What do you think, how serial killers and murderers are like in real life? When the question was asked on AskReddit many friends or relatives of murderers replied with something that wasn’t expected. Nothing specifically stands out and you have absolutely no idea about the secret life that they live.
The scary part is that it isn’t the weird quiet kid in class but it’s the funny charming guy.
Charming and Popular Boy
From user, u/Mister-Grumpy: Charming, had lots of friends. I remember sitting on the school bus thinking I should try to be more like him. He was always smiling, and girls would flirt with him. About 8-10 years after that, he was arrested along with another guy his age for the burglary, rape, and murder of a very old woman and her dog.
He was a Jerk and Killed five people
From user u/cat9tail: He was a jerk. His wife was my friend, and she started slowly telling me a few things about him. They came to our home for some gatherings we held, and he was simply “off” and very controlling of her social life. When several of us reached out to her, she happily accepted our help to get her out of the marriage and into safety. Soon after, he showed up at my door one-day demanding money, which I did not give him. He left, angry.
A few months later, he was evicted from his rental in the next town over and came back into our town, hell-bent on killing everyone who helped her and who was associated with the rental situation and another circumstance that he was mad about. I was not home that night, thankfully. He hunted down and killed five people, one of whom was a friend of mine. He committed suicide when the police had him cornered. That was nearly 30 years ago.
Andy, my friend, I still miss you and your goofy grin. Read More.
Normal Kid murdered Chris Kyle.
From user u/tamalediet: I went to school with the guy that murdered Chris Kyle (American Sniper) and Chad Littlefield. He was a pretty normal kid, kinda funny, had ADHD I believe, and was in some of the academic assistance programs if I can remember right. Class clown type, for the most part, doesn’t remember him getting into a bunch of fights or anything.
Nothing specific really stands out. His mom was one of our teachers in elementary. He left school early and joined the military. Did a couple tours, including the Haitian disaster relief in the early 2010s. Apparently fishing bodies out of wreckage is what messed him up really bad. After that he had horrible PTSD and developed some bad mental health issues.
Horrible story and outcome from someone who was once pretty normal. I knew him from 3rd grade or so until senior year. Not great friends or anything but he seemed like a decent guy. We’d been out of school for about 10 years or so when it happened so a lot changed over that time I’m sure.
Gentle and Kind
From user u/Meganja23: I wasn’t friends with him but he wanted to be friends with me! I moved to another town when I was 10, it was a neighborhood. My neighbors were friendly so were people on the street. My next-door neighbors and the neighbor across the street, Bill. When I was 10 my house burned to the ground and when I was crying out front with the firefighters and insurance workers Bill approached me and talked with me. He was gentle, kind, an older man with grey silver hair and a beard to match. He told me he knew I was often alone at home because my mom works and told me I was allowed to come over at any time. He even mentioned having games to play and movies to watch. I told him thank you.
As I grew older, I didnt pay much attention to Bill. I never went over but every day I walked home Bill was out doing something in this lawn or garage. He had a bike and often had a younger gentlemen in his 40’s who visited a lot.
One night Bill’s packing up a huge Uhaul by 11 PM on a weekday. I was 13 then.
A month or so passed, we found out from one of our neighbors that she might of done something bad. Neighbor finds Bill on Americas Most Wanted (this woman is a stay at home mother who doesnt believe in the outside world products and stuff. Tons of free time). She said it looked exactly like him, so much so that the next time she saw him outside she told him so. She casually went up the man and told him she saw someone who looked exactly like him on Americas Most Wanted.
The very single next day is the day I saw them moving out at 11PM.
When I asked what the crimes were, she told me looking sick that he and his brother have been kidnapping young girls, raping them, and killing n throwing them out as they move separately or together to find another spot. They’ve been wanted for decades.
Love Him like a Brother
From user u/burnt-cinnamon-roll: He was like a big, goofy, brother. I loved him to bits but fell out of contact with him when I split with my ex. Last year his ex (we were friends through him) sent me an article via FB Messenger detailing how he murdered his new wife and her three young kids then set the trailer they were all living in on fire. The pictures of him in the article chilled me to the bone, the guy I knew back then wasn’t there. There was just a cold-blooded emptiness in his eyes. He’s still waiting to be put on trial.
Fairly normal, his family didn’t have any clue
From user u/surfpuink622: My ex GF’s brother, he was fairly normal. Nobody had a clue until the police gave their theory and then the whole family pretty much agreed it was him. He killed 6 prostitutes between Maryland and New Jersey.
My Mom really liked her
From user u/chancesarent: My mom used to work with Dana Sue Gray and was friends with her. (My mom didn’t know her middle name was Sue until the murders, btw) my mom really liked her but she was very materialistic. Whenever I saw her she was very friendly and would talk to me about Ren and Stimpy as I was 9 and obsessed with the cartoon at the time. What was really weird was that we lived in a decent-sized city, but one of her victims that lived and later helped ID her, Dorinda Hawkins, was our next-door neighbor. There was no other connection she had to Dorinda and she strangled her in a storefront downtown.
Karla Homolka was a sweet girl
From user, u/gmckenzie1995: Not me but my old boss used to babysit Karla Homolka for several years before she was old enough to not need a babysitter, but she would still come over to her house and hang out with her kids all the time.
She said she was a sweet girl, and that her kids were very close friends with her. She also knew Paul Bernardo because of Karla but she never mentioned him much other than she believed he brainwashed her into aiding him with all the murders.
The Dark Knight Killer went to school with my cousins
From user, u/lauxamlamae: The Dark Knight killer who shot up the theater in Colorado grew up right behind my aunt’s house in San Diego. She would frequently babysit the kids in her neighborhood, this was the mid-90s to early 2000s. I’d come over a lot to visit my cousins, there were always lots of kids over playing, usually older than me and he was one of them. He went to high school and college with my cousins as well but I personally only ever met him as a very young child and I can’t personally remember any interactions.
My one cousin however did know him as a normal, extremely intelligent person, very interested in the brain and science. Come college he was so invested in his studies they grew apart and eventually moved away cutting all contact. Wish I knew more or had more to say, all I remember is being in the backyard playing with the dogs by the pool being rambunctious little ones never thinking one day down the road that kid would dye his hair orange and be a murderer.
My professor sat next to Ted Bundy
From user u/nofartknockin: One of my professors “Mr. Anderson” sat near Ted Bundy in a college course due to the proximity of their last names in alphabetical order. My grandmother in law had a store next to a serial killer from Montana (can’t remember his name now) but in both cases, the people said they were just nice as could be. No suspicion of being a killer at all.
That’s what scares me the most, they aren’t the weird quiet kid. They’re the charming funny guys.
He asked for drinks just a day before
From user, u/krackrocksteady: I worked with a guy who killed his wife and drove her car through a few states with her body in the back (it was an SUV) and their youngest son in the front. I live in Texas, he got caught in Ohio after his wife was reported missing and they tracked her car via the Onstar system. They found him at a woman’s house he apparently met online, a fight ensued and he got arrested just before the police opened the trunk and found his wife.
The last text I got from him was him telling us he “needed to get out,” and asking us to get drinks or something with him. Both of us were busy that day, so we couldn’t. The next day back at work, he isn’t there. Two more days pass, nothing. I ask our trainer if he’s heard anything, as he wasn’t responding to texts, and the trainer gave me a look and said he couldn’t discuss it. I found out what happened when I googled his name.
I stopped playing with him because he kept trying to rape all the female NPCs/player characters.
From user, u/originalsanitizer: Played D&D with a guy on deployment for a few months while I was in the Navy. We hung out in the same group of people. I stopped playing because he kept trying to rape all the female NPCs/player characters. When we got back from deployment the FBI and NCIS were pier-side waiting for him. He and some other guys had raped and killed a woman who’s husband was on deployment. Also had some friends who tied up an old man who they suspected of molesting one’s younger brother when we were teenagers.
They tortured him for hours, then killed him and tried to burn the body. Two got life, the other turned evidence and only served a few years. Had another guy I was pretty good friends with getting arrested by ATF for trying to blow up the car of our local ADA. He bought fake C4 from an undercover agent, they swarmed him while he was pushing the switch. As I write this, I realize I’ve been close to some really messed up people. Maybe I’m the one who isn’t right.
Weird Guy with drug edition
From user u/Jmjones30 :He wasn’t a serial killer, but a killer nonetheless. I grew up around him and his family, they were poor but were usually able to make ends meet. He was known to have previous drug addictions and was overall a very weird guy. He was the type of guy that sent alarms off in your head when you’re around him, I always tried to avoid him. He and his wife had two kids together, but they always had a very rocky marriage. She left him numerous times, but they always got back together.
She ended up moving out of state to take care of an ill family member and left him. He showed up at their door insisting on talking to her, and she eventually let him in. They got into a very heated argument and he turned a gun on her and shot her, right in front of their young two kids. He tried to turn it on himself but I believe the oldest wrestled it from him and held it until the cops showed up. It was an incredibly sad and sickening story, no one could believe he would do such a thing.
Childhood friend arrested with 3 Prostitutes bodies
From former user: He was so sweet, he was basically my childhood friend. Then one day I stopped hearing from him, 1 or 2 years later he called me and asked me out. I said yes and was so happy. I really did love him. On the way to the restaurant, someone hit my car and I wasn’t able to go. A week later, the day before I was supposed to meet him, he got arrested for having 3 bodies of prostitutes that had recently gone missing, stored in his basement. all of them severely damaged and beaten.
Friend worked with John Lennon’s killer
I have a friend that worked with Mark David Chapman. He is the man who killed John Lennon. My friend said that Mark David Chapman was a really nice guy when she worked with him. I guess you never really know someone.
My aunt was Aileen Wuornos
From user u/DucklesMcFuckles: It wasn’t a friend, my Aunt was Aileen Wuornos. She was executed a few years before I found out. When the movie Monster came out my parents took me and my brother to see it and afterward they gave us the whole story and let us know she was VERY close in the family.
She was old and decrepit, had balding frizzy white hair, and had a terrifying facial expression.. crazy eyes I guess. My cousins have no idea they are so closely related to her but.. let’s just say the crazy definitely was inherited. My female cousin is leading the exact same type of life, she was already out of control and dating adult men at the age of twelve. And they look eerily similar. I’m just waiting for the day I can answer these types of threads with “yes I know a serial killer and I grew up with her”.
One of the nicest guy she dated
From user u/fredzout: A guy I was in high school with was a multiple murderer, but not quite a serial killer. I didn’t really have much direct contact with him in school, but at a class reunion after he was executed, his prom date said he was one of the nicest guys she dated in HS.
Pee Wee was pretty normal
My father was next door neighbor to the infamous Pee Wee Gaskins, my dad and his family thought he was pretty normal and had him over a few times, he was going to sell his car to my dad thank god he didn’t it was used in the murders, after he was arrested they moved upstate because they were close to him even if civil at best, they were invited to the execution by Pee Wee but they all declined.