ABSTRACT DEPARTMENT OF HUMANITIES GLAPION, QUIANNA B.A. LOYOLA UNIVERSITY NEW ORLEANS, 2000 M.A. TEXAS SOUTHERN UNIVERSITY, 2009 FBI FILES: A PSYCHOLOGICAL COMPARISON OF LITERARY AND REAL-LIFE SERIAL KILLERS Committee Co-Chairs: Viktor Osinubi, Ph.D. and Timothy Askew, Ph.D. Dissertation dated May 2019 This study examines the psychology of fictional and real-life serial killers and the behavioral similarities between them. Three fictional murderers, mainly Macbeth (William Shakespeare’s Macbeth), Buffalo Bill (The Silence of the Lambs), and the Creature (Frankenstein), as well as real life killers such as Charles Manson, Ed Gein, and Edmund Kemper were researched in depth. The data for this study was gathered from a variety of sources such as biographies, television interviews, published novels, articles, and documentaries. This study also focuses on predispositional factors and personality traits that led these killers to a life of crime. While no single behavioral trait was found to be present in every murderer studied, some of the psychological factors that were found to have predictive value included: abusive upbringings, mother hate, adoption, pornography, and brain damage were also reliable predictors in the lives of fictional and nonfictional perpetrators. i FBI FILES: A PSYCHOLOGICAL COMPARISON OF LITERARY AND REAL-LIFE SERIAL KILLERS A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTY OF CLARK ATLANTA UNIVERSITY IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY BY QUIANNA GLAPION DEPARTMENT OF HUMANITIES ATLANTA, GEORGIA MAY 2019 © 2019 QUIANNA GLAPION All Rights Reserved ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I wish to express my deepest appreciation to Dr. Viktor Osinubi, my committee chair, who has the substance of brilliance and ingenuity. Dr. Osinubi introduced me to Criminal Profiling and Forensic Linguistics. I appreciate all of your poignant guidance throughout my doctoral journey. Encouragement for this scholastic journey also came in the form of the support of Dr. Timothy Askew. No words can sufficiently express my gratitude for his guidance as one of my professors and mentors. I am also grateful for his dedication, patience, and spirit of excitement with regard to teaching and conducting research in the most impeccable form. In addition, much gratitude to Dr. Kelly DeLong and Dr. Alma Vinyard for serving on my committee. iii TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ................................................................................................. iii CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................ 1 II. A REVIEW OF LITERATURE ..................................................................... 28 III. THE CASE OF PARANOID DELUSIONAL DISORDER IN MACBETH AND CHARLES MANSON .......................................................................... 64 Charles Milles Manson “The Killer Guru” ..................................................... 79 IV. I’M EVE NOT STEVE: GENDER DYSPHORIA IN THOMAS HARRIS’ THE SILENCE OF THE LAMB’S BUFFALO BILL AND EDWARD GEIN “THE PLAINFIELD BUTCHER” ............................................................... 104 Edward Theodore Gein “The Plainfield Butcher” ........................................ 119 V. REVENGE IN MARY SHELLEY’S FRANKENSTEIN AND EDMUND KEMPER III, MODERN DAY FRANKENSTEIN ..................................... 131 Edmund Emil Kemper III “The Co-ed Butcher” .......................................... 149 VI. CONCLUSION: THE DEATH OF A SERIAL KILLER AND WHAT EVERYBODY SHOULD KNOW ................................................................ 165 WORKS CITED ...................................................................................................... 176 iv CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION This dissertation examines the psychological linkages that seem to exist between some of the most notorious fictional murderers and their real-life counterparts. Real-life murderers such as Charles Milles Manson “The Killer Guru,” Edward Theodore Gein “The Plainfield Butcher,” and Edmund Emil Kemper III “The Co-ed Butcher” are compared with selected literary counterparts such as Macbeth in Shakespeare’s Macbeth, Jame Gumb in Thomas Harris’ The Silence of the Lambs, and the Monster in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein to explain their dysfunction and their pathways to committing murder. These literary murderers indeed possess some of the psychological motivators such as paranoid schizophrenia, gender dysphoria, and self-hate that also led their real- life counterparts to incipient madness and murder. It is no coincidence that the aforementioned literary killers imitate the criminal lives of real-life killers, which creates a kinship between them. Particularly, Charles Manson necessitates comparison with Shakespeare’s Macbeth because both murderers had an army of followers. Both Macbeth and Manson forged a pernicious bond with their inner circle in order to engage in criminal acts because they did not want to do so on their own. Therefore, both perpetrators had a folie à deaux, that is the presence of the same or similar delusional ideas. The term “folie á deaux” was developed by French psychologists Lasèque and Fabret to refer to two or more closely associated people, not 1 2 always family members, who share the same psychotic delusion. In addition to the communal effort of their slayings, Macbeth and Manson’s most common psychological trait is paranoid delusional disorder, which became evident after murdering their first victim (s). After being sentenced to death for orchestrating the Tate-LaBianca murders, Manson was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia and paranoid delusional disorder (Helter Skelter 628). Just like his real-life counterpart, Charles Manson, Macbeth became delusional after the death of King Duncan. The symptoms and manifestations of Macbeth’s and Manson’s psychoses will be discussed in chapter III of this dissertation. Jame Gumb (“Buffalo Bill”) was chosen to compare with Edward Gein because Gein was part of Gumb’s composite character and inspiration for Thomas Harris’ The Silence of the Lambs. Also, both murderers attempted to become transsexuals on their own. The Monster in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein was chosen as Edmund Kemper’s literary counterpart because both murderers were ostracized and isolated by their creators because of their appearance and hulking stature, which caused them to feel a sense of worthlessness due to rejection. Furthermore, the literary murderers, examined in this study are appropriate because many literary murderers leave the progeny of their stories as a blueprint for real-life murderers to execute their own homicidal quests. Put plainly, serial murder is one of the components of art imitating life. For instance, serial killer David Harker, who strangled a thirty-two-year-old woman, cut up her body and ate chunks of her thigh with pasta and cheese said that he was a huge fan of The Silence of the Lambs. Harker once said, “People like me don’t come from films, films come from people like me” (qtd. in Serial Killer Files 112). The same holds true for literature. For 3 this purpose, this study proceeds from the premise that many fictional murderers, in fact, are created from the stories of real-life killers, and real-life killers can also develop from the legend of fictional murderers. Hence, this dissertation will provide examples of how art imitates life. The psychological motivators such as paranoid schizophrenia, gender dysphoria, and self-deprecation, that ignite their murderous impulse, will constitute the basis of this research. According to criminal profilers and psychologists such as John Douglas, Glenn Wilson, Robert K. Ressler, and Roy Hazelwood, all serial murderers possess the stigma of being insane, impulsive, and psychotic. Also, many killers have been proven to be sane by the legal system; however, serial killers can suffer from some type of psychological and emotional imbalance that propel them to murder. In addition, psychologists, criminal profilers, and neurologists have offered several psychological precipitators that can cause one to murder. According to criminal profiler Robert Ressler, in his book Whoever Fights Monsters: My Twenty Years Tracking Serial Killers for the FBI, drugs are seldom one of those factors (33). The Behavioral Analysis Unit and National Center for the Analysis of Violent Crime and the FBI insist that all serial killers are not dysfunctional loners and that they are not only motivated by sex, but also anger, fantasy, and financial gain, and attention seeking can contribute to the causalities of murder. Coupled with this fact, neurologist Johnathan Pincus, in a Discovery Channel documentary titled Actions That Lead a Person to Serial Killing, provides his recipe for serial murder: abuse, brain damage, and mental illness. Pincus suggests that if there is damage to the prefrontal cortex (the area of the brain that controls impulse, judgment, reasoning, and social skills), 4 it can ruin impulse control. Pincus further suggests that mental illness can impair a person's judgment, but mental illness, on its own, does not lead to violence. So then, brain damage, mental illness, and childhood abuse also fuel an individual's murderous compulsion. While the real-life serial killers that are studied in this research were never diagnosed with brain damage, they did, in fact, experience child abuse and suffer from mental illness. Specifically, Charles Manson suffered abuse at the hands of his uncle and schoolmates while Edward