16 Killers Who Deliberately Prolonged Their Victims' Suffering

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Lawrence Bittaker and Roy Norris

Another deadly pair, Lawrence Bittaker and Roy Norris - also known as the "Tool Box Killers," took the lives of at least five teenage girls. Over a period of five months in 1979, they prowled Southern California, picking up girls between 13 and 18 and pulling them into their van. Then they would assault and torture their victims with items they'd picked up at the hardware store.

They also recorded their victims' deaths, evidence that was used against them during their trial. When Norris revealed the duo's actions to an old ex-con friend, the police subsequently became aware and apprehended Bittaker and Norris in November 1979. Bittaker received a capital punishment sentence and, as of 2018, remains in San Quentin State Prison. Norris was sentenced to life in prison.

 

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Dean Corll

Photo: Texas Department of Corrections / via Investigation Discovery / Public Domain
Dean Corrl of Texas is often known as the "Candy Man" or the "Pied Piper" because he would give free candy to children. In the early 1970s, Corll lured young teens with the promise of a free ride or a party. Once they climbed into his van, he would abduct them. Back at his house, he tied his victims to a plywood "torture-board."

Corll particularly liked to prey on boys, and he would assault them for days. With help from his teen accomplices - David Owen Brooks and Elmer Wayne Henley, Jr. - Corll harmed at least 28 males between 1970 and 1973. Then, Henley fatally shot Corll in 1973. Houston Police subsequently apprehended the accomplices - who later each received 99-year sentences - and uncovered the shed where Corll hid his victims' remains.

 

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Robert Berdella

Photo: Kansas City Police Department / via Huffington Post / Public Domain
Robert Berdella, also known as the "Butcher of Kansas City," commenced his notorious 2-year spree in 1984. It started when Berdella drugged his 19-year-old acquaintance, Jerry Howell, and dragged him into the basement of his Missouri home. Berdella repeatedly assaulted and tortured Howell before asphyxiating him. It was the beginning of a pattern, and after that, Berdella began to lure workmen or male sex workers to his basement.

By 1988, Berdella had done this to six different men, ranging in ages from 19 to 25. He displayed some of their skulls as trophies and kept Polaroids documenting his acts. But on March 1988, one victim escaped, and Berdella was caught. In 1992, he passed from a heart attack while incarcerated.

 

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Robert Hansen

Photo: Alaska Department of Corrections / via NY Daily News / Public Domain
From 1971 to 1983, Robert Hansen abducted and assaulted as many as 30 victims near Anchorage, Alaska. He selected exotic dancers or prostitutes to assault but released them with a warning never to tell. However, Hansen abducted 17 other women - with approximate ages ranging from 17 to 41 - and flew them out to the Alaskan wilderness. There, he stripped them naked and told them that they were his prey.

Then, Hansen would order the women to run so that he could hunt them down with a favorite hunting knife or big game rifle. It was this practice that was his eventual downfall. In 1983, teen captive Cindy Paulson escaped prior to the flight and managed to contact the police. After his arrest, Hansen received a 461-year prison sentence. In 2014, he passed due to a heart condition while incarcerated.

 

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John Brennan Crutchley

Photo: Florida Department of Corrections / via Wikimedia Commons / Public Domain
Known as the "Vampire Rapist," John Brennan Crutchley was never actually convicted of murder, although he was convicted of both kidnapping and rape. In 1985, a teenage woman was found on the side of the road. When someone stopped to help her, she said that she had been kept at a house and had been repeatedly assaulted.

According to her account, she had awoken tied to a kitchen countertop, with a video camera watching her. A man assaulted her, then put needles into her arm and began to extract and drink her blood, saying that he was a vampire. He reportedly did this so often that she was missing up to 45% of her blood upon her rescue.

Crutchley claimed this was a kinky but consensual sexual encounter. Further investigation showed that he had done this before, and police linked his pattern to many unsolved disappearances. However, investigators were never able to locate any potential victims' bodies and could not charge Crutchley in relation to the believed deaths. In 2002, Crutchley was found asphyxiated in his cell, which has been attributed to a self-inflicted action.

 

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Elizabeth Báthory

Photo: Unknown / via Mystic Files / Public Domain
Elizabeth Báthory is the most prolific female murderer of all time. The Hungarian countess lived from 1560 to 1614 and allegedly took the lives of over 600 people, prior to inflicting medieval torture on many. It's believed that she had a chamber built just to serve her dark desires. Some accounts maintain she would drain the blood from living victims and then bathe in the liquid as an attempt to revive her own beauty.

Báthory targeted her own servants as well as peasant girls to use in her sacrificial slayings. In 1609, authorities apprehended Báthory and confined her to a single room for the remainder of her life. The servants who acted as accomplices were executed.