SERIAL KILLERS AND THEIR MOTHERS

No one really knows why a serial killer kills, which is why there is a plethora of theories out there. Some believe that it has to do with genetics. Others think that there might be some kind of damage to the brain. And still some believe that it comes down to something as simple as environment. One of the most accepted theories is that serial killers got their start because of their mothers.

It is easy to blame mothers of serial killers because they acted out of the norm. Instead of being stay-at-home moms who and doted on their children, they were often abusers and prostitutes. Since they didn’t live within society’s norms or expectations, how can they expect their sons to?

Ed Gein was born on August 27, 1906. His mother was eccentrically religious and believed that women (not including herself) were prostitutes and vessels of disease. She operated a small grocery store in Plainfield, Wisconsin, and bought a farm on the outskirts of town to prevent outsiders from influencing her sons. She was married to a man who was frequently unemployed and a violent alcoholic. He would drink heavily then abuse his children. Gein’s mother hated his father, but her deep religious beliefs forbid divorce. She also believed that her sons would grow up to be just like their father, so she often abused them.

After Gein’s father died of heart failure, he and his brother were allowed to do odd jobs to support their mother and the farm. His brother began to question and reject his mother’s view of the world, and spoke ill of her around Ed. On May 16, 1944, he was found dead from suspicious circumstances, and it is speculated the Ed killed him, but charges were never filed. Gein’s mother died on December 29, 1945, from a series of strokes.

Edmund Emil Kemper III was born on December 18, 1948, and was the middle child and only boy. He had a great relationship with his father, but hated his mother. She was a violent woman who often made him sleep in a locked basement because she feared that he would rape his younger sister. Some believe that Kemper’s mother had a borderline personality disorder. His parents were divorced in 1957, and he was forced to live with his mother.

He ran away from home in the summer of 1963 to find his father in California. His father had since remarried and wanted nothing to do with his son. He was placed in the care of his grandparents. He was unhappy being sent there because he disliked his grandmother. He began his killing spree by shooting his grandmother and grandfather.

Carroll Cole was born May 9, 1938. His mother was an adulterer who slept with several men while Cole’s father was fighting in World War II. He supposedly was forced to watch his mother entertain men, and she beat him brutally to keep him from telling his father. Even after his father returned, she still whipped and beat him for punishment. He grew up hating women, and often picked women up in bars, murdering those he perceived as “loose.” He was the most wrathful to women who were married because they reminded him of his mother.

Henry Lee Lucas was born August 23, 1936, and was the youngest of nine children. His mother was a prostitute and alcoholic. She beat her three sons regularly, sometimes for no reason. She also dressed Lucas in girl’s clothing. When Lucas was 10, he and his brother got into a fight, and Henry was stabbed in the eye. His mother ignored the injury for so long that his eye became infected and had to be replaced with a glass one.

Charles Manson’s mother was 16 years old when she gave birth to him on November 12, 1934. For three weeks, he was known as No Name Maddox before finally receiving a name. Manson’s mother was imprisoned for five years for robbing a Charleston service station, and when she got out, the two of them lived in run-down hotel rooms. His mother tried to put him in a foster home, but no such homes were available. Manson was placed in the Gibault School for Boys, and after 10 months, he ran away to find her. When he found her, she rejected him.

The preceding men became killers because of abuse suffered at the hand of their biological mothers. But, in some cases, the mother doesn’t have to inflict physical abuse to sway her child to become a serial killer. Sometimes just not knowing who their mothers are because they were put up for adoption is enough to push them into the realm of murder. This was the case for Joel Rifkin, who never knew his parents at all; Kenneth Bianchi, who was born to a prostitute who gave him up for adoption after two weeks; and David Berkowitz, who was the illegitimate child of a man his mother had an affair with. Then again, there are some adoptive parents who inflict terrible abuse on their children, as is the case with Joseph Kallinger.

Kallinger was born Joseph Lee Brenner III. In December 1937, he was placed in a foster home because his father abandoned his mother. He was adopted two years later, and abused severely boy both his parents. At age six, he suffered a hernia inflicted by his foster father, and at age nine, he was sexually assaulted by some neighborhood boys. For punishment, his foster parents forced him to kneel on jagged rocks, he was locked inside closets, forced to eat excrement, committed self-injury, was burned with irons, was whipped with belts, and was starved.

The one common thread all of these killers have in common is that they were abused in some form or another, usually by a mother or mother figure. Who could blame them for hating women and wanting to hurt them? Mothers aren’t supposed to act like that; they are supposed to be loving and nurturing. According to the U.S. Department of Heath and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families, in 2006, approximately 905,000 children were victims of maltreatment. Of those, 64.1% experienced neglect, 16.0% were physically abused, 8.8% were sexually abused, 6.6% were psychologically matlreated, and 2.2% were medically neglected. One-half (48.8%) of all the victims were white, and 26.7% lived with a single mother. Forty percent of the child victims were maltreated by their mothers acting alone, 17.6% were maltreated by their fathers acting alone, and 17.8% were abused by both parents. Although it seems incomprehensible because of the social stigma and the preconceived notion that men are usually the abuser, most mothers instigate abuse the majority of the time. This is most likely because mothers are the one who are left to raise the children.

Social expectations are that a woman is giddy and thrilled to be a vessel for new life. She is supposed to place everything else on the back burner and focus all of her attention on her child. After all, life is a miracle. For the majority of women, this expectation is fulfilled, but some were never wired to be moms. There are no regulations or a test that has to be passed for a woman to get pregnant. How they react when that child comes into the world has a lot to do with circumstances and the mothers own upbringing. The cycle of violence is usually passed down from one generation to the next; the abused becomes the abuser. Kallinger was married twice, and had two children with his first wife and five children with his second. He abused both of his families, and his son, Joseph Jr., died from injuries inflicted by his father. Kallinger also took his 13 year old son with him on a crime spree in Philadelphia, Baltimore, and New Jersey.

The years in which most of these killers were born also contributes to their circumstance; it was way before the women’s movements of the 60s and 70s. Without a father or a husband to support them, women didn’t have a lot of choices in careers. They were forced to do whatever they needed to to survive; therefore, most of them became prostitutes or gave their children up for adoption. As a prostitute, they were abused or abandoned by men, so they took their anger out on their children. The mothers are powerless in society, but they are powerful in the home. They express this power through the punishments that are meant to demean and demoralize because that is what they know. Although it is not fair or right, the abuse suffered by the mothers is transfered onto the kids.

Sadly, it can be assumed that most of these mothers probably didn’t think that how they were punishing their sons was harmful. Most parents punish their children for doing something wrong to teach them a lesson, to teach them that there are consequences for bad behavior. The one thing that stands out with the majority of these serial killers is that they were punished for doing nothing. Although the punishments might seem extremely severe by most social standards, it is also very subjective. For some people, spanking is an extremely harsh punishment, while for others it’s acceptable to spank a child with a belt.

Not all of the killers hated their mothers. Out of the examples above, only two took vengeance on their mothers. Ed Kemper decapitated his mother and used her head for oral sex, and Henry Lee Lucas killed his mother during an argument, claiming that he did it in self-defense. Other than that, Gein was devastated when his mother died, and felt like he had lost his only friend and lover. Carroll Cole called his mother after murdering his grandmother and grandfather, and she tried to convince him to go to the police. In 1974, Berkowitz located his birth mother, and she disclosed to him the details of his illegitimate conception. The information upset him and he fell out of contact with his mother, but he didn’t murder her and stayed in contact with his half-sister.

According to National Child Abuse Statistics at childhelp.org, “children who experience child abuse and neglect are 59% more likely to be arrested as a juvenile, 28% more likely to be arrested as an adult, and 30% more likely to commit violent crime. 14.4% of all men in prison in the United States were abused as children, and 36.7% of all women in prison were abused as children.” Although most abused children do not resort to such violent methods as serial killers, it is still evident that the abuse has impact. But it doesn’t only have to be the mother. Abuse by fathers also influences serial killers. John Gacy was constantly berated by his alcoholic father, and Albert De Salvo watched his father bring home prostitutes and savagely beat his mother.

While child abuse can partially explain the actions of the serial killer, it cannot be used as a scapegoat. The role that parents play in their child’s lives is to act as guardian and teacher. They should give their children the tools that are necessary to live and function in society. Parents might not be good at what they do or might go about it in an abusive fashion, but, at some point, the child has to make their own decisions. Why some choose to become serial killers might never be explained.