"I Ask for No Consideration": Jeffrey Dahmer's Statement and Sentencing, 1992

Name: "I Ask for No Consideration": Jeffrey Dahmer's Statement and Sentencing, 1992
Uploaded: 2022-10-16
Duration: 24 min 35 s
Description: Court TV's footage of Jeffrey Dahmer reading his full statement to the Milwaukee court, followed by Judge Laurence Gram's reasons and fifteen consecutive life sentences.

Court TV's footage of Jeffrey Dahmer reading his full statement to the Milwaukee court, followed by Judge Laurence Gram's reasons and fifteen consecutive life sentences.

Subject: Jeffrey Dahmer
Recorded: February 17, 1992
Runtime: 24:35

Content warning: Dahmer and the judge refer to the murders of fifteen young men and boys, the destruction of their bodies and the identification of remains.

The Statement

On February 17, 1992, before Judge Laurence Gram Jr. passed sentence in Milwaukee County Circuit Court, Jeffrey Dahmer stood and read a prepared statement. It lasted about six minutes. Court TV's cameras were in the courtroom, and this recording, from Court TV's own archive, contains the whole statement, followed by the judge's reasons for the sentence, the sentence itself on all fifteen counts, and the closing exchanges with counsel.

Historical Context

Dahmer was arrested in Milwaukee on July 22, 1991, after a man escaped from his apartment and led police to it. He confessed to killing seventeen young men and boys between 1978 and 1991. In January 1992 he pleaded guilty but insane to fifteen counts of murder in Milwaukee County, and a trial was held to decide only whether he was legally insane. On Saturday, February 15, 1992, the jury found that he was not. Wisconsin has no death penalty.

Circumstances of the Statement

The sentencing hearing took place two days after the verdict. Statements from his victims' families came before his; they are not part of this recording, though the judge refers to a family statement in his remarks. District Attorney E. Michael McCann and defence attorney Gerald Boyle were present, and Boyle asked at the end for a ten-minute contact visit for Dahmer with his mother, stepmother and father, which the judge granted.

What the Statement Covers

Dahmer says the case was never about getting free and that he "wanted death" for himself. He says he did not kill for reasons of hate, that he "knew I was sick, or evil, or both", and that he now believed he was sick. He says his help in identifying remains was "hardly anything", that he had "created a holocaust", and that he would not contest the families' civil cases and wanted any money to go to them. He apologises to the police officers who had lost their jobs over the May 1991 call involving Konerak Sinthasomphone ("I just plain fooled them"), to the judge in his earlier case and to his probation officer. He thanks his lawyers and the deputies, recites a Bible passage, and ends: "I ask for no consideration."

Judge Gram then says that the jury was right to find no mental disease, and that, had he needed to rule, he would have held that a paraphilia is not a mental disease under Wisconsin law. He gives his own view of Dahmer's motive (that he killed to remain anonymous and destroyed the evidence), questions sentencing-day religion, and imposes life imprisonment on each count, with ten more years for habitual criminality on the first two counts and parole eligibility set at seventy years on each of the others, all consecutive, so that Dahmer "will never again see freedom".

What Makes the Recording Significant

The statement is Dahmer's best-known address in court, and its words have been quoted ever since. This recording preserves the whole of it in his own voice, from the broadcaster that filmed it, together with the judge's full reasoning and the sentence.

Archival Importance

This recording supplies the complete statement and the sentencing, with date and source.

Important Caveats

That he was sick, that his crimes were not hate crimes, and that he had found religion are Dahmer's own characterisations; the jury rejected his insanity defence, and the judge openly doubted sentencing-day conversions. The judge's account of Dahmer's motive is his own view. Court TV's description says Dahmer was "convicted of 15 of the 16 murders he had committed in Wisconsin": the fifteen convictions were his guilty pleas, and the jury decided only his sanity. The transcript has not yet been checked by a human listener.

Speaker Not Identified: [inaudible] stand right now.

Jeffrey Dahmer: Your Honor, it is over now. This has never been a case of trying to get free. I didn't ever want freedom. Frankly, I wanted death for myself. This was a case to tell the world that I did what I did not for reasons of hate. I hated no one. I knew I was sick, or evil, or both. Now I believe I was sick. The doctors have told me about my sickness, and now I have some peace.

Jeffrey Dahmer: I know how much harm I have caused. I tried to do the best I could after the arrest to make amends, but no matter what I did, I could not undo the terrible harm I have caused. My attempt to help identify the remains was the best that I could do, and that was hardly anything. I feel so bad for what I did to those poor families, and I understand their rightful hate.

Jeffrey Dahmer: I know I will be in prison for the rest of my life. I know that I will have to turn to God to help me get through each day. I should have stayed with God. I tried and failed, and created a holocaust. Thank God there will be no more harm that I can do. I believe that only the Lord Jesus Christ can save me [unclear: "for" / "from"] my sins.

Jeffrey Dahmer: I have instructed Mr. Boyle to end this matter. I do not want to contest the civil case. I have told Mr. Boyle to try and finalize them if he can. If there is ever any money, I want it to go to the victims' families. I have talked to Mr. Boyle about other things that might help ease my conscience in some way, of coming up with ideas on how to make some amends to these families, and I will work with him on that. I want to return to Ohio and quickly end that matter so that I can put all of this behind me, and then come right back here to do my sentence.

Jeffrey Dahmer: I decided to go through this trial for a number of reasons. One of the reasons was to let the world know that these were not hate crimes. I wanted the world [unclear: "in" / "and"] Milwaukee, which I deeply hurt, to know the truth of what I did. I didn't want unanswered questions. All the questions have now been answered. I wanted to find out just what it was that caused me to be so bad and evil. But most of all, Mr. Boyle and I decided that maybe there was a way for us to tell the world that if there are people out there with these disorders, maybe they can get some help before they end up being hurt or hurting someone. I think the trial did that.

Jeffrey Dahmer: I take all the blame for what I did. I hurt many people. The judge in my earlier case tried to help me, and I refused his help, and he got hurt by what I did. I hurt those policemen in the [unclear: "Konerak" / "counteract"] matter, and I shall ever regret causing them to lose their jobs, and I hope and pray that they can get their jobs back, because I know they did their best, and I just plain fooled them. For that I am so sorry. I know I hurt my probation officer, who was really trying to help me. I'm so sorry for that, and sorry for everyone else that I have hurt.

Jeffrey Dahmer: I've hurt my mother and father and stepmother. I love them all so very much. I hope that they will find the same peace I am looking for. Mr. Boyle's associates, Wendy and Ellen, have been wonderful to me, helping me through this worst of all times. I want to publicly thank Mr. Boyle. He didn't need to take this case, but when I asked him to help me find the answers and to help others if I could, he stayed with me and went way overboard in trying to help me.

Jeffrey Dahmer: Mr. Boyle and I agreed that it was never a matter of trying to get off. It was only a matter of which place I would be housed the rest of my life, not for my comfort, but for trying to study me in the hopes of helping me, and learning to help others who might have problems. I know I will be in prison. I pledge to talk to doctors who might be able to find some answers.

Jeffrey Dahmer: In closing, I just want to say that I hope God has forgiven me. I know society will never be able to forgive me. I know the families of the victims will never be able to forgive me for what I have done. I promise I will pray each day to ask for their forgiveness when the hurt goes away, if ever. I have seen their tears, and if I could give my life right now to bring their loved ones back, I would do it. I am so very sorry.

Jeffrey Dahmer: Your Honor, I know that you are about to sentence me. I ask for no consideration. I want you to know that I have been treated perfectly by the deputies who have been in your court and the deputies who work the jail. The deputies have treated me very professionally, and I want everyone to know that. They have not given me special treatment.

Jeffrey Dahmer: Here is a trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance: Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of [unclear: "who" / "whom"] I am the worst. But for that very reason I was shown mercy, so that in me, the worst of sinners, Christ Jesus might display his unlimited patience as an example for those who would believe in him and receive an eternal life. Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory forever and ever.

Jeffrey Dahmer: I know my time in prison will be terrible, but I deserve whatever I get because of what I have done. Thank you, Your Honor, and I am prepared for your sentence, which I know will be the maximum. I ask for no consideration.

Speaker Not Identified: [unclear: "matter, Your Honor" / inaudible] Thank you.

Judge: It now becomes the duty of the court to impose sentence in this case, and one of my obligations [is] to set forth on the record the basis for the sentence imposed. In doing that, I'm required to consider the seriousness of the offenses, the needs of the community for protection from the defendant, as well as the needs of the defendant. In doing this, there are some observations that I would like to make. You know, I've spent three weeks listening, and now it's my time to say a few things.

Judge: Uh, one of the things is that real people have been involved in this case and have been affected by it. I thought, you know, the first family statement that I got, which went down and said a little bit about the feelings of each of the family members, I think conveyed that it's real people that have been affected by the crimes that have been committed here. And that doesn't go to just one family, it goes to all the families. But I thought that one was particularly, stood out in my mind, with the way it was done.

Judge: However, the victims' families are not the only real people involved in this case. There's the defendant's family. You know, this is a court that handles criminal matters on a regular basis. Right now we're designated as a violent crime court, so it's not unusual for us to see not just the families of victims, but also the families of defendants. You know, time and time again you see a situation where the defendant comes from a good family but committed a horrible crime. We must sentence the defendant for committing that crime, knowing full well that the families, the family of the defendant will also be adversely affected, and perhaps did nothing for which they should be hurt any more than the victims' families did anything for which they should be hurt.

Judge: A number of you have heard me use the expression before: I wish I had that magic button that I could put things back in place. But I don't have the power to bring people back to life. You know, that's in the hands of somebody else. I can't change what's happened. What I have to do is acknowledge the facts as they are and proceed to a meaningful sentence.

Judge: We heard a great deal of talk in this case about mental disease. The jury found that a mental disease did not exist, I think correctly so. What I noticed is that many of the participants, including both lawyers, had difficulty using mental disease as a term separate from mental illness. Many times those terms were, I think, unconsciously used interchangeably. Mental disease is a word of art, a legal word of art, defined in the statute book. Some mental conditions, or mental illness, by definition do not constitute a mental disease. And had it become necessary for the court to rule, it would be the ruling of this court that a paraphilia, as a matter of definition, is not a mental disease as that term is defined in our statute.

Judge: One of the things that was particularly significant to me, when we had our psychiatric and psychological experts on the stand and they were talking, what was it, DSM-III-R, that thick book that we had, was that when this term paraphilia was coined, it was coined to replace "sexual deviate". And it was done so because they were carving out from the definition homosexuality, because there had been a change in public attitude in regard to that particular situation. It seems to me that in doing so, what the people defining the term were trying to do, not necessarily [that] they were trying to conform to Wisconsin law, but they were trying to create a term that fits that exception that we have in our statutes, which says that an abnormality manifested only by repeated criminal or otherwise antisocial conduct does not constitute a mental disease.

Judge: You see, what the statute's doing is taking some things that constitute a mental condition and say, as we use the term mental disease, that's not included within that language. I say that because I think I owe it to my profession, having heard all the testimony that I've heard, to set forth on the record what my views are as far as that particular situation is concerned. It never became necessary for me specifically to rule on it.

Judge: As to the seriousness of the offense, I've listened to the testimony the way everybody else has listened to the testimony, the way our 14 jurors listened to the testimony, and I too have a view of what's going on, or what was going on, as far as Mr. Dahmer is concerned. First of all, every witness that examined him told us he was an intelligent man, probably superior intelligence. I agreed that he used that intelligence to manipulate people. I don't think there's any question about it.

Judge: I believe what we had was a homosexual who could not accept the fact that he was a homosexual. That he from time to time involved himself in homosexual activities, and there was never a problem in a situation that he could walk away from and remain, in effect, anonymous. But once he brought somebody to his home, he could no longer remain anonymous, and therefore he [unclear: "was caught" / "could be caught"]. There's one way to avoid that: destroy the evidence. It's a vicious way to destroy the evidence. But that's my view of what was going on.

Judge: Uh, in terms of what happened to these people, gosh, I was horrified. You know, when we asked the questions in jury selection about, you know, how you react to some of these things, fortunately nobody gets to ask the judge that question. Nobody gets to ask the judge how you feel about horror movies, because I'll tell you what I do: I turn them off. That's one of the powers that you have when you control the television set.

Judge: I can go into other things in my background that, uh, well, let's talk about it. There was a time in my life that I made a living in a packing house, and I was a little squeamish in terms of dealing with animals. Gosh knows I got to be squeamish when we talk about doing some of those same things to human beings, real people. I saw Dr. Fosdal on the witness stand. Here's a physician. I don't know if any of you noticed it, but I noticed that he got very, very uncomfortable when he was talking about what was done to these human beings.

Judge: People are looking to me to provide a measure of protection to the community. And I don't think there's only one way that that protection can be provided, and that is to see that this defendant never again has the opportunity to walk the streets of our community as a free man. You know, that really, that's part of judicial discretion, I guess, but it really in this case doesn't require a whole lot of discretion. I can't imagine anybody else coming up with any other conclusion, and I think that's been acknowledged by both the defense attorney and the defendant himself.

Judge: [unclear: "As to" / "And that's"] the treatment, the needs of the defendant: that's something in what the court does in sentencing that's not within the discretion of the court, but it is within the discretion of the institution where he will be going. As I listened to the parade of psychiatric and psychological experts, I didn't hear anybody say that he was a totally normal individual. I think the opinion is universal that he has some significant problems, and if he can benefit, or society can benefit, from treatment or study, I think that should happen within the institutional system, and there's no reason why it can't.

Judge: Mr. Dahmer made reference to religion. Anybody have any idea how many defendants find religion when they come before this court for sentencing? Do they sincerely find it? I don't know. How do I determine that? Some of them keep that newfound sense of religion all the way till that door over there. Some keep it a lot longer. You know, that's something between God and Mr. Dahmer. And if indeed he's found religion, I hope that he keeps it, and I hope it helps him for the rest of his life, which is going to be spent in one of our penal institutions.

Judge: Now, Mr. McCann, is it the first two counts on which there's a habitual? Uh, I don't have the complaint in front of me. Is that correct?

District Attorney: It actually attaches to all of them, Your Honor.

Judge: All counts, but only the first two?

District Attorney: No, it attaches to all 15. I addressed specifically the first two because that would add 10 years to what would be the minimum parole release.

Judge: And on the others I have the discretion, because it's under the new, the new statute. Of course, clearly he falls within the habitual criminality statute, and the court makes that finding.

Judge: As to count one, the court will impose the mandatory life sentence plus an additional 10 years on the habitual criminality. Count two, life imprisonment plus 10 years, consecutive to count one. Count three, life imprisonment, with the date of parole eligibility 70 years from the inception of that particular sentence. I don't have all the numbers, that I can't work it out, but it'll be 70 years from the beginning of that sentence, which will be consecutive, uh, to count two. Count four, life imprisonment, with a parole eligibility to be 70 years from the commencement of that sentence, consecutive... Where am I at on the numbers? Somebody has to [inaudible]. [unclear: "Court reporter" / "Then reported"], what was the last? I should check this off on your side.

Court Reporter Or Clerk: [inaudible] Four was the last one.

Judge: Last, four. Four was the last one, okay. Count five, life imprisonment, parole eligibility to be 70 years after the inception of that sentence, to be consecutive to count four. Count six, uh, life imprisonment with parole eligibility to be 70 years after the inception of that sentence, to be consecutive to count five. Count seven, life imprisonment with parole eligibility to be 70 years after the inception of that sentence, to be consecutive to count six. Count eight, life imprisonment with parole eligibility to be 70 years after the inception of that sentence, to be consecutive to count seven.

Judge: Count nine, life imprisonment with parole eligibility to be 70 years after the inception of that sentence, to be consecutive to count eight. Count 10, uh, life imprisonment, uh, with parole eligibility to be 70 years after the inception of that sentence, to be consecutive to count nine. Count 11, life imprisonment, uh, with parole eligibility to be 70 years after the inception of that, uh, sentence, to be consecutive to count 10. Count 12, life imprisonment with parole eligibility to be 70 years after the inception of that sentence, to be consecutive to count 11. Uh, count 13, life imprisonment with, uh, parole eligibility to be 70 years after the inception of that sentence, to be consecutive to count 12.

Judge: Count 14, life imprisonment with parole eligibility to be 70 years after the inception of that sentence, uh, to be consecutive to count 13. Count 15, life imprisonment with parole eligibility to be 70 years after the inception of that sentence, to be consecutive to count 14.

Judge: I believe I have, and I intended to, follow the recommendation of the state. I could have said something different which would have had the same impact. I really see, nobody gains anything by just to say more and more years. The important point is that the sentence is structured in such a way that this defendant will never again see freedom. That is owed to this community in order to protect the community, as well as acknowledgement of the seriousness of the offenses. Those are the reasons. The sentence, of course, is to the state prison system. Uh, one thing I didn't provide: all of these sentences are consecutive to the time he's presently serving. There are appellate rights. Mr. Boyle, you'll be reviewing with your client his appellate rights.

Defence Attorney: I'd like to indicate to the court that they will be signed in the proper form. The [unclear: "charge" / "target"] that will be checked, as required, is that he is undecided. That's only to preserve the right to move it along the proper way. The final decision will be made within 20 days [unclear: "after we had let some settlement here" / "after sentencing here"]. I don't anticipate there will be an appeal. I only say that because that's what my client wanted me to say, but I still want deliberation on that decision, and I want to make that a part of the record. Lastly, Your Honor, I am required to ask the court on the record for a 10-minute contact visit with his mother, stepmother and father, and I would ask if the court would grant that.

Judge: Are they present?

Defence Attorney: They're in some hallway.

Judge: I didn't know that they're present.

Defence Attorney: In the building, I understand they are. I have not seen them.

Judge: Any objection to them?

District Attorney: I join in the request.

Judge: So ordered.

Defence Attorney: Thank you, Your Honor.

Judge: Anything further for the court?

Counsel: No, may it please the court. Thank you.

Judge: Court's in recess. ---