Features

Female Serial Killers:

Countess Elizabeth Bathory: 
   Born in 1560, and a countess from the renowned Bathory family, Elizabeth Bathory certainly etched her name in history. The ‘Blood Countess’ is alleged to have lured young, attractive women to her dungeons in seventeenth-century Hungary, promising them work in her castle. However, the crux of the whole sordid affair, according to legend, is that the Blood Countess would kill the women and bathe in their blood, hoping to remain youthful. She and four collaborators were believed to have been responsible for the deaths of more than 600 peasant girls, although they were only convicted for 80. The Countess herself was never tried or convicted.
 
   Belle Sorenson Gunness:
   Gordon Gekko once said, “Greed is good.” Belle Sorenson Gunness, or ‘The Black Widow’, took that philosophy to the next level. Born in the 1800s, Gunness is alleged to have killed her two daughters, along with numerous suitors and husbands, all in the name of insurance collection. She managed to build up quite an empire, luring lovers with letters and personal ads. Rumour has it that 42 bodies lay buried in Gunness’ yard, testimony to a life of hard yakka. 
 
   Gesche Gottfried:
   With a name like Gottfried, you’d have to assume some level of social ineptitude on the behalf of poor Gesche. You’d be accurate in doing so. Born in 1785, Gottfried murdered many of her family members, namely her children, her two husbands and fiancé, and of course, her parents. Arsenic was her poison (ha!), and Gottfried even managed to gain sympathy from fellow villagers as a result of such widespread family ‘illness’. This earned her the nickname the ‘Angel of Bremen’, as she spent her days nursing her sick relatives. Gottfried was later publically executed. 
 
   Rosemary West:
   Don’t let the affiliation with thyme fool you; Rosemary West is a big meanie. The English serial killer currently serving life imprisonment in Durham made a name for herself by collaborating with husband Fred in abducting, raping, and murdering young girls. The periodic whore had a troubled childhood, being constantly sexually abused by her old man, who went on to become one of her clients, under the watchful eye of good ol’ Fred. While she was found guilty of ten murders, it is believed that Rose had a hand in a few more unsolved disappearances in the region. 
 
   Aileen Wuornos:
   Anyone who has seen the 2003 film Monster will (a) be astounded at how unattractive Charlize Theron can look, and (b) be familiar with the story of Aileen Wuornos. The American self-confessed “hater of human-life” was convicted and sentenced to death for the murder of six men. The tormented soul said her victims raped/attempted to rape her during her working girl days, and Wuornos used self-defense as an excuse. Albeit an unsuccessful one. She was executed in October 2002, via lethal injection.
 
   Jane Toppan:
   The common theme with these killers seems to be ‘troubled childhood’. Critic advises ditching any friends with divorced parents as they’re bound to knock you off sooner or later. Jane Toppan is another of these troubled psychos. Born in Boston as Honora Kelley, Toppan’s mother died when she was very young, and her father was both an alcoholic, and insane. Tense mix. After a childhood spent between foster homes, Toppan turned her hand to the noble art of nursing. This is where she really flourished. Toppan gained sexual pleasure from bringing her patients to the brink of death with drug cocktails, getting in bed with them, bringing them back to life, then killing the motherfuckers. 
 
   Marybeth Tinning:
   One of the more peculiar cases, Marybeth Tinning is believed to suffer one of the most extreme cases of Münchausen syndrome by proxy, whereby someone causes deliberate harm to another, usually for attention. Tinning was convicted of the murder of one of her children, however of all her nine children (all dead), only one died from legitimate medical issues. Tinning had a habit of bringing her children in to a hospital emergency room, claiming they’d suffered some affliction; they’d be sent home, only for Tinning to return later with a dead child. Classically American, it took the dummies a long time to establish a connection, and finally they apprehended the fertile slayer. 
 
   Katherine Mary Knight:
   Yet another product of a troubled childhood (sexual abuse), Knight was the first Australian woman to be sentenced to life imprisonment. Katherine was deemed a pleasant student in school, although minor issues often resulted in a seemingly uncontrollable rage. Not long after leaving school, she landed her ‘dream job’, cutting up animals at the local abattoir, getting her own set of butcher knives. The knives were put to good use when Knight murdered her boyfriend. She stabbed him in his sleep, decapitated him, and cooked and served up parts of his body to places she had set for his two children. Along with the meat, baked potato, pumpkin, cabbage, zucchini, yellow squash, and a topping of gravy were also reportedly served. Knight had previously stabbed, otherwise assaulted, and threatened to murder her previous partners and their families, as well as leaving her baby daughter on a train track.