For years, some of these killers lived unnoticed among their neighbors while investigators struggled to uncover the truth.
Ted Bundy
Bundy captured national attention because he was different from the way most people imagined a serial killer to look. Tall, handsome, smart, and charming, Bundy gained his victims’ trust before attacking them across several states in the 1970s, often by pretending to be hurt or asking for help.
Bundy eventually confessed to killing 30 women, though the exact number he murdered is still debated. The story became bigger than most as Bundy made several escapes from jails and detention centers, and his Florida trial was televised nationally. Bundy was sentenced to death for his Florida kills and was executed by electrocution in 1989.
Jeffrey Dahmer
Jeffrey Dahmer killed 17 young boys and men from 1978 to 1991. He committed most of his murders after moving into his own apartment in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Dahmer’s crimes were undiscovered until July of 1991, when one of his possible victims managed to escape and lead police back to his apartment. What they found there revealed the true extent of Dahmer’s crimes.
Dahmer later confessed to murders that involved dismemberment, among other horrors. He received multiple sentences of life in prison, as Wisconsin does not practice capital punishment. Dahmer was murdered by a fellow inmate in 1994 at the Columbia Correctional Institution.
Luis Garavito
Colombian serial killer Luis Garavito (nicknamed La Bestia or The Beast) became one of the most infamous criminals in Latin American history when police linked him to the killings of hundreds of children throughout Colombia in the 90s. Garavito typically preyed on vulnerable boys and traveled frequently from area to area, which made it hard for officials to realize that multiple crimes were related.
Garavito confessed to murdering over 140 children, though police believe the actual amount is higher. Garavito was convicted of multiple murders and sentenced to multiple terms of Colombian prison sentences. Garavito died in a Colombian hospital from natural causes in 2023 while imprisoned.
John Wayne Gacy
John Wayne Gacy seemed to lead a very normal suburban life. He owned a construction company and volunteered with his community and sometimes danced as a clown for fundraisers. Underneath that facade, he killed 33 young men and teenage boys throughout the 1970s.
Police found remains of 29 victims buried under his house or on his property in the Chicago area. Some of his victims were disposed of elsewhere. Gacy was found guilty in 1980 and sentenced to death and executed in Illinois in 1994.
Samuel Little
Samuel Little was far less well-known than Bundy or Dahmer during his killing spree, which partly contributed to him remaining unidentified. Little killed women, many of whom were vulnerable or marginalized individuals, throughout various states in America from 1970 until 2005.
Once authorities linked Little to three murders through DNA, they started connecting him to larger numbers. Little would ultimately confess to 93 murders, and the FBI has since called him the deadliest serial killer in U.S. history. Little was sentenced to multiple life sentences and passed away in prison in 2020.
Gary Ridgway
Gary Ridgway, aka The Green River Killer, murdered victims in Washington State. His victims were predominantly women and girls during the 1980s and 1990s. Victims’ bodies were found along the Green River and other places throughout Washington. Police spent years trying to link a suspect to the killings.
New DNA technology led police to link Ridgway to the killings, and he was arrested in 2001. Ridgway entered guilty pleas to 48 murders in 2003 to avoid the death penalty. Since then, another victim has been added to his tally. Ridgway has admitted to other murders as well, so the total is likely much higher.
Andrei Chikatilo
Andrei Chikatilo, also known as the Rostov Ripper, perpetrated a series of murders in the Soviet Union from 1978 to 1990. The victims were mostly women and children.
Police were unable to quickly apprehend him, and critical errors in investigations allowed him to continue killing. These errors even led to an innocent man being convicted and executed for one of Chikatilo’s murders. Chikatilo was arrested in 1990 after being placed under police surveillance and suspicion. Chikatilo later confessed to many murders and was convicted of 52 murders. He was executed in Russia in 1994.
Dennis Rader
For years, Dennis Rader hid in plain sight among friends and neighbors in Kansas as a husband, father, and active community member while secretly living a second life as a serial killer. Self-titled BTK, Rader killed 10 people over nearly two decades and taunted police and the media with letters describing his crimes.
He eventually stopped killing, but his ego would ultimately lead to his capture. Years later, Rader began writing to the media and investigators again. Evidence tied to a computer disk he mailed to police helped lead to his arrest. Rader was arrested in 2005, where he confessed and was sentenced to 10 consecutive life terms in prison.
Jack the Ripper
Jack the Ripper is one of the most famous unidentified criminals in history. He killed prostitutes in the Whitechapel District of London in 1888. While five murders are officially classified as those of Jack the Ripper, others have been attributed to him at times. The crimes were widely reported in newspapers, and letters purportedly from the killer increased public hysteria; however, many of these are suspected to be hoaxes.
Police suspected many individuals but could never positively verify their guesses. Although new theories still surface more than 130 years later, none of them have been able to provide undeniable evidence of Jack the Ripper’s identity.
Harold Shipman
British physician Harold Shipman took advantage of professional trust to gain unprecedented freedom to kill. Shipman killed his patients, predominantly elderly women, injecting many with fatal doses of diamorphine. Suspicion was raised when he had an unusually high death rate for his patients, and inquiries were made into the will of one of his victims.
He was found guilty in 2000 of murdering 15 patients; however, he was later found to have murdered at least 215 victims, with suspicion that his true victim count is much higher.
Pedro López
Pedro López, the “Monster of the Andes”, murdered girls throughout Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru. He was arrested in Ecuador in 1980 and reportedly confessed to hundreds of killings. In Ecuador, he was convicted of 110 murders, although many, many more have been attributed to him.
More disturbing than his crimes may be what happened following his incarcerations: After serving his Ecuadorian sentence, López was held in psychiatric custody in Colombia, where he was released in the late 1990s. His activities after that point are unclear.
Peter Sutcliffe
For many years throughout the 1970s, women living in northern England lived in fear of a killer newspapers called the Yorkshire Ripper. Peter Sutcliffe killed 13 women and attempted to kill seven more between 1975 and 1980. British police were involved in one of the country’s largest manhunts to catch him, but many mistakes were made during the investigation, including relying too heavily on a hoax recording and letters sent by someone who claimed to be the killer.
Sutcliffe was arrested in 1981 after being pulled over by police while with a s** worker, during which they discovered he had altered plates on his car. He was found guilty the same year and spent the rest of his life in prison until he died in 2020.
Rodney Alcala
Rodney Alcala gained notoriety for his crimes, and also for one curious event on live television. While in the midst of his killing spree in 1978, Alcala appeared on the American game show The Dating Game as a contestant, where he was chosen by the woman contestant. She eventually decided not to go on the date.
He was convicted of murdering numerous women and girls throughout California and New York during the 1970s. He has been investigated for possibly having committed other unsolved murders as well. Alcala died in prison in 2021 while awaiting execution in California.
Richard Ramirez
From 1984 to 1985, Richard Ramirez terrorized the people of Southern California. Instead of specializing in one specific victim like most serial killers, Ramirez invaded the homes of men and women, young and old. News media called him the Night Stalker, and his face became known around the nation from heavy news coverage of the crimes.
Shortly after police released his description in 1985, citizens spotted Ramirez walking down the street, chased him until police caught up with him, and arrested him. He was found guilty of 13 murders and many other crimes and was given the death penalty. Ramirez would die of natural causes in 2013 while on California’s death row.
David Berkowitz
David Berkowitz, aka Son of Sam, committed his crimes in New York City in 1976 and 1977. Berkowitz shot people with a handgun, murdering 6. Several others were wounded. The random nature of some of the shootings induced public panic. Berkowitz sent letters to the media that taunted police and increased the media attention.
Police were able to trace a parking ticket found in his neighborhood on the night of one shooting. He was arrested in August 1977. Berkowitz pleaded guilty and is currently serving multiple life sentences.
Sources: Please see here for a complete listing of all sources that were consulted in the preparation of this article.
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