SERIAL MURDER AS ALLEGORY: A SUBCONSCIOUS ECHO OF UNRESOLVED CHILDHOOD TRAUMA Robert Lyle Robertson BA (Beh. Sc.), Dip. Soc. Pl. School of Justice Studies, Faculty of Law Queensland University of Technology A thesis submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Justice (Research) 2004 KEYWORDS Serial murder Hermeneutics Life History Life Narrative Poisonous Pedagogy Allegory ii ABSTRACT This thesis explores the notion that we may be able to more fully understand the etiology of serial murder. Specifically, it concludes that the behaviours of serial murderers can be allegorical of unresolved childhood trauma – that in the murderous actions of the adult there can be a depth of subconscious allegorical connection to the repressed (forgotten) and unresolved trauma of the murderer’s own childhood. The focus for this hermeneutic inquiry is the intersection that can be constructed between the phenomenon of serial murder and the assertion of the psychoanalyst Alice Miller that every perpetrator of violence was once a child who was (himself or herself) a victim. Alice Miller’s concept of Poisonous Pedagogy is explained and critiqued. Her belief that our childhoods tell the stories of our adult behaviours is questioned in light of the similar theoretical ground of Life History, Life Narrative, Psychobiography, and Psychoanalytic Narrative. Miller’s contention that there are directly allegorical connections between childhood abuse and adult murderous behaviours is illustrated by her analysis of the life of Jurgen Bartsch. A hermeneutic examination of the biographic records of two other serial murderers (Ted Bundy and John Wayne Gacy) is then undertaken to question the available support for Miller’s contentions. It is concluded that there is strong support for Miller’s assertions regarding the etiology of violence, and that violent adult behaviour, even serial murder, can be allegorical of unresolved childhood trauma. It is suggested that there is a need to extend this area of research through face-to-face engagement with perpetrators of violence. It is recommended that we directly engage serial murderers in personal discourses that will allow further exploration of Miller’s notion that serial murderers’ behaviours are allegorical echoes of harm that was done to them. iii CONTENTS Keywords ii Abstract iii Table of Contents iv Diagrams vi Statement of original authorship vii Acknowledgements viii CHAPTER 1: Serial Murder – A Psychodynamic Approach Introduction 1 Research aim 3 A psychodynamic perspective 4 The implications of a psychodynamic perspective 5 A focus on serial murder 5 Why focus on serial murderers? 9 Definition of serial murder 10 Nature or nurture? 12 Methodological orientation 14 Research objectives 19 Research questions 20 Thesis structure 20 CHAPTER 2: Miller’s Psychodynamic Explication Of The Genesis Of Aberrant Behaviour Miller's theories of the origins of aberrant adult behaviour 25 Poisonous Pedagogy 25 Splitting Off and Projection 30 The Repetition Compulsion 31 Violence as Allegory 32 Miller’s departure from Freudian theory 33 The (re)construction of early memory 43 Stettbacher - psychic illness and its resolution 48 Modelling Miller’s Poisonous Pedagogy 54 A model of Miller’s Poisonous Pedagogy 54 Repressed Memory – Abstract reality or mythical excuse? 56 Allegory in words and actions 66 iv CHAPTER 3: Congruence With Miller – Other Psychodynamic Interpretations Of The Etiology Of Behaviour Psychobiography 67 Psychoanalytic Narrative 75 Life History 82 Life Narratives 91 Psychoanalysis and Anamnesis 96 Psychoanalytic Life History 98 CHAPTER 4: Alice Miller’s Examination of the Life of Jurgen Bartsch Jurgen Bartsch’s offences 103 Jurgen’s early life 105 Abuse at boarding school 109 Allegory in Jurgen’s murderous behaviours 112 CHAPTER 5: Ted Bundy The sanitised family 116 Ted’s illegitimacy 117 Ted’s first three years 119 Louise moves away from her father 120 The three butcher’s knives 121 Ted’s life in the Bundy household 125 Ted’s first public encounter with his illegitimacy 127 The mask of sanity 128 Autobiographical notations on Ted Bundy’s life 131 Family history 132 Self image 139 The ‘flaw’ and the ‘entity’ 144 Possession 156 Disappearance 163 CHAPTER 6: John Wayne Gacy Family background 169 Gacy’s father 170 Gacy’s mother 172 Childhood sexual development 173 Leaving home 177 v Business success in early adulthood 180 Gacy’s homosexuality 183 First evidence of violence 185 Gacy’s first prison sojourn 187 Gacy’s escalation into violence 190 A ‘new start’? 192 Gacy’s first murder 193 The mitigating effect of family presence 195 In the midst of chaos, a façade of order and normality 200 Increasing chaos – the beginning of the end 201 A final victim leads to arrest 205 CHAPTER 7: Discussion - Three lives summarised The Repetition Compulsion 208 Allegory in murder 219 Jurgen Bartsch 219 Theodore (Ted) Bundy 223 John Wayne Gacy 229 Comparison of themes 234 CHAPTER 8: Conclusion - Can Murder be Allegory? Research objectives 243 Research questions 246 Suggestions for future research 251 Can murder be allegory? 253 REFERENCES 254 DIAGRAMS A model of Miller’s Poisonous Pedagogy 54 vi Statement of original authorship The work contained in this thesis has not been previously submitted for a degree or diploma at any other higher education institution. To the best of my knowledge and belief, the thesis contains no material previously published or written by another person except where due reference is made. Signature:_________________________________ Date:________________________ vii Acknowledgements This thesis has had a long gestation. I want to thank all those closely connected to me for their patience in waiting to see its issue. In particular, I want to thank Dr Arlene Morgan, my most influential mentor, for setting me off in this direction. Dr Lin Reilly, Dr Mal McCouatt, and Dr John Solas deserve my thanks for steering my early explorations of this topic. Dr Gayre Christie, Dr Richard Hill, and Dr Ian Wells then provided the support needed to see me through to conclusion. Along the way, there have been many discussions with peers who have engaged with me in this discourse - not least of these is my colleague and friend Robin Ward. Lastly, I want to thank my wife, my family, and all those close to me, who eventually learned to mention the ‘thesis’ word very carefully. I sense a collective sigh of relief at its final arrival. viii MASTERS THESIS CHAPTER 1 R. ROBERTSON CHAPTER 1 SERIAL MURDER – A PSYCHODYNAMIC APPROACH Introduction …every act of cruelty, no matter how brutal and shocking, has traceable antecedents in its perpetrator’s past. (Miller, 1987:ix) This thesis will examine the assertion of the psychoanalyst Alice Miller that every perpetrator of violence was once a victim of violence. The specific vehicle chosen to facilitate this examination of Miller’s theory is serial murder. Alice Miller is a psychoanalyst who theorises that violent adult behaviour has its roots in childhood trauma at the hand of adult pedagogues. More directly than most other authors, she asserts that violence is a learned behaviour. She postulates that the connection between repressed childhood trauma and violent adult behaviour is real and direct. Adults will not act in violent ways, she claims, if they have (at any time or age) experienced the love, support and advocacy from another that is necessary for the resolution of (otherwise repressed) trauma. Miller radically questions the validity of the Freudian psychoanalytic model and its central contention that the child is ushered into this world possessed of innate drives. Although she agrees with Freud's early position that therapy involves the catharsis of recalling repressed memory, she dismisses Freud's sex drive theory. 1 MASTERS THESIS CHAPTER 1 R. ROBERTSON Her extensive work (1987, 1990, 1991, 1995 and 1998) centres on the concept that the existence of unresolved, repressed childhood trauma is a necessary precondition for the phenomenon of violent adult behaviour: ...it is absolutely impossible for someone who has grown up in an environment of honesty, respect, and affection ever to feel driven to torment a weaker person in such a way as to inflict lifelong damage. (Miller, 1990: 190 - 191) Miller’s categorical stance needs to be tested. This is particularly the case, since she chose, in her extensive writing on the subject she labelled ‘Poisonous Pedagogy’, to eschew the more formal academic publishing route and to publish in the more populist press. She notes that she was thankful that, through the efforts of her publisher, her “…works did not disappear on the list of a technical publisher but were able to reach a wider circle of ’patients’, i.e., of the suffering people for whom they were actually written” (Miller, 1987: xvii). Yet, largely because of this publishing strategy, there has been a substantial neglect by academia of Miller’s extensive work. Her forceful stance that violence is the result of unresolved early trauma should be challenged, because if Miller is right, then Western society’s unfailing impulse to lay the blame for violence solely at the feet of individuals is misdirected. Support for Miller’s thesis would argue for a change in the focus of our criminal justice system, away from the individualisation of blame and punishment, towards a more global, shared responsibility for violence. 2 MASTERS THESIS CHAPTER 1 R. ROBERTSON Research Aim In order to examine Miller’s assertion of a relationship between repressed trauma and violent