Roof Goat

[Kara]

When being interrogated, Dennis Rader actually asked one of the lead investigators about the disk thing. "Why did you lie to me?" Even if the technology he was using was not all that familiar to Rader, the response he got to that question should have been obvious:

"Because I was trying to catch you."

Rader is an interesting man, well, for a psycho-stalker-killer. Don't get me wrong, he's a sick, twisted, evil man and it's too bad he killed all those people before the state's ban on the death penalty was lifted. I'm too young to have paid attention to any of the murders that happened in my lifetime, plus I didn't live 10 miles away from him back then. He had been quiet for several years, then a guy was righting a book about him so he started sending letters to the news stations and newspaper. He liked to send cryptic messages to taunt police and frighten people.

He was genuinely disappointed that the police tricked him. The detective that had been working the case, the one that he asked why they lied to him, said he thought that the police enjoyed playing "the game" too much to do that to him.

The Chief of Police came on TV the next day (after they had questioned him all night long and got a full confession) and said "BTK is arrested." He got a standing ovation from the crowd, but Rader's defense lawyers threw a big fit before the trial because they said he couldn't get a fair trial and wanted the trial moved to another state. But the D.A. wanted this case, she wanted nothing more than to go down as the one who put him away, and she wouldn't allow it. Then he confessed anyway.

That was really disturbing too. It was televised live. The judge asked him if he could prove, without any shadow of doubt, why he felt he was guilty. Then he went into graphic detail of how he "selected" and stalked every victim, how he got in their homes, how he killed all 10 of his victims, what he did afterward, and how he believes that the people he killed will be there when he dies to serve his every need forever, that they belong to him. There was no emotion at all, he was telling it like I would tell someone I went shopping yesterday or had eggs for breakfast.

My SO and I moved a couple of years ago to a suburb out of the city for a quieter place to live and cheaper, better housing. On the edge of town is the state prison, where Rader will rot away and die. His wife divorced him immediately, took what sanity she had left, and moved as far away as she could get. I heard his son tried to kill himself, but nothing after that. Haven't heard anything about his daughter, except that the police acquired a blood sample from her to match it with blood found at the crime scenes.

A local strip club owner bought his house. What she wanted to do with it, we never found out, but she had some kind of business in mind (she also runs the club where most of the women are men. Yes, the one Harrison Ford likes to visit when he's in town that I mentioned before). Then the city somehow nullified the auction and she never actually took possession of it. They've since torn it down and are going to make it a park.

/thread derailment

[Jester]

Rader is an interesting man, well, for a psycho-stalker-killer.

Yes, he was interesting for a killer in many ways. Before he resurfaced, he was grouped along with the Green River Killer and the Zodiac Killer as one of the killers who had been active the longest without getting caught. And frankly, he could have stayed un-caught if his own ego and stupidity hadn't interfered. Before he sent them that disk, they had almost nothing on him, and unlike Ridgway in the Green River case, he had never even been on any suspect list. He was as far below radar as any killer has ever been. (And yes, I know that neither Gacy nor Dahmer were suspects until they were finally caught.)

He was also interesting in the fact that, like Ridgway, he defied the idea that serial killers never stop killing. Both men stopped for quite some time. Well, Rader did....Ridgway they aren't really sure about--he may have just started hiding the bodies better. And Rader was a very upstanding member of the community, even if some people found him a bit annoying.

Yes, for those of us that read about such things, Rader is definitely one of the more interesting case studies.

[Andara Bledin]

And frankly, he could have stayed un-caught if his own ego and stupidity hadn't interfered.

Not ego, although possibly stupidity. But the way he's described (I'd never heard of him before) it sounds like his brain just was never wired right.

It looks like a classic case where the individual in question just doesn't have the same emotional connection everybody else does. They learn to "fake it" by watching how other people react. They know that killing others is considered wrong, but they would be hard pressed to explain why.

^-.-^

[Jester]

Andara, you are right that is a classic case of psychopathy, wherein the individual has no "normal" human emotions.

But you are quite wrong when you say his ego didn't get him caught. Yes, he was stupid, but he was also egotistical. To wit, he contacted the police after over 20 years of silence once press reports came out that Robert Beattie was writing a book about the case. His ego couldn't stand the idea that someone else would be telling his story (he had been working on his own verison of a "book" about the case), so he jumped back into the fray. Thus his ego made him do a stupid thing.

Serial killers. Interesting lot.

[tollbaby]

I thought that was sociopathy. Anyway, it perfectly describes my ex-husband. He's softened a bit since we've had children, and he genuinely seems to enjoy them and be somewhat fond of them, but that's the extent of his emotional capacity.