Chapter Twenty-Four #2
“More or less. I compiled the information from the Ripper murders along with what we know about Larsen’s recent crimes.
” He scrolled to one of the sections labeled Organized vs.
Disorganized. “I’m sure you remember a lot of this from your criminal justice classes.
An organized killer is one who plans his crime ahead of time, brings his weapons with him.
The disorganized killer grabs a knife out of a victim’s kitchen drawer to stab her.
He’s more spontaneous, less controlled and tends to make a lot of mistakes.
A disorganized killer is generally easier to find than the organized one because of those mistakes. Which one would you say Larsen is?”
“Easy. Organized. He planned everything down to the last detail, from the camera hidden in the tree over the path where I went walking to the section of fence he loosened behind the Brodericks’ home.
He had to have spent months getting that shack set up as his own personal prison, installing the bars on the windows and doors. ”
“You get an A plus. He’s definitely an organized killer, which gives us insight into his mind and how he thinks.
Mason confirmed that Larsen purchased that shack over a year ago.
I don’t know whether he planned to go after you again, or someone else.
But he was definitely preparing it well ahead of time for another victim.
Knowing he was an organized killer helps predict other things, like that he probably had a steady job. ”
“He worked for a realty company,” she said.
“Not exactly nine to five, but he would have had some kind of schedule, checked in now and then, attended meetings.” She crossed her arms, remembering what she’d researched on the Kentucky Ripper’s crimes.
“But that doesn’t fit what I know about the Ripper. ”
“Maybe. Maybe not.” He punched a few buttons and a list of names and dates appeared on the screen to the left of the main one they’d been looking at. “You should recognize those.”
“The ripper’s victims. Six of them.”
“What do they have in common?”
“Other than the obvious? The carved X’s in their bellies, the fact that they were abducted for days or weeks before being killed? That all of them were stabbed, including the ones you haven’t listed. Some were shot too.”
“Other than all of that. What type of killer was responsible for the kinds of crime scenes we found in those examples?”
She thought about it, then shrugged. “You’re going to say whoever killed them was organized.
I remember those crime scenes were pristine.
Very little forensic evidence was found.
No weapons were left behind. I could go on, but I can’t argue that point.
Those particular crime scenes were indicative of an organized perpetrator.
But there were eight more killings. And those were the opposite of organized. They were...sloppy.”
“Yes. They were.” He displayed another list of names on the monitor to the right of the main one, the eight victims she’d just mentioned. “All of these were similar because they seemed to be the work of a disorganized killer.”
“Right,” she agreed. “Given the mix of organized and disorganized crime scenes, the conclusion goes more to a mental disease, like Finney suffered from. He was, is, bipolar. The theory was that he killed some in his manic state—the disorganized killings—and some in his depressive state—the organized ones.”
“It’s a popular theory, one the police bought into back then.
” He motioned toward the first list. “Consider these victims again. Although they were brutally killed, the number of stab wounds is low. Only three for the first victim, six on another, and something in between for the rest.” He waved toward the second list. “These, however, had anywhere from twelve to thirty-one stab wounds in addition to being beaten in two of the cases. One victim even suffered cigarette burns all over her back.”
“I remember.” That sick feeling was roiling in her stomach again.
“It’s called overkill,” he said. “The killer inflicted far more wounds than necessary to kill his victims. Normally, that might suggest that he knew them, had personal feelings of hate toward them. But it can happen with a disorganized killer as well, with or without a mental defect. He kills in the heat of the moment, because of some imagined slight or explosive anger over something seemingly inconsequential to you or me but that is blown all out of proportion in his mind.”
Again, he motioned toward the screen on the list, the names of the six victims that he’d grouped together.
“Here’s another take on these. In each of these cases, there’s evidence that the killer spent a lot of time in the victim’s home during the stalking phase while the victim wasn’t there. What does that indicate?”
“I’m not sure. Maybe I need a refresher course on my college classes.”
He smiled. “I’m sure it will all come back to you when you go back to finish your master’s degree. Familiarity is the missing link here. We spend time somewhere when we feel comfortable there, because the location isn’t foreign or unknown to us.”
She stared at him a long moment. “I’m trying to follow, but all that tells me is that the Ripper likely lived in Kentucky, close to the crime scenes. That was part of the original geographical profiling. That’s why Finney was such a good fit.”
“And Lowe. Don’t forget him, the second potential Ripper on the original suspect list. He was from Kentucky too, born and raised in the same general area as Finney.”
“Okay. Yes, I remember that. It’s part of the reason that I thought Lowe might have been the one who abducted me.”
He swiveled his wheelchair to face her. “Think about the other things we know about those crime scenes. In the first list of victims, the bodies were left where they’d be easily found, potentially indicating the killer had some religious background, that he wanted them to get a Christian burial, or whatever religion he followed. ”
“The bodies weren’t hidden in the rest of the killings either. They’re the same.”
“I’m going to disagree on that,” he said.
“In the overkill list, the victims were, well, slaughtered for lack of a better description. Discarded. There was no caring emotion behind that action. The bodies were easily found only because the killer couldn’t be bothered to try to hide them.
Not so with the organized killer list. Those bodies were treated, after death anyway, with a modicum of respect.
Left clothed or covered, lying down, almost as if they were sleeping as opposed to being tossed out like garbage.
It’s subtle, but it’s a difference. If you look at every kind of comparison that can be made, those two lists of victims each present evidence of a very different kind of killer.
In fact, it’s my opinion that it proves there wasn’t one Kentucky Ripper. There were two.”
She sucked in a breath. But it really shouldn’t have been a surprise after everything he’d just shown her. She glanced from list to list, read the headings on the middle screen, the bullets beneath them. “But, if you’re right, then your original profile was wrong.”
He surprised her by smiling. “Don’t look so worried. You’re not dashing my newly found confidence. There’s more to the original profile than appeared in any police reports.”
“Okay. Now you’ve lost me.”
He shifted in his chair, a quickly hidden grimace telling her how much his night of research had cost him physically. His hip was aching. He needed a hot soak in a tub and a long nap. But she didn’t want to embarrass him by pointing out the obvious, so she remained silent.
“When I profiled the murders allegedly attributed to the Kentucky Ripper,” he continued, “I presented the police with two profiles. Two different killers. When Finney was arrested, it was the profile I gave them that most closely matched his characteristics that they used. The other profile I gave them was ignored. That’s why you never saw it in any of the official case files that you researched. ”
“I still have to wrap my head around this. You’ve turned the investigation I did upside down.”
“No. I haven’t. I’ve proved that your original conclusions were right all along.”
She threw her hands up in the air. “Now I’m beyond lost.”
“Sorry. I’m not explaining this very well. To try to put it succinctly, if I look at Larsen and everything we now know about him, including that he used to live in Kentucky, he fits that first list of victims to a T.”
“Larsen is the Ripper.”
He sat forward in his chair. “He’s one of them.
That’s where your research comes into play.
Everything about that second victim list—if we consider that Bishop is right and Finney was a mentally ill fall guy who didn’t kill anyone—that second list fits the man you believed all along was the Kentucky Ripper. ”
She pressed a hand to her throat. “Avarice Lowe.”
He nodded. “All I’m waiting on for confirmation is a list of dates and alibis for Larsen. Mason’s working on that to see if Larsen was on vacation or sick or whatever on the dates when the first set of victims was abducted. I’ve already cross-referenced everything I had on Lowe.”
She glanced up at the dates he’d mentioned, the ones beside the disorganized list. They all had check marks beside them. “Lowe doesn’t have alibis for the second set?”
“No. He doesn’t.”
She sat back. “Two Kentucky Rippers, and a third guy in prison who had nothing to do with the murders.”
“It’s worse than that,” he told her. “There’s one more puzzle piece that you haven’t seen.” He typed on his computer tablet again.
“What could be worse than two killers?” she asked.
He hesitated with his finger poised over one of the function keys. “How about this?”