  Mystery
This week: Edited by: The Milkman  
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In the last month I renewed one key element to writing a mystery novel, novella or a short story, and that is research. I also discovered that there are a large separation between the media coverage, Hollywood and fact about serial killers. Because of this month's research online and in several books I had to switch my topic from "Married men who commit serial murder" to “what the professionals say about serial killers as a whole with an entire section on “Women who like to kill”. This will be the first of a three part series and it will factoring in the common traits of both sexes who have killed multiple times (which as you’ll discover is not an accurate definition of serial killer).
The most straight forward definition I have found is from Belea T. Keeney and Kathleen M. Heide *: Serial murder is the premeditated murder of three or more victims committed over time, in separate incidents, in a civilian context, with the murder activity being chosen by the offender.
I also must add that most definitions include a minimum number of killings to classify them as serial murders. The number I found was three.
Before I can stray off to the point of this editorial I would like to name some gender-related traits shared between the male and female serial killer.
# Serial killers seem to blend in well with the community as they are exceptionally skillful in presenting themselves so that they appear beyond suspicion.
People, which include the Mystery Writer, often held the misconception that serial killers must look monstrous or evil, which causes them to overlook the pleasant, normal looking murder next door. Ever hear a killers next door neighbor say, "He was the nicest guy on the block. I can't believe he killed all of those people"?
# Serial killers tend to have impaired childhood attachments, formative traumatic experiences, and a private internal world of violent thoughts and fantasies.
This combination leaves the individual isolated, preoccupied, and lacking of socially accepted constraints on behavior.
# If nothing else, serial killers are opportunists, and they seek out conditions that will allow them to kill repeatedly without detection or apprehension.
E. Hickey, studied serial killers for a period of more than 100 years and was able to classify some data on gender, race and age of these repeat offenders.
-- median age of 30
-- 90% Caucasian
-- On average killed between 8 to 14 victims in a period of 4 to 8 yrs.
-- 12 to 17% were women offenders
The researcher was also able to determine that men are more mobile; meaning they are more willing to travel several hundred or thousands of miles to murder. Men are also more violent and more often sexually motivated in their killings. Women tended to commit murder over a longer period of time, had a smaller "Comfort Zone", more often killed for personal gain, and used poison as a weapon more often. Women were more likely to kill their husbands or relatives.
The comfort zone refers to the area in which the killer feels the most safe to commit their crimes.
Hopefully the first couple of paragraphs left you with enough background information for you do one of two things, delve deeper into your own fact finding or wait until next month for my second editorial on this multi-faceted subject.
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Here are a couple of items that are based on the toppic of this month's editorial...
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Here are a few of the Mystery items that caught my eyes for this month. I hope you enjoy them.
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Mystery: October 11, 2006 Issue [#1304]
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