Inside the Mind of BTK

My Lifelong Hunt for BTK 69
murder someone, consumed with the need to control and devour
another human being. When Gilmore wasn’t home, I surmised, he
remembered the boy he’d just spoken to and decided to see if there
was anyone home at his house who might make a worthwhile victim.
It was a bold, stupid maneuver that could have gotten him caught, but
he somehow pulled it off.
It was close to midnight when I finally decided to pack up my
paperwork and head home from the cemetery. The moon shone
bright, but the beam of my flashlight had turned a weak yellow. I felt
a bit calmer, more in control.
The more I thought about the Vian case, the more I could sense
that the UNSUB was probably kicking himself over how this killing
had unfolded. Three years had passed since his botched, haphazard
attack on Kathy Bright and her brother. The incident had no doubt
spooked him, causing the part of him that hungered to murder to
retreat and slink back underground in hiding. For three years, he no
doubt plotted and fantasized over taking another victim. After his
experience at Bright’s house, I would have expected to see a smarter,
savvier killer the next time he surfaced.
But that wasn’t really the case. For the most part, he bulldozed his
way into Shirley Vian’s house by fast-talking a five-year-old boy, then
got out by the skin of his teeth. He was calculated and determined, but
more than anything else, the killer was lucky.
When I tried to imagine what transpired in Shirley Vian’s bedroom
on the afternoon the UNSUB stole her life, I caught glimpses of
him standing in Shirley’s bedroom over her body, drinking in the image
of her wrapped up with all that cord and electrical tape. All the while
he was probably attempting to masturbate.
But the children seemed intent on ruining everything with their
incessant screaming and their pounding on the bathroom door and
shattering of glass. He yearned to kill them, but first he needed to take
care of business before the situation completely went south. So he continued
masturbating, and when the phone in the front room started
ringing, he finally decided he’d had enough and fled. Police were never
able to ascertain who had been calling, but whoever placed the call no
doubt saved the lives of Vian’s three kids.
What was going through his head, I wondered, as he departed
Vian’s house? He’d obviously gone there because his intended target,
the one who had consumed so many of his waking hours, wasn’t at