Sadistic Killers: Profiles of Pathological Predators

SADISTIC KILLERS

Copyright © Carol Anne Davis 2007

All rights reserved.

The right of Carol Anne Davis to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

Condition of Sale

This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out or otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent publisher.

Summersdale Publishers Ltd

46 West Street

Chichester

West Sussex

PO19 1RP

UK

www.summersdale.com

Printed and bound in Great Britain

ISBN: 1-84024-581-6

ISBN 13: 978-1-84024-581-3

Cover photographs show Irma Greese and Neville Heath.

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About the Author

Carol Anne Davis was born in Dundee, moved to Edinburgh in her twenties and now lives in south-west England. She left school at 15 and was everything from an artist’s model to an editorial assistant before going to university. Her Master of the Arts degree included criminology and was followed by a postgraduate diploma in Adult and Community Education.

A full-time writer since graduating, her crime novels
Kiss it
Away
,
Noise Abatement
,
Safe as Houses
and
Shrouded
have been described as chillingly realistic for their portrayals of dangerous sex and death.

She is also the author of the true crime books
Couples Who
Kill: Profiles of Deviant Duos
,
Children Who Kill: Profiles of Preteen
and Teenage Killers
and
Women Who Kill: Profiles of Female Serial
Killers
.

Carol’s website is located at www.carolannedavis.co.uk.

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Acknowledgements

I’m grateful to Dr Bob Johnson for providing me with information about his work with sadistic killers. During his years as a consultant psychiatrist at Parkhurst Prison – and as Head of Therapy at Ashworth Maximum Security Hospital

– he treated numerous violent men.

And I’m deeply indebted to Lynn Paula Russell for giving what must be one of the most honest and detailed interviews on consensual sadomasochism ever to appear in a mainstream publication. As the artist behind
The Illustrated Book of Corporal
Punishment
and numerous similar works, she brings courage and humour to a subject that is frequently misunderstood.

Many thanks to Mark Ramsden for sharing his insight into the psychological forces driving many sadomasochists. Mark wrote the text for the photographic book
Radical Desire
and is also author of several novels including
The Dungeonmaster’s
Apprentice
and
The Sacred Blood.

I’m grateful to the publishers of
Master Detective
magazine for providing me with additional information about the largely forgotten murder of British teenager Suzanne Capper. I’d also like to acknowledge the Home Office for clarifying the legal position on sadomasochism and for suggesting other sources worthy of research.

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For Ian

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CONTENTS

Introduction......................................................................................................9

Part One – Nowhere to Go: British Sadists

Neville George Clevely Heath.......................................................................15

Patrick Joseph Byrne.......................................................................................30

Victor Glenford Miller....................................................................................39

Anthony Paul Anderson...................................................................................45

Colin John Ireland..........................................................................................50

Sadistic Diversity.............................................................................................63

Part Two – Moving On: American Sadists

Robert Ben Rhoades.......................................................................................96

Rex Allan Krebs.............................................................................................105

Dayton Leroy Rogers.....................................................................................117

Robert Christian Hansen..............................................................................133

John Joseph Joubert......................................................................................162

Jesse James Cummings..................................................................................170

Richard Francis Cottingham.........................................................................181

Part Three – The Wilderness Years: Australian Sadists
Christopher Bernard Wilder..........................................................................198

Ivan Robert Marko Milat...............................................................................218

Paul Charles Denyer......................................................................................232

Part Four – Everything Under the Sun: Sadism Worldwide
Sadists Who Kill Men...................................................................................242

Sadists Who Kill Women................................................................................255

Sadists Who Kill Children..............................................................................270

Sadists Who Kill Indiscriminately.................................................................279

Female Sadists................................................................................................286

Part Five – Boundaries

Safe And Sane: Consensual Sadomasochism................................................306

Changing Things...........................................................................................319

Appendix: Useful Addresses..........................................................................327

Select Bibliography........................................................................................329

Index...............................................................................................................332

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INTRODUCTION

‘Life being what it is, one dreams of revenge,’ wrote the artist Paul Gauguin in the nineteenth century. It’s a sentiment echoed by many sadistic killers. Most are working class males in their twenties and thirties, but the chapter on female sadists explores murders committed by women as young as 19.

Sadistic killers differ from most murderers in that they love to control their victims and make them suffer – witnessing such pain and fear brings the sadist immense sexual satisfaction.

They also want to prolong this controlling phase for as long as possible. This is in stark contrast to the man or woman who kills for profit, to eliminate a love rival or during a domestic argument. Such non-sadistic killers try to annihilate the other party as quickly as possible, often stabbing them through the heart or bludgeoning them about the head. Similarly, the murderous parent hurriedly smothers their baby’s cries and the necrophile kills swiftly in order to have access to dead flesh.

To the sadist, this shoot-to-kill approach is a complete anathema, as it leaves him (or, less commonly, her) with a dead body. In contrast, he needs a live, sentient victim who will respond to his commands. If he can transport his victims to his home or to a hotel, as Robert Rhoades and Richard Cottingham did respectively, then he can train them to satisfy his every desire. But if a sadist inadvertently kills his victim too quickly, he will often try to hurt or humiliate the corpse, extensively mutilating the flesh in his desire for revenge. His rage, which has invariably built for years during his unhappy childhood, has to go somewhere so he attacks the cadaver.

Details of what the sadist did to his victim (and, in some instances, how the victim responded) have often come from the sadist himself as he confided in close friends, a tape recorder 9

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SADISTIC KILLERS

or a diary. In other instances, this information comes from pathologist, police or psychiatric reports.

The British sadists profiled in this book were often on low incomes so lacked a safe house to take their victims to.

Consequently they killed in hotels, hostels or the victim’s own home. In contrast, the American sadists had customised vans in which to transport their victims and one of the sadists even owned a small plane. Similarly, the Australian sadists often utilised the great outdoors, attacking their victims on secluded beaches or taking them deep into the woods. I chose these cases from the many available because of their variety: every type of sadist, from a teenage boy scout to a wealthy building contractor to an unemployed cross-dresser, is portrayed in detail here.

Sadism isn’t new, but it was once the province of the comparatively rich – as Maslow’s hierarchy of needs delineates, you have to be well fed and comfortably housed before you can begin to feel sexual. But in our industrialised society, even the unemployed sadist has his basic requirements taken care of and can find the energy to lure victim after victim to a secluded forest, safe house or modified van.

Broadly speaking, there are three types of sadists – the sadistic killer, the sadistic criminal and the consensual sadist.

The profiles in this book obviously concentrate on the killers, with the majority of them killing serially. But it also covers the second category by default as almost all of the killers were sadistic criminals earlier in their offending careers. That is, they abducted and harmed various victims but did not kill them, either because they came to their senses or their quarry escaped.

The third category, that of the consensual sadist, should ideally be outside of a study of criminality, but law enforcement agencies and the general public don’t always make the distinction and, as a result, the man who whips his consenting sexually-10

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Introduction

submissive girlfriend is confused with a genuine abuser and may even be charged with actual bodily harm. Yet many of our most lauded literary figures and artists have been recreational sadists – and ten per cent of the general population has an interest in sadomasochistic exchanges – a subject explored in the penultimate chapter on consensual erotic punishment.

The final chapter explores how we can prevent sadistic killers being formed and how we can potentially treat those who already exist. It’s followed by a
Useful Addresses
section for anyone who wants to know more about sexual power play, child protection and criminal violence.

Doubtless the occasional Pollyanna figure will dismiss this book as gratuitous, but, as former FBI agent John Douglas pointed out, it’s only by studying a man’s actions that we can know what kind of person he truly is. More importantly, without this knowledge we can never change anything.

11

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PART ONE

NOWHERE TO GO: BRITISH SADISTS

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CHAPTER ONE

NEVILLE GEORGE

CLEVELY HEATH

Heath’s obsession with flagellation began during
his childhood in England. By adulthood he had
bankrupted himself by paying prostitutes in foreign
climes to let him cane them again and again.

Returning to Britain and purchasing several riding
switches and dogwhips, he sadistically murdered
two young women.

Formative in uences

Neville was born on 6 June 1917 to Bessie and William Heath, a housewife and barber. Bessie was described as much more domineering than her significantly older spouse. The family lived in Ilford but soon moved to Wimbledon where Bessie gave birth to a second son. Neville was always much closer to his mother and brother than to his father.

When Neville was five, his parents enrolled him at a mixed gender convent school which was just down the road.