Sexual Murder - Justicia Forense

Table 7.2 (continued)Noted by Krafft-EbingSome murders are highlyplanned and organized.Characteristics of Contemporary Serial Murderers asCharacteristics Quotes from Krafft-Ebing (1886)“He set about his horrible deeds with such care that heremained undetected for 10 years” (p. 67).Source: From Schlesinger, L.B., Serial Offenders: Current Thought, Recent Findings, CRC Press, BocaRaton, FL, 2000, p. 6. With permission.later engaged in such activity, and then progressed to disinterred humanbodies. “I covered it [the body] with kisses and pressed it wildly to my heart.All that one could enjoy with a living woman is nothing in comparison withthe pleasure I experienced. After I had enjoyed it for about a quarter of anhour, I cut the body up, as usual, and tore out the entrails. Then I buriedthe cadaver again. … Enjoyment in doing so was greater than in using thebody sexually” (p. 70).Krafft-Ebing wrote at length about the relationship between fantasy andthe compulsion to kill. He described the case of the “Girl Stabber of Bozen,”who knifed girls in the genital region. This offender drew his own pornography,likely used as a fantasy aid, which was found in his home followinghis arrest. Another individual (Krafft-Ebing’s Case 27) ejaculated the instanthe stabbed a woman. Krafft-Ebing noted that the stabbing was “an equivalentfor coitus” (p. 73). The connection between fantasy and the compulsion tokill is also highlighted in the case of the “Girl Cutter of Augsburg.” Thisoffender had a collection of knives in his home that gave him “an intensefeeling of sexual pleasure with violent excitement. According to his confession,he had injured, in all, fifty girls” (p. 74).The root of sadism, according to Krafft-Ebing, is the offender’s feelingof power and control over others. “The idea that she might feel the powerI had over her” is sexually arousing (p. 76). The author reported the caseof an individual who felt sexual pleasure only by “humiliating [and] mortifying”women; [she should] “feel that she is completely in his power. Oneof the hidden roots of sadism — the impulse to complete subjugation ofthe woman, which here became consciously entertained” (p. 78). Krafft-Ebing also described several individuals who engaged in sadistic acts withanimals, rather than humans, for fear of being arrested. One man hadejaculations when he killed chickens or pigeons by wringing their necks.Another person enjoyed “committing sodomy with geese, and cutting theirnecks off tempore ejaculationis” (p. 85).Although some women also have sadistic proclivities, Krafft-Ebing notedthat most sadistic acts are committed by men. Drawing on his medicalbackground, the author reasoned that the “active or aggressive role” in sexualrelations belongs to the man — “women remain passive, defensive” (p. 59).