Murderers

One of the most notorious serial killers ever convicted in America, Jeffrey Dahmer terrorized the Milwaukee region in the 1980s. He targeted young men and boys, who he would lure to his house on some pretext before torturing and killing them. Finally arrested and imprisoned in the early 1990s, he was killed by a fellow inmate in 1994.

Ted Bundy was an American serial killer who kidnapped, raped and murdered a number of women and girls during the mid and late 1970s. He ultimately confessed to his crimes and was sentenced to death by electric chair. Later, the life of one of the most notorious criminals of the late 20th century inspired a number of books and movies.

Criminal and cult leader Charles Manson was the leader of the notorious Manson Family, a criminal cult that committed a series of murders in the late 1960s and early 1970s. He was arrested and imprisoned many times in his life and died in 2017 while serving his life sentence at California State Prison.

Zodiac Killer was an the unidentified American serial killer who spread terror in the northern California from late 1960s to early 1970s. In his letters to police and press, he claimed to have killed 37 people, out of which five were confirmed. Though he was never caught, his case inspired numerous books, films and television series including Clint Eastwood’s classic Dirty Harry.

John Wayne Gacy was a sex offender and a serial killer. He assaulted, raped and murdered at least 33 boys and young men in 1960s and 1970s. He tortured and killed all his victims inside his ranch house near Norridge, a village in Norwood Park. He was given death sentence in March 1980 and was executed in May 1994.

American serial killer, rapist, and burglar, Richard Ramirez terrorised the people of California, primarily Los Angeles, between 1984 and 1985 before being eventually captured by the police. The brutal criminal, also known as Night Stalker, was finally found guilty of 43 charges, including 13 murders and was sentenced to death. While on a death row, he died of cancer. 

Best known as part of the legendary criminal couple Bonnie and Clyde, Bonnie Parker was infamous for her bank robberies with her partner Clyde Chestnut Barrow. They apparently murdered several policemen, too. Their crimes were romanticized in many movies including a 1967 film starring Faye Dunaway as Bonnie.

Jack the Ripper was anl unidentified serial killer who predominantly targeted female prostitutes living and working in the ghetto of the East End of London. Since the murders were never solved, Jack the Ripper became infamous folklore in England. The murders were so cleverly done that the authorities were not even able to ascertain the killer's gender.

Popularly known as the Butcher of Plainfield, Ed Gein was a murderer and body snatcher. His spine-chilling life insane acts like exhuming corpses and making keepsakes and trophies from their skin and bones, inspired films like The Silence of the Lambs, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, and Psycho.

Christopher Scarver is a convicted murderer whose physical assault on Jesse Anderson and serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer at the Columbia Correctional Institution resulted in the death of both Anderson and Dahmer. Already sentenced to life for killing a man named Steve Lohman, Christopher Scarver received two more life sentences for killing Anderson and Dahmer.

Ronald Kray was a British criminal involved in organized crime in the East End of London in the 1950s and 1960s. Along with his twin brother, Reggie, he ran a gang that was notorious for committing murders, armed robberies, and arson among other criminal activities. The brothers were arrested in 1968 and sentenced to life imprisonment.

Billy the Kid was a gunfighter of the American Old West whose notoriety grew when he escaped from jail after killing two sheriff's deputies. He remains one of the most notorious personalities of the American Old West, whose life has been often dramatized in popular culture. His story has inspired over 50 films, including Billy the Kid, and The Outlaw.

Whitey Bulger was an Irish-American FBI informant and organized crime boss. His arrest and subsequent trial exposed FBI handler John Connolly who had helped Bulger in return for the latter's information about the Patriarca crime family. Bulger's life and work inspired the 2015 film Black Mass. Many fictional TV and film characters have also been inspired by Whitey Bulger.

Lee Harvey Oswald was arrested for killing Dallas police officer J. D. Tippit. Further investigation suggested that he had murdered US President John F. Kennedy about 45 minutes before murdering Tippit. Though he denied the accusations, he was charged with the murder of Kennedy. While in police custody, Oswald was shot dead by Jack Ruby, a nightclub owner.

Joseph James DeAngelo is an American serial killer, rapist and burglar who carried out his crimes for many years in 1970s and 1980s and was finally captured by the police in 2018. The former police officer and auto mechanic, who was known by various names like Golden State Killer and Visalia Ransacker, was sentenced to life in prison in 2020.

John Gotti was the boss of the Gambino crime family, described as America's most powerful crime syndicate. It made millions per year from criminal activities like racketeering, loan sharking, drug trafficking, prostitution, extortion, pornography and illegal gambling. The FBI convicted him in 1992 and he was sentenced to life in prison without parole and later died of throat cancer.

The Robin Hood of Australia for many and villain for others, Ned Kelly become immortal not just for his murderous confrontation with the police, but also for his reported last words “such is life”. The bushranger and outlaw remains a cult figure in Australia even a century after his execution. His sympathizers considered his as a champion of the poor.

Jack Ruby was a Dallas nightclub owner who shot Lee Harvey Oswald, the alleged assassin of the 35th US President, John F Kennedy. Jack Ruby was charged with first-degree murder. He died of cancer in January 1967 in a hospital just after The Texas Court of Appeals had reversed his death sentence and was slated to grant him a new trial.

Former salesman, Scott Peterson, is a convicted murderer who is imprisoned in San Quentin State Prison. Peterson was convicted for the murder of his seven months pregnant wife, Lacy, and unborn son, Connor. Though Lacy’s family initially thought him to be innocent, evidence gathered later proved otherwise. The case attracted tremendous media attention and even inspired numerous movies and documentaries.

A former member of the notorious Charles Manson's "Family," Patricia Krenwinkel is a criminal who has participated in multiple murders. She was part of the gang that murdered actress Sharon Tate, who was pregnant at the time of her death. Krenwinkel has been denied parole fourteen times and is currently incarcerated at the California Institution for Women.

Derek Bentley was 19 when he was hanged for murdering a policeman during a burglary attempt. An illiterate, he had the mental age of 11 and also suffered from epilepsy. The controversial case led to a 45-long battle for a posthumous pardon, which was granted, and then a reversal of the murder charge.

Luka Magnotta is a Canadian convicted murderer and former pornographic film actor. He was arrested for murdering Jun Lin, an international student from Wuhan. The murder was sensationalized by the media as Luka Magnotta mailed the victim's feet and hands to federal political party offices and elementary schools. The murder inspired a three-part documentary series titled Don't F**k with Cats.

James Earl Ray was charged with assassinating Martin Luther King, Jr. in Memphis on April 4, 1968 and was convicted and sentenced to 99 years in prison in 1969. He served 29 years of his sentence before he died at the age of 70 from problems related to kidney disease and liver failure caused by hepatitis C.

Susan Smith is an American murderer who was convicted for murdering her children, Michael and Alexander, who were three-year-old and 14-month-old respectively. She falsely claimed that her kids were kidnapped by a black man before being adjudged guilty of the crime. Sentenced to life in prison, Smith is currently incarcerated at the Leath Correctional Institution in South Carolina.

Issei Sagawa is a Japanese murderer, necrophile, and cannibal. He garnered international attention when he murdered, mutilated, cannibalized, and raped Renée Hartevelt's corpse for several days in Paris in 1981. Although he was arrested, Sagawa was released two years later after being found legally insane. Issei Sagawa has been the subject of many documentary films.

Robert Maudsley is an English serial killer currently serving life imprisonment at Wakefield Prison, England. He committed three of his four murders in prison, forcing the authorities to keep him in solitary confinement. Maudsley's case was sensationalized as it was claimed that he had eaten part of the brain of one of his victims, although the PCC refuted such claims.

Better known as the Birdman of Alcatraz, US convicted killer Robert Stroud was also an ornithologist and an author. Starting his career as a pimp in his teens, he killed a man. While in prison for manslaughter, he killed a guard. He spent most of his later life in solitary confinement and studied birds.

Ruth Ellis began her career as a nightclub hostess as a teen and was also a nude model for a while. She later also worked as an escort. She became the last woman in the UK tot be hanged after she shot and killed her lover, race-car driver and affluent socialite David Blakely.

Susan Atkins was an American murderer who was convicted for participating in eight killings, including the infamous Tate murders, carried out by members of the Manson Family. Sentenced to life imprisonment, Atkins was the longest-serving female inmate in California history at the time of her death. 

John Bingham, 7th Earl of Lucan was an English peer who disappeared on 8 November 1974 after being suspected of murder. Lucan's personal problems, gambling losses, and mounting legal expenses had a dramatic effect on his life. In 1974, the nanny of Lucan's children, Sandra Rivett, was bludgeoned to death and Lucan went missing, never to be seen again.

The legendary Alexander "Sawney" Bean led a 45-member Scottish clan in the 16th century. His group was infamous for killing and cannibalizing more than 1,000 people in about 25 years. He and his group were eventually caught by a search party of King James VI and executed.

Karla Faye Tucker was a convicted criminal who killed two people with a pickaxe during a burglary. She committed the crime with a few accomplices in 1983. She was convicted of murder the following year and sentenced to death. She was executed by lethal injection in 1998. She was the first woman to be executed in US since1984. 

Randall Woodfield is a serial killer and rapist linked to a total of 18 murders and is suspected of having killed up to 44 victims. He was dubbed the I-5 Killer or the I-5 Bandit by the media. He began committing sexual assaults and robberies in 1975 and started murdering people in 1980. He was finally arrested in March 1981.  

Best known as the villain Dirty Den from the BBC soap EastEnders, Leslie Grantham initially worked as a soldier with the Royal Fusiliers of the British Army. Convicted of the murder of a cab driver in Germany, he spent a decade in prison. He later attempted suicide as aftermath of a sex scandal.

Steelworker Leon Czołgosz was an anarchist who assassinated President William McKinley. He shot McKinley twice from point-blank range on September 6, 1901, and the president died of his wounds on September 14. Czołgosz was eventually convicted and executed for his crime. He was the main character in the musical Assassins.

John Billington was an Englishman best remembered for his voyage to the New World on the famous Mayflower. He was one of the co-creators and signers of the Mayflower Compact. John Billington murdered another white settler named John Newcomen. He was tried by a jury in September 1630 and executed at the age of 40.

Barbara Graham was a convicted criminal who was executed in the gas chamber at San Quentin Prison in 1955. She became the third woman in California to be executed by gas. Born to an unwed teenage sex worker, she had a troubled childhood. As a young woman, she became involved with hardened criminals and took to a life of crime. 

Herschel Grynszpan was a German Jew best remembered for assassinating a German diplomat named Ernst vom Rath to avenge the persecuted Jews. Rath's assassination had a huge impact on the Jews as the Nazis cited his murder as justification for their planned antisemitic pogroms against the Jews in Germany. Herschel Grynszpan disappeared in 1944 and was declared dead in 1960.

Known as the Acid Bath Murderer, John George Haigh was Known for shooting or beating his victims to death and then dissolving them in sulphuric acid. To his friends, he seemed to be a wealthy man of culture. Though he initially got away with 5 murders, he was caught after his 6th murder.

Rod Ferrell is an American cult leader and murderer. A member of the Vampire Clan, Ferrell claimed to be a vampire. It was later ascertained that he had become obsessed with a game called Vampire: The Masquerade. In 1998, Rod Ferrell became the youngest American on Death Row after pleading guilty to the double murder of a couple from Florida.

Jacques Mesrine was a French criminal who carried out numerous burglaries, bank robberies, and kidnappings in the US, France, and Canada. He also killed many people and escaped repeatedly from prison, which earned him notoriety. Nicknamed The Man of a Thousand Faces, Jacques Mesrine was an expert in hiding his true identity. His life inspired a two-part film titled Mesrine.

Part of the infamous criminal couple Bonnie and Clyde, with Bonnie Parker, Clyde Barrow had been a criminal long before he met Bonnie. While they were known for robbing gas stations, banks, and restaurants. Their exploits were romanticized in films and later inspired gangster chic fashion.

Henri Charrière, convicted by French courts as a murderer in 1931 and pardoned in 1970, gained-attention after releasing his autobiographical novel Papillon. The book that gives details of his incarceration in the French penal colony of French Guiana and subsequent escape from there became a bestseller and garnered critical-acclaim. Its sequel Banco documents his life in Venezuela following the escape. 

Patrice Alègre is a French serial killer who raped and killed his victims. In 2002, he was convicted of six rapes, five murders, and an attempted murder and was sentenced to life imprisonment. Patrice Alègre's abusive childhood is said to be one of the reasons behind his sex-related crimes later in his life.

Marie-Fortunée Lafarge, a beautiful and cultured French woman, gained notoriety for being tried and convicted of murdering her husband by arsenic-poisoning. Her trial generated much interest and curiosity and became a cause célèbre leading many to arrive from across Europe to witness it. The case had a great-impact on the French society with spectators divided into pro- and anti-Marie factions.  

Madame de Brinvilliers was a French aristocrat who was sentenced to death by the French government after being accused of killing her father and brothers to inherit their estates. Speculated of having poisoned more than 30 sick people in order to test out her poisons, Madame de Brinvilliers' life, killings, and execution inspired many works of art.