purging the dahmer case

well the paper was a success, submitted with 8 minutes to spare! it was all about gender-wage gap, comparatively in the US and Scandinavian countries. goddam it Sweden!! you fucking rock man...on so so many levels.

so i am DONE with writing for the semester! still have two finals though before i hit the skies and head to north carolina.

fuuuucked up shit man! my roomie is totally getting physically ill over this next story, so i gotta spew it out here, as keeping it in is just too fucking disturbing. and unfair. to me. if you're queasy or grossed out easily, stop reading here.


today in my last forensic pathology class, the lead investigator on the Jeffery Dahmer came in and spoke to us. i've had him as an instructor last semester for victimology, but did not recall this crazy tidbit of information. it was a pretty disturbing class, to say the least. many people had to excuse themselves over the content of the lecture. we were shown probably 200 pictures which are still highly classified within the police department. a lot of polaroids were shown to us that jeff himself took of his victims, taken during and after they were dying and long dead. he felt like everyone always left him, so he kept his victims around. in pieces. he was obsessed with anatomy and physiology and actually received medic training in the armed forces before getting discharged for alcoholism. as a kid he would collect roadkill, dissect it, and bury it. as he got older and experienced sexual awakening, this behavior intensified. the current theory is that he began to intertwine sexual urges and his desire for dead bodies, a bizarre and consequence laden melding of interests. he began to masturbate over the remains and inside of them. he then proceeded to prey on gay men in THIS city (disturbing in itself). he liked his victims thin so he could see their musculature, race wasn't important. an equal opportunity predator, if you will. his MO usually involved getting shitfaced and offering men in gay clubs or bars to go home with him and shoot some bondage pics with him. for cash. many obliged very willingly. he never took a victim using any sort or threat of force. once in his place, he'd offer them a drink in a glass where he had already put crushed sleeping pills in (usually 7). he'd fool around with them until they passed out 30 minutes later. while they were unconscious, he'd either fuck em every way imaginable, often bound, or he'd  strangle them right away. basically live with and fuck them for two more days after their death. afterward, he begin to cut and open em up. he'd hang them by the neck on the shower spout. often the tub had multiple parts of bodies in it, from different people. he was obsessed with the viscera. hands and feet were always the first to go. he'd skin the bodies meticulously and proceed to dissect the body, cutting off muscle for his consumption (biceps taste the best, he thought). head was next to go. he'd then pose all of these parts and take photos of them. drawers full of them. he'd make a decision on which parts he wanted to keep around and preserve. most often it was the heads and penises (also scalps and a face), as he could "use" them. the disposable parts he'd put into a sealed bin with HCl to decompose. neighbors complained often of the smell coming from his place. it only escalated victim after victim.
twice he tried to create a human zombie sex toy by drilling a hole into his victims head and injecting stuff into their brains, placing them in a comatose state. one briefly got away after coming to and some firefighters found him naked in the streets, drunk as fuck, and not comprehending or speaking any english. the police were called. they returned him right to dahmers door, as he showed them pictures of his victim posed on the couch in his underwear. his explanation was it's his lover and he gets naked and funny when he's drunk. the police at time were beginning to treat all people, regardless of sexual orientation, the same. domestic=domestic. had they returned drunk naked women to their husbands? yeah sure. no different. well, this guy was toast after that. the firefighters nor the police ever noticed the hole in his head.
his last victim (still living. here!) again met him at the club, agreed to take some pics and fool around. for cash. jeff didn't have pills for this guy and decided to drink him under the table. they got wasted and fooled around and posed for pics. jeff pulled out some handcuffs and got them on one of the guy's wrist. the guy got the feeling something wasn't right and backed down a bit, saying he didn't want to be bound anymore. a drunken fight ensued and jeff pulled out his knife and the guy took off out the door in his underwear, barefoot, with one handcuff on. luckily he ran into two police officers walking their beat. he said he didn't want to press charges or anything, just wanted his shit back and get the handcuff off, as the police's smith & wesson keys didn't work to unlock them. the officers escorted him up to dahmer's apartment. as jeff opened up the door a crack the officers immediately smelled death. it's a smell, if you ever experience, you never forget. it's like coffee...you just know it when you smell it. they talked dahmer into letting them come in while the guy got dressed and collected his belongings. dahmer began looking for the cuff key (there never was one because he always cut the hands off of his victims to remove them). one of the cops, while also looking for the key, came across a partially open drawer. the officer could see the drawer full of pictures of what looked like dismembered bodies. he pulled the drawer open and saw jeff's collection of souvenirs. a big fight then broke out as the two officers tried to take him into custody. they eventually hog-tied him and peeked in the fridge and found jeff's favorite victim's head inside. top shelf. in the freezer, they found  pre-packaged "meals" from his victims ready to thaw and cook.

and that was the end of mr. jd's killing spree. he was a very bright guy. white, from an upper-middle class family. he was a decent looking guy (without the molester/hipster glasses) he knew what he was doing was wrong. from the beginning. he went to great lengths to conceal his behavior: rape, murder, dismemberment, necrophilia, and cannibalism. he was extremely open and honest about his actions. he had remorse for his victim's families.
so fucking disturbing. and unusual. and opportunistic. 

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so how do people go so so wrong?! i'm always curious how people can have the capacity to hurt and/or murder other people. i mean, anyone can do it physically, but few have the actual psychological capacity to do so. do these people lack the general inhibition that a conscience provides? are they that damaged from nurture or lack thereof? is there a genetic/biological predisposition for potentially developing violent thoughts and behaviors? and what about paraphilias? we are far from even beginning to explain it, yet still we try.

i like to think that all humans are inherently good. but where does that put all the people who intentionally kill, rape, molest, beat, torture, or maim? and can these people be rehabilitated? different industrialized nations take a variety of stances on the subject. from complete isolation and sensory deprivation (well, if they weren't crazy to begin with...) to community involvement, inclusion, and socialization (yes, even violent murderers). rehabilitation to retrobution. it's hard to say what's right for who. every criminal and crime are unique in numerous ways and always involve many different circumstances. unfortunately, we can't break things down that far to analyze all of the circumstances surrounding every single crime and therefore have standard penalties ($/prison time/probation/parole) for deviant behavior. but the system has been and continues to be broken. worst part is that we know it, yet do nothing.