Pathology Trumps Intellect: A Cold Case, Forensic Genealogy, and the Killer Already in the File
The best part of a book event almost never happens on the main stage. It happens in the hallway afterward, chatting with other attendees as we trade war stories. This past February, at the Creepy Book Festival, I spent a good while talking with Troy A. Hillman, a retired detective and former CPA who […]
Forensic Files: Jeffery Dahmer
When Jeffrey Dahmer is discussed in popular culture, conversations often center on his psychology, his fixations, and the question of how he avoided detection for so long. Those are questions of behavior and motive. This forensic file examines the Dahmer murders through the lens of physical evidence, identification methodology, and procedural execution. The […]
Forensic Genetic Genealogy: A Crime Writer’s Field Guide
Marcia King’s mother kept the same telephone number for thirty-seven years. She kept the same house in Arkansas. She didn’t move. She didn’t disconnect. Marcia had hitchhiked out of town in 1980 and stopped calling, and her mother, like every mother in this position has done since the invention of the telephone, left the […]
Jeffrey Dahmer: The Crimes of Compulsion
Jeffrey Dahmer lived in a horror museum. When Milwaukee detectives stepped into Apartment 213 on the night of July 22, 1991, they walked into a nightmare. Human skulls arranged on shelves. A human heart wrapped in the freezer. Seventy-four Polaroids documenting dismemberment with the dispassion of a hobbyist cataloguing a collection. The case […]
BTK Forensic Case: How Forensic Evidence Caught Dennis Rader
For decades, the BTK killer was a ghost. Dennis Rader murdered ten people across Wichita, Kansas between 1974 and 1991,[1,2] taunted police with letters, and then went quiet. He had a wife, kids, a regular job, and a church he attended on Sundays. Nobody suspected a thing. What finally brought him down wasn’t luck. […]
BTK Killer Dennis Rader: Control, Ego, and the Psychology Behind the BTK Letters
For years, Dennis Rader controlled the narrative about his serial murders. Between 1974 and 1991, Rader murdered ten people in and around Wichita, Kansas. His victims ranged from entire families to women living alone, selected, stalked, and killed in their own homes. His first attack claimed four members of the Otero family in a […]
How Investigators Balance Objectivity and Empathy in Crime Solving
Crime solving lives in a space most people never have to enter. It’s where facts collide with trauma, where evidence sits beside grief, and where the worst moments of someone’s life become the starting point of an investigation. And in that space, one question quietly shapes everything: how do investigators balance objectivity and empathy […]
Forensic Psychology: Criminals Believe They Are Heroes
The body tells you what happened. Behavior tells you why. In crime fiction, readers may be drawn in by the mystery or the puzzle of who committed the crime. What keeps them turning pages is the psychology behind the act. Readers want to understand how someone justifies crossing the line into violence. They want to […]
The Forensic File: The Zodiac Killer
When the Zodiac Killer is discussed in popular culture, conversations often center on the mystery of his identity, the ciphers he mailed to newspapers, and the question of how he avoided capture. It’s natural to focus on who he was and what drove him to kill. Those are questions of psychology and speculation. This forensic […]
The Forensic File: The Aileen Wuornos Murders
When Aileen Wuornos is discussed in popular culture, conversations often centers on her trauma, her female gender, and the mythology surrounding her dark deeds. It’s natural human instinct to seek answers to the question of “why did she kill?” and “what or who prompted her to be like this?” “How did she get this way?”. […]
