Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, February 1, 1993 TAG: 9302010011
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: KATHY LOAN STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: BLACKSBURG LENGTH: Medium
EX-FBI AGENT OFFERS A LOOK AT THE DARK SIDE
Time-Life Books' latest promotion tempts readers with the opportunity to get into the minds of the most notorious serial killers.Robert Ressler, a former FBI agent who coined the term serial killer, offered a Virginia Tech audience last week the opportunity to get inside his head.
Ressler has interviewed Jeffrey Dahmer, John Wayne Gacy, Ted Bundy and other infamous serial killers.
People's interest in serial killers can be attributed to a "fascination with the aberrant," Ressler said.
But publishers and moviemakers need to take care that they inform, not glorify.
Ressler lashed out at popular slasher movies like the "Nightmare on Elm Street" and "Texas Chainsaw Massacre" series that depict violence and sex together.
He called "Silence of the Lambs," last year's Oscar-winning film in which Jodie Foster plays an FBI trainee who is modeled after his work, "entertaining, but nonsense."
No FBI recruit would be sent to interview serial killers and put on a top-level investigation on her own, Ressler said. And as bad as Hannibal Lecter and Buffalo Bill - the killers in the film - were, he said "people are worse."
"Everybody has a capability, a dark side of their mind, that if allowed to run free . . ." Ressler said.
That fascination with the dark side is what drew an overflow audience to Squires Student Center Thursday night to hear Ressler lecture and show slides of serial and mass murderers.
At one point, the mostly student audience was groaning at a particularly gruesome slide depicting skulls a killer had preserved with motor oil and decorated with lipstick.
The next moment, they were laughing at Ressler's anecdote about the skulls.
"10-W-30, if you're interested," he said.
Ressler warned the audience that many serial killers, such as Bundy and Dahmer, prey on young people and in campus communities.
"College campuses are not the safe havens they once were," Ressler warned.
He urged students to use common sense and not to leave dormitory hall doors propped open or bypass other safety measures.
"To circumvent that security is just plain foolish," he said. "Common sense, most of the time, can keep you from being a victim."
Bundy, a law student who was executed in 1989 for the murder of a 12-year-old girl, was as "common as anybody in this room," the former FBI agent said.
But he killed at least 35 people - probably more, Ressler said - by using his intelligence.
"I hope he's roasting in hell," Ressler said.
But on the whole, Ressler believes society would be better served by keeping violent criminals alive than executing them. The state of Florida spent $10 million in legal fees to bring Bundy to execution, he said. By keeping them imprisoned and studying them instead, Ressler said there could be a better understanding of what predisposes someone to become a serial killer.
The phenomenon of serial killers has been painted as an American problem. Only recently has the former Soviet Union admitted it has a problem with serial killers. The most notorious, former schoolteacher Andrei Chikatilo, was sentenced to death last year after being tried for the murders of 52 children and women in a series of cannibalistic sex crimes.
Most serial killers can be polite, respectful and blend into society. Most are very charming and revel in publicity, Ressler said.
In the 1960s, serial killers might advertise for models to pose for detective magazine photographs, then bind and gag their victims before killing them.
With the increases in technology, killers are becoming more sophisticated in their approaches, Ressler said.
Today, it's not uncommon for these killers to pose as police, using fake badges and car sirens to gain their victims' trust.
Ressler has also studied mass or spree killers - those who killed a number of people at one time. He said an increase in mass murders in the workplace - such as post offices - can be attributed to people who have trouble dealing with authority figures.
Ressler predicted that when authorities find the shooter in last week's CIA headquarters killings, it will turn out to be a disgruntled former employee, someone who was not hired by the CIA or someone who has a political fixation.
"Right now, that CIA shooting could be solved," Ressler said, adding that somebody knows something that could put authorities on the right track.