Do serial killers want to be caught? (3 insights)

This blog post aims to answer the question, “Do serial killers want to be caught?” and study who serial killers are and how their brains work in order to determine if serial killers want to be caught. 

Do serial killers want to be caught?

No, most serial killers do not want to be caught. The following are 3 insights into why serial killers do not want to be caught –

• Serial killers are too enamoured with the act of killing.
• Serial killers are highly skilled and confident.
• Serial killers rasie the risk for excitement. 

These 3 insights into why serial killers do not want to be caught will be discussed in further detail below after taking a deeper look at who a serial killer is.

Who is a serial killer? 

A serial murderer is someone who murders three or more people, generally for abnormal psychological enjoyment, over a period of more than a month and with a large gap between them. While the majority of authorities establish a three-murder threshold, others raise it to four or lower it to two.

The most common reason for serial killing is psychological fulfilment, and many serial killings involve sexual interaction with the victim, but serial murderers’ motives can also include rage, thrill-seeking, financial gain, and attention-seeking, according to the FBI.

In a similar way, the murders may be attempted or completed. The victims may share characteristics such as demographic profile, appearance, gender, or ethnicity.

The FBI frequently focuses on a certain pattern that serial killers follow. Based on this pattern, vital clues about the killer’s identity and intentions will be revealed.

Despite the fact that a serial killer is a different categorization from a mass murderer, spree killer, or contract killer, there are conceptual parallels between the three. 

There is some disagreement over the precise requirements for each group, particularly when it comes to the distinction between spree and serial killers.

Types Of Serial Killers.

Although it is hard to fully categorise and comprehend each serial murderer, it is possible to examine their tactics and habits in order to better characterise the sort of criminal they are. 

The Federal Bureau of Investigation has classified serial murderers into three categories based on how they commit their crimes. Knowing which group a serial killer belongs to can help investigators better understand their crimes and how to bring them to justice.

The Medical Killer.

Despite the fact that this sort of killer is extremely rare, certain people have used the medical field to carry out their evil crimes. Because it is not commonplace for individuals to pass away at a hospital, this sort of murderer believes they are shrouded. 

They are typically knowledgeable people who know how to cover their crimes with care and deception. If a person looks to have died of natural causes, there will be no reason to assume foul play and seek for the perpetrator. 

Only a few physicians in history have been able to kill scores of individuals before others notice.

The Organized Killer.

This is the most difficult sort of serial murderer to track down and apprehend. They are typically clever and extremely well organised, almost to the point of being fastidious. 

Every element of the crime is meticulously planned, and the assailant takes every measure to ensure that no damning evidence is left behind. This sort of psychopath is known to observe potential victims for several days in order to select someone they perceive to be a good target. 

Once the victim has been picked, the murderer would abduct them, frequently using a ruse to win sympathy, and transport them to a new place where the murder will be carried out. When someone is killed, the offender will generally take steps to ensure that the body is not discovered until they want it to be.

A criminal like this is generally quite proud of what they regard to be their “job” and pays close attention to news headlines about their crimes. One of their motivational motivations may be to elude the cops who are attempting to solve their crime.

The Disorganized Killer.

These people almost never plot their victims’ deaths in any way. The victims they kill are almost always in the wrong place at the wrong time. 

When the chance arises, this sort of serial murderer appears to strike at random. They make no attempt to hide their crime and move around often to avoid getting apprehended. 

Killers who are disorganised frequently have low IQs and are antisocial. They don’t have many close friends or family members, and they don’t like to stay in one area for lengthy periods of time. 

These assassins are more likely to have no remembrance of their crimes or to admit that they were driven by voices in their brains or some other fictitious source.

What are these 3 insights into why serial killers do not want to be caught?

Serial killers are too enamoured with the act of killing.

Serial killers improve and become more daring as they gain experience. Serial killers are said to be secretly hoping to be apprehended. However, for the majority of people, this is just not the case. 

They are too enamoured with the act of killing. Serial killers develop confidence, pleasure, and courage as a result of their accomplishments, especially in the early phases of their murder careers.

They aren’t experts right away. Serial killers, like all new criminals, have no prior experience when they commit their first murder, even though they may have dreamed about it for a long time. 

The practicalities of committing the first-time murder and disposing of the body are difficult and need considerable planning. Novice serial killers must learn how to avoid detection while targeting, approaching, controlling, killing, and disposing of their victims.

For new serial killers, the learning curve is quite high. Serial killers like Jeffrey Dahmer and Joel Rifkin have remarked that their first killing was by far the most difficult. With each successive successful murder, serial killers gain vital expertise and confidence.

They polish all of their abilities and tactics along the process while reducing issues and avoiding major errors. To put it another way, serial killers grow more and better at their craft as time goes on.

Serial killers are highly skilled and confident.

Serial killers are extremely tough to catch due to the skills and confidence they have earned from their experience. Serial killers gain more confidence and authority as they continue to operate and elude capture. 

They may start to feel that they will never be arrested since they like killing and avoiding discovery. Serial killers may be more willing to take risks as a result of this empowerment.

Serial killers rasie the risk for excitement. 

Serial killers can heighten the excitement of their killings by raising the risk elements, such as killing during the day rather than at night, but this increased danger can also lead to their arrest by law enforcement agencies if/when they make errors or if anything unexpected happens.

Serial killers who have gone unnoticed for a long time may begin to take shortcuts and become irresponsible or even sloppy in their work. Joel Rifkin, the most prolific serial killer of all time in the state of New York, who murdered seventeen prostitutes in the early 1990s, this is a textbook example of a professional serial killer who got careless.

When a state officer stopped over Rifkin’s Mazda pickup vehicle for having no rear licence plate, he was caught off guard and rudely. When the state trooper approached the truck, he smelt the distinct odour of death and discovered the decaying remains of Rifkin’s final victim under a tarp in the back. 

“She was a prostitute,” Rifkin said coldly when asked about the body. I picked her up on Manhattan’s Allen Street. I had a sexual encounter with her. After that, things got out of hand, and I strangled her. “Do you suppose I’ll need an attorney?”

It is just false to assert that serial killers desire to be apprehended. For it to be true, most serial killers enjoy their profession much too much. However, some empowered and emboldened serial killers feel they will never be found and begin to take needless risks in order to increase their thrill, but this can lead to their capture.

In other cases, very prolific serial killers may become bored, careless, or sloppy in their work, resulting in errors that lead to their capture. Any serial killer, no matter how diligent, will make an error that will lead to his arrest if he works long enough.

Conclusion – 

This blog post aimed to answer the question, “Do serial killers want to be caught?” and reviewed who serial killers are and how their brains work to help determine if serial killers want to be caught. Please feel free to reach out to us with any questions or comments you may have.

References –

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TYPES OF SERIAL KILLERS. Crime Museum, LLC. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.crimemuseum.org/crime-library/serial-killers/types-of-serial-killers/

Webb, D. Serial Killers. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.all-about-forensic-psychology.com/serial-killers.html

Serial killer. Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. (2022, March 9). Retrieved from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serial_killer

DO SERIAL KILLERS LIKE BTK WANT TO GET CAUGHT? © 2022 AETN UK. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.crimeandinvestigation.co.uk/article/btk-and-do-serial-killers-want-to-get-caught

Statisticians Reveal the Number of Serial Killers That Were Never Caught During The 20th Century. The Physics arXiv Blog. (2021, September 24). Retrieved from https://www.discovermagazine.com/the-sciences/statisticians-reveal-the-number-of-serial-killers-that-were-never-caught