True Crime Serial Murders

To all appearances, Dennis Rader was a model citizen in the small town of Park City, Kansas, where he had lived with his family almost his entire life. He was a town compliance officer, a former Boy Scout leader, the president of his church congregation, and a seemingly ordinary father and husband. But Rader's average life belied the existence of his dark, sadistic other self: he was the BTK serial killer.

From the start, Robert Hansen seemed destined for an unhappy life. Overworked by his strict parents and relentlessly bullied by his classmates, he spent his teenage years alone. His love of archery and hunting were the only comforts he had until he left his small town for Alaska, the last great frontier. Witness the depraved second life of a respected family man - the life of the worst serial killer in Alaska's history.

To his neighbors, Wayne Nance, a furniture mover from Missoula, Montana, appeared to be an affable, considerate, and trustworthy guy. No one knew that Nance was the "Missoula Mauler," a psychopath responsible for a series of sadistic sex slayings that rocked the idyllic town between 1974 and 1986. Nance's only requirement for murder was accessibility - a preacher's wife, a teenage runaway, a female acquaintance, a married couple. Putting on a friendly façade, he could easily gain his victims' trust. Then, one September night, thirty-year-old Nance pushed his luck.

As a young man, Randall Woodfield had it all; he was a star athlete with good looks and an award-winning student. Working in the swinging West Coast bar scene, he had more than his share of women. But he wanted more than just sex. An appetite for unspeakable violent acts led him to cruise the I-5 highway through California to Washington, leaving a trail of victims along the way. As the list of the dead grew, the police mobilized to stop a twisted killer who had 44 known deaths to his name.

For weeks, the body count of sexually violated, brutally murdered young women escalated. With increasing alarm, Los Angeles newspapers headlined the deeds of a serial killer they named the Hillside Strangler. The city was held hostage by fear. Darcy O'Brien weds the narrative skill of an award-winning novelist with the detailed observations of an experienced investigator to unravel this chilling true-crime story.

Ann Rule, who shared her own nerve-jangling account of unknowingly befriending sadistic sociopath Ted Bundy in The Stranger Beside Me, chronicles other fateful encounters with the hidden predators among us in this riveting collection, fifteenth in the best-selling series drawn from her personal files. First in line is a stunning case that spanned thirty years and took a determined detective to four states - ending, finally, in Alaska - where he unraveled not one but two murders.

One late spring evening in 2010, Shannan Gilbert—after running through the oceanfront community of Oak Beach screaming for her life—went missing. No one who had heard of her disappearance thought much about what had happened to the twenty-four-year-old: she was a Craigslist escort who had been fleeing a scene—of what, no one could be sure. The Suffolk County police, too, seemed to have paid little attention—until seven months later, when an unexpected discovery in a bramble alongside a nearby highway turned up four bodies, all evenly spaced, all wrapped in burlap. But none of them Shannan’s.

The Zodiac Killer conducted a campaign of terror in the late 1960s, killing seven victims before taunting investigators through a series of cryptic letters, clues and coded messages sent to local newspapers. For more than five decades, investigators have searched for the identity of the Zodiac Killer. Hoaxes and forged letters fueled an ongoing media circus while the mystery inspired TV documentaries, feature films, books, websites, podcasts, and even copycat killers.

In Talking with Serial Killers: World's Most Evil, bestselling author and criminologist Christopher Berry-Dee delves deeper into the gloomy underworld of killers and their crimes. He examines, with shocking detail and clarity, the lives and lies of people who have killed and shines a light on the motives behind their horrific crimes. Through interviews with the killers, the police, and key members of the prosecution, alongside careful analysis of the cases themselves, the listener is given unprecedented insight into the most diabolical minds that humanity has to offer.

In September 2001 Carmen Rodriguez, a beautiful 32-year-old Hartford mother of four, went missing. At first police were stymied - until a killer's crucial mistake led investigators down a long, dark road of cold, calculated murder.

On a chilly November afternoon in 1998, a tearful 36-year-old man walked into the Humboldt County Sheriff's Department in Eureka, California, and confessed to something horrible. "I hurt some people," he said. Inside his pocket was the ghastly proof of his statement. But there was more to Wayne Adam Ford than the trail of mangled victims he left behind. More, even, than the twisted predator inside, which drove him to increasingly perverse sexual appetites.

Melissa Ramirez, Claudine Anne Luera, Guiselda Hernandez, and Janelle Ortiz were four marginalized women striving to make ends meet as sex workers. They looked out for one another. But they would soon share a connection that none of them could have imagined. When Melissa was found dead, the other three women were on edge but assumed they were safe. Twelve days later, they too were dead and police had detained an unlikely suspect—Juan David Ortiz, a ten-year veteran of the U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

This is the first truly comprehensive book examining the life and career of the murderer who has become one of America's great supervillains. It reveals not only the true story but how the legend evolved, taking advantage of hundreds of primary sources that have never been examined before, including legal documents, letters, articles, and records that have been buried in archives for more than a century.

In this collection of true crime murder stories, discover three books containing a full graphic account of the exploits of monstrous individuals.

From suicide attempts to claiming her mother cursed her, to miscarriages, and losing 10 of her 14 children, Leonarda’s life wasn’t easy. Protecting her four surviving children became something of an obsession for the woman. Perhaps tragedy loosened her grip on reality, or maybe the fear of losing her oldest to war caused a mental break. Whatever the cause, Leonarda’s chilling deeds will raise the hair on the back of your neck and leave you wondering if those around you are capable of the same evil.

Jillian Lauren had no idea what she was getting into when she wrote her first letter to prolific serial killer Samuel Little. All she knew was her research had led her to believe he was good for far more murders than the three for which he had been convicted. While the two exchanged dozens of letters and embarked on hundreds of hours of interviews, Lauren gained the trust of a monster. After maintaining his innocence for decades, Little confessed to the murders of ninety-three women, often drawing his victims in haunting detail as he spoke.

In the fall of 1978, teenager Theresa Allore went missing near Sherbrooke, Quebec. She wasn't seen again until the spring thaw revealed her body in a creek only a few kilometers away. Shrugging off her death as a result of 1970s drug culture, police didn't investigate. Patricia Pearson started dating Theresa's brother, John, during the aftermath of Theresa's death. Though the two teens would go their separate ways, the family's grief, obsession with justice, and desire for the truth never left Patricia.

For twelve years the Golden State Killer terrorized California, stalking victims and killing without remorse. Then he simply disappeared, for the next forty-four years, until an amateur DNA sleuth opened her laptop. In I Know Who You Are, Barbara Rae-Venter reveals how she went from researching her family history as a retiree to hunting for a notorious serial killer—and how she became the nation’s leading authority on investigative genetic genealogy, the most dazzling new crime-fighting weapon to appear in decades.

For years he'd stalked elementary schools and playground looking for young girls from low-income neighborhoods to abduct, rape and murder. He thought of them as "throwaway kids" - hardly missed, and soon forgotten, except by those who loved them. He was ever parent's worst nightmare. The bogeyman they warned their children about ... the fiend who lurked outside bedroom windows.

In this true crime collection, you’re going to explore more insane stories that led to many sleepless nights for the police. From an unknown Florida serial killer to a killing nurse taking the lives of over 35 patients.