Serial Killers: The Method and Madness of Monsters by Peter Vronsky Page B

across the nation huddled up their children behind locked doors. But where did that 50,000 figure that Walsh cited come from? According to recent research by John Gill, it was Senator Claiborne Pell, Democrat from Rhode Island, who in 1981 was the first public official to formally claim that the Department of Health and Human Services stated that 50,000 children vanish each year. Officials at HHS denied making that estimate and Pell’s staff doesn’t remember which official they spoke to. 32
    As the hearing progressed, all kinds of speculative statements were entered into the record and presented at press conferences. The most prevalent trend was to combine the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reports homicide categories of unknown and stranger into one figure, pumping up the percentage of killings that appeared to be motiveless murders by unknown perpetrators, presumably roaming serial killers. Using this kind of “fuzzy math,” it was claimed that nearly 25 percent of all murders—a total of 4,000 to 5,000 each year—could be attributed to serial killers. The only thing that could save us now was funding from Congress.
    This claim was gleefully picked up by the press and true-crime authors. Even serious academic studies on serial murder bought into this big number. For example, an often-cited work by Holmes and De Burger states that in 1988
[b]etween 3,500 and 5,000 persons are slain by serial murderers each year in this country. We emphasize that this is an estimate, but we believe that it represents a reliable approximation, given the data available and the input of various experts now engaged in efforts to deal with this problem. (italics in original) 33
    This figure is still being thrust on us today. The back cover art of a recently published edition of Michael Newton’s Encyclopedia of Serial Killers features a specially highlighted box with a blurb promoting the book: “The starting point for any serious study of the serial or addicted killers who claim an estimated 3,500 victims each year—and evade detection . . .” 34
    But these numbers were never realistic and by now everyone should know it. The total maximum number of all known serial killer victims in the United States over a span of 195 years between 1800 and 1995 is estimated at only 3,860 tops. 35 Of this total, a maximum of 1,398 victims were murdered between 1975 and 1995, at an average rate of 70 victims a year. Even if we account for unknown victims, that figure is nowhere near the 3,500 annual number so often bandied about. But 3,500 victims a year sells better than 70. As Joel Best put it in his analysis of child abduction statistics in the 1980s, “Three principles seem clear: Big numbers are better than small numbers; official numbers are better than unofficial numbers; and big, official numbers are best of all.” 36
    For the record, a study of 1,498 child murders in California between 1981 and 1990 determined that not stranger serial killers, as John Walsh claimed, but relatives, predominately parents, are the most frequent killers of children up to age nine. Strangers were involved in only 14.6 percent of homicides of children between ages five and nine; and 28.7 percent of those between ages ten and fourteen. The offender relationship was unknown in 10.4 and 20.1 percent of homicides in the two age groups, respectively. Acquaintances murdered 30.2 percent and 39.2 percent of victims in each age group, and females comprised 36.4 percent and 18.7 percent of the killers, while relatives including parents killed 44.8 percent and 11.9 percent, respectively. 37 Of children between ages ten and fourteen the motive behind their murder was a dispute in 60.9 percent of the cases, a firearm was used in 64.2 percent, and a public place was the location in 51.5 percent. In summary, young children are killed at home by relatives, while more mobile and independent older adolescent children are increasingly killed by acquaintances first, and then by strangers