True Crime Serial Murders

Randy Roth was handsome, hardworking, kind, and in top physical shape. But for all his charm and good looks, he was seemingly cursed with the ladies. His first marriage ended in divorce before the couple's fifth anniversary; his second wife plunged to her death during a hike; and his third wife left him after less than five months. But when Roth's fourth wife, Cynthia, drowned in an apparent speedboating accident in Washington State's Lake Sammamish just weeks after their first anniversary, a pattern of suspicious behavior finally caught up to him.

Standing at the towering height of 6 ft 9 in, Ed Kemper could make for an intimidating figure. He meticulously planned out his crimes, and for years went undetected. This is the story of the so-called 'Co-Ed Killer', whose brutal murders shocked America. Over the course of a decade, he killed ten victims, including several young female students as well as his own mother. Offering rides to unsuspecting hitchhikers, he took them back to his place, raped them and then dismembered the bodies.

Outback Outlaw is an unflinching and uncompromising account of a man forever cemented in the annals of Australian true crime. Ryan Green’s riveting narrative draws the listeners into the real-life horror experienced by the victim, and has all the elements of a classic thriller.

What do Wyatt Earp, Belle Gunness, Big Foot the Renegade, Billy the Kid, Dr. H.H. Holmes, and The Black Hand have in common? They were all subjects of true crime newspaper reporting in the 1800s. Now their stories and that of many others are brought together in their original form in this compilation by New York Times best-selling author Mike Rothmiller. These classic works of journalism resurrect astonishing stories that will take the listener back to when these horrific tales mesmerized a nation.

From the summer of 1979 through the spring of 1981, Atlanta, Georgia, was held under siege by a serial killer, and dozens of victims started to appear. The series of murders, which became known as the “Atlanta Child Murders case”, gripped the city of Atlanta with fear and shocked the nation because most of the victims were children. In this true-crime audiobook, you will hear about how the Atlanta Child Murders case put a city under siege and how a task force of law-enforcement officers from several different agencies eventually captured the killer.

Serial killers are big business. From the endless books, films, and television programs to the fascination of the 24-hour news networks, there is something about these mass murderers that catches the eye and catches the attention. While many people are familiar with the better known killers like John Wayne Gacy or Jack the Ripper, this is not the end of the story. There are so many examples of serial killers from around the world that many of them have simply been forgotten about.

As investigators brought out the bagged remains of several dozen young men from a small Chicago ranch home and paraded them in front of a crowd of TV reporters and spectators, attention quickly turned to the owner of the house. John Gacy was an upstanding citizen, active in local politics and charities, famous for his themed parties and appearances as Pogo the Clown. But in the winter of 1978-79, he became known as one of many so-called “sex murderers” who had begun gaining notoriety in the random brutality of the 1970s.

In September 1998, young reporter Claudia Rowe was working as a stringer for The New York Times in Poughkeepsie, New York, when local police discovered the bodies of eight women stashed in the attic and basement of the small colonial home that Kendall Francois, a painfully polite 27-year-old community college student, shared with his parents and sister. Growing up amid the safe, bourgeois affluence of New York City, Rowe had always been secretly fascinated by the darkness and soon became obsessed with the story and with Francois.

In March 1976, Ted Bundy was convicted of the aggravated kidnapping of a young woman near Salt Lake City, Utah. Bundy had not been accused or convicted of any violent crime except this one. No one knew then how many women Bundy had murdered, and many thought him incapable of doing so.

It is often difficult to comprehend what makes a person kill. But when they kill and then commit further acts of depravity on their victim, it gives a whole new meaning to wrongdoing. In volume three of the True Crime Stories, we examine murderers who have all displayed the same gut-churning, wicked twist - each of them ate their victims. Each of these violent killers is examined in detail, including their backgrounds, the crimes they committed, and how they were brought to justice.

On June 5, 1983, Henry Lee Lucas was arrested for the unauthorised possession of a handgun. The police believed that he was linked to the disappearance of two females, so they used the opportunity to apply pressure and encourage a confession. After four days in custody, Lucas confessed to killing the two women.

The year 1969: The hippie scene is vibrant in Provincetown, Massachusetts. Long-haired teenagers roam the streets, strumming guitars and preaching about peace and love...and Tony Costa is at the center of it all. To a certain group of smitten young women, he is known as Sire—the leader of their counterculture movement, the charming man who speaks eloquently and hands out hallucinogenic drugs like candy. But beneath his benign persona lies a twisted and uncontrollable rage that threatens to break loose at any moment. Tony Costa is the most dangerous man on Cape Cod.

In this, the first book of its kind, Kate Kray, who married gangster Ronnie Kray, peers into the minds of the top 20 worst killers in criminal history and, sparing no detail, reveals the awful truth of their abominable acts. The extreme nature of their violence and their shocking lack of remorse makes for uncomfortable yet fascinating listening.

In the late 1800s, the city of Austin, Texas, was on the cusp of emerging from an isolated western outpost into a truly cosmopolitan metropolis. But beginning in December 1884, Austin was terrorized by someone equally as vicious and, in some ways, far more diabolical than London's infamous Jack the Ripper. For almost exactly one year, the Midnight Assassin crisscrossed the entire city, striking on moonlit nights, using axes, knives, and long steel rods to rip apart women from every race and class.

Professor David Wilson has spent his professional life working with violent men - especially men who have committed murder. Aged 29 he became, at that time, the UK's youngest ever prison governor in charge of a jail, and his career since then has seen him sat across a table with all sorts of killers: sometimes in a tense interview; sometimes sharing a cup of tea (or something a little stronger); sometimes looking them in the eye to tell them that they are psychopaths.

Bizarre, compelling, terrifying, and authentic true crime stories of murder and mayhem. In this audiobook you will find 18 stories about love affairs gone deadly, mass murder, a family slaughter, even a story about a killer who impersonated his victim - chilling crimes that could only be perpetrated by the twisted minds and gruesome obsessions of coldblooded killers, the stuff that horror movies and novels are made of.

Many have seen and studied the classic films of Alfred Hitchcock, but how many know a lot of these movies were inspired by real life murders? These cases range from his native England in the 1800’s to 1950’s America. Influencing his work from The Lodger, his third directorial effort and first true suspense thriller, all the way down to Frenzy, his next to final film. Such minor details appear in his films as a woman’s necklace or being buried in a garden. Or can be so detailed that one film, about a wrongly accused musician, is based on a true story outright.

Today, neuroscientists are imaging, mapping, testing, and dissecting the source of the worst behavior imaginable in the brains of the people who lack a conscience: psychopaths. Neuroscientist Dean Haycock examines the behavior of real life psychopaths and discusses how their actions can be explained in scientific terms, from research that literally looks inside their brains to understanding how psychopaths, without empathy but very goal-oriented, think and act the way they do.

On September 5th, 1934, a young beachcomber made a gruesome discovery on the shores of Cleveland’s Lake Erie: the lower half of a female torso, neatly severed at the waist. The victim, dubbed “The Lady of the Lake,” was only the first of a butcher’s dozen. Over the next four years, twelve more bodies would be scattered across the city. The bodies were dismembered with surgical precision and drained of blood. Some were beheaded while still alive.

United States of True Crime is an anthology series with books devoted to the most disturbing cases in each of the 50 states. This book focuses on ten of the most chilling crimes in Colorado history.