"The homicide detective, in establishing the guilt or innocence of a suspect must concern himself-as we have previously discussed-with means, opportunity, and motive. The criminal may choose his weapon and select his opportunity. His motive cannot be manipulated; he is its creature. And it is usually motive by which his crime succeeds or fails.
"What are we to make of the motive of New York's current multiple murderer-an individual described in headlines as 'The.44 Caliber Killer' or 'Son of Sam'? The former title refers to the handgun used to kill six and wound seven-to date. The latter is a self-awarded nickname used by the killer in taunting notes to the police and press and, by extension, to all of us.
"The detective's mind at work: He calls himself 'Son of Sam.' Invert to Samson, who lost his potency when his long hair was shorn. Then we learn the victims had long hair. A connection here? A clue? No, I do not believe so. Too tenuous. But it illustrates how every possibility, no matter how farfetched, must be explored in attempting to establish the criminal's motive or plural motives.
"In researching the murky drives of the wholesale killer, the detective goes to the past history of similar crimes, and finds literature on the topic disturbingly scant. Rape, robbery, even art forgery have been thoroughly studied, analyzed, charted, computerized, dissected, skinned, and hung up to dry.
"But where are the psychologists, criminologists, sociologists, and amateur aficionados of murder most foul when it comes to resolving the motives of those who kill, and kill again, and again, and again…?
"Good reason for this, I think. Cases of mass homicide are too uncommon to reveal a sure pattern. Each massacre is different, each slaughter unique. Where is the link between Jack the Ripper, Charles Manson, Unruh, the Black Dahlia, Speck, the Boston Strangler, Panzram, William Heirens ('Stop me before I kill again!'), Zodiac (never caught, that one), the rifleman in the Texas tower, the Los Angeles 'Trash Bag' butchers, the homosexual killers in Houston, the executioner of the California itinerant workers? What do all these monsters have in common? '"They were all quite mad,' you say. An observation of blinding brilliance rivaled only by John F. Kennedy's, 'Life is unfair.' "No, the puzzling denominator is that they are all male. Where are the ladies in this pantheon of horror? Victims frequently, killers never. Oh, there was Martha Beck, true, but she 'worked' with a male paramour and slaughtered from corruptive greed. Shoddy stuff.
"We are not here concerned with greed as a motive for multiple homicide. Nor shall we muse on familial tensions which erupt in the butchery of an entire Nebraska family or Kentucky clan, including in-laws and, oddly enough, usually the family dog.
"What concerns us this evening is a series of isolated murders, frequently over a lengthy period of time, the victims unrelated and strangers to the slayer. Let us also eliminate political and military terrorism. What remains of motive? It is not enough to intone, 'Paranoiac schizophrenic,' and let it go at that. It may satisfy a psychologist, but should not satisfy the homicide detective since labels are of no use to him in solving the case.
"What, then, should the detective look for? What possible motives for random slayings may exist that will help him apprehend the perpetrator?
"Pay attention here; watch your footing. We are in a steamy place of reaching vines, barbed creepers, roots beneath and swamp around. Beasts howl. Motives intertwine and interact. Words fail, and the sun is blocked. Poor psychologists. Poor sociologists. No patterns, no paths. But shivery shadows-plenty of those.
"First, maniacal lust. Oh yes. This staple of penny dreadfuls did exist, does exist and, if current statistics on rape are correct, seems likely to increase tomorrow. It might-and that was the first of many 'mights' you will hear from me tonight-it might account for the barbarities of Jack the Ripper, the Boston Strangler, the Black Dahlia, Heirens, Speck, and others whose names, fortunately, escape me. I have a good memory for old lags, con men, outlaws and safecrackers. When it comes to recalling mass killers, my mind fuzzes over. It is, I think, an unconscious protective mechanism. The horror is too bright; it shines a light in corners better left in gloom.
"Sexual frenzy: passion becomes violence through hatred, impotence, a groaning realization of the emptiness of sex without love. Water results; blood is wanted. Then blood is needed, and the throat-choked slayer seeks the ultimate orgasm. And aware- oh yes, aware!-and weeping for himself-never for his victim; his own anguish fills him-he scrawls in lipstick on the bathroom mirror, 'Stop me before I kill again!' As if anyone could rein his demented desire or want to. Leave that to the hangman's noose. It is stated that capital punishment does not deter. It will deter him.
"Second, revenge. It might serve for Jack the Ripper, the Boston Strangler, Unruh, the killer of those California farmhands, the homosexual executioner in Houston-ah, it might serve for the whole scurvy lot, including the latest addition, Son of Sam.
"Revenge, as a motive, I interpret as hatred of a type of individual or a class of individuals who, in the killer's sick mind, are deserving of death. All women, all blacks, all homosexuals, the poor, the mighty, or attractive young girls with long brown hair.
"When the New York Police Department compared ballistics reports and came to the stunned conclusion that it was up against a repeat killer, one of the first theories advanced involved the long hair of the victims. It was suggested that the murderer, having been spurned or humiliated by a girl with flowing tresses, vowed vengeance and is intent on killing her over and over again.
"More recent reports demolish this hypothesis. Males have been shot (one was killed), and not all the female victims had brown, shoulder-length hair. One was blonde; others had short coiffures.
"But still, revenge as a motive has validity. It has been proposed that Jack the Ripper executed and mutilated prostitutes because one had infected him with a venereal disease. A neat theory. Just as elegant, I believe, is my own belief: that he was the type of man who compulsively sought the company of whores (there are such men) and killed to eradicate his own weakness, eliminate his shame.
"I told you we are in a jungle here, and nowhere does the sun shine through. We are poking around the dark, secret niches of the human heart, and our medical chart resembles antique maps with the dread legends: 'Terra incognita' and 'Here be dragons.' "Third, rejection. Closely allied to revenge, but rejection not by individual or class but by society, the world, life itself. 'I didn't ask to be born,' the killer whines, and the only answer can be, 'Who did?' Is Son of Sam of this rejected brotherhood?
"There was once a mass killer named Panzram. He was an intelligent man, a thinking man, but a bum, a drifter, scorned, abused, and betrayed. He rejected, scorned, and abused in turn. And he slew, so many that it seemed he wanted to kill not people but life itself. Wipe out all humanity, then all things that pulse, and leave only a cinder whirling dead through freezing space.
"That was total rejection: rejection of the killer by society, and of society by the killer. Has no one ever turned his back on you, or you to him? We are dealing here not with another planet's language that no one speaks on ours. The vocabulary is in us all, but we dast not give it tongue.
"The flip side of rejection, real or fancied, is the need to assert: 'I do exist. I am I. A person of consequence. You must pay attention. And to make certain you do, I shall kill a baker's dozen of those lumps who look through me on the street. Then you will recognize who I am.' Is that what Unruh was thinking as he strolled along the New Jersey street, shooting passersby, drivers of cars, pausing to reload, stopping in stores to pot a few more? '"I am I. World, take notice!' First, rejection; then, need to prove existence. Murder becomes a mirror.