By Cristo M. Sanchez
1. Ed Kemper, while at the Medical Facility in Vacaville, California, participated in reading audio books for the blind and spent more than 5000 hours in the reading booth over 10 years, and has more 4 million feet of tape and several hundred books to his credit. Included in his work is the children's book The Trumpet of the Swan and the novelisation of the Star Wars trilogy.
2. Serial killer and cannibal Richard Chase believed he could absorb vitamin C through his brain by placing oranges on his head.
3. Ted Bundy allegedly once saved a child from drowning.
4. It is generally agreed upon by most psychiatrists that psychopaths cannot be successfully treated.
5. The highest confirmed body count of any serial killer is Colombian Luis Alfredo Garavito's record of 138 confirmed murders and more 300 suspected murders.
6. America’s first serial killer is considered to be Dr. H.H. Holmes, who confessed to 27 murders after he was caught in 1894, only 9 murders of which have been confirmed.
7. California has the highest number of serial murder cases in the 20th century, at 16% of the national total. Maine has the lowest with none.
8. There is a graphic novel about Jeffrey Dahmer's childhood up until his first murder by Fred Backderf, who grew with him, named MY FRIEND DAHMER.
9. Following the execution of John Wayne Gacy, his brain was removed to be studied, but to date no abnormalities or common traits with other serial killers' brains have been found.
10. The US is the country with the highest count of convicted serial killers with 226 (and counting).
Editor's note: this trivia column ran in Serial Killer Magazine and is reproduced as written. Three items need a figure checked against this archive. Luis Alfredo Garavito is recorded here at 138 convictions in Colombia, more than 193 confirmed and 221 claimed by him in 2003; the column's 'more than 300 suspected' is above anything the roster can support. H.H. Holmes has no entry in this archive, so the 27 confessed and 9 confirmed cannot be checked here. The count of 226 convicted American serial killers was current when the column was printed and is not a live figure. The rest holds: Edmund Kemper is in the archive at ten and did record audiobooks at Vacaville, Richard Chase at six, Ted Bundy at thirty confessed, and John Wayne Gacy at thirty three.