything—her dress, the grass, his hands, the knife—a predictable mess, though far worse was still to come. He set the knife aside and forced his fingers into the incision, pushing past the spasming muscle that gripped his wrist with the tautness of a worn elastic sheet. ...

The police approached the Mullin family home, their knocks echoing like the tolling of a death knell through the silent house, surrounded by uncollected mail, a silent testament to absence. Imagining the worst, they prepared to breach this fortress of solitude, fearing Herb had taken his own life in some final, desperate act. As they made arrangements for a warrant, a neighbor emerged, a ghoul from normalcy, to explain that no amou...