Although the horrors that played out in Jeffrey L. Dahmer`s apartment are over, his arrest last week has again raised the question of how someone can kill repeatedly, almost at will, and elude the law for years.
In this case, some of the victims took 90-mile bus trips to a different city, to the home of a complete stranger, a foul-smelling, darkened apartment- missing the subtle signs of grave danger that would have alarmed others.
Is it because the victims of Dahmer and other serial killers live on the fringes of society, rejected so many times that they respond unquestioningly to anyone who pays attention to them? And are young men, especially gay ones, more vulnerable to such dangers?
Counselors and others who work with young people or are familar with the gay lifestyle say a combination of factors puts certain people at risk of becoming the victims of the kind of monster Dahmer has confessed to being.
Some have never learned whom they can trust, whom they can`t. They have never seen good relationships between adults, at home or elsewhere.
Others, who may have fallen into the shadowy world of prostitution, drugs and pornography, no longer know the difference between safe and perilous pleasure. And then there are those who are simply desperate for money.
Authorities now suspect that Dahmer, 31, killed at least 17 men over the last decade. The span of time over which the slayings occurred, and the relatively limited geographic area in which Dahmer operated, have also sparked debate over whether police can do more to investigate serial killings.
Part of the problem, some gay and lesbian activists charge, is that police are less likely to follow up complaints and missing persons reports involving gay men.
The Dahmer case lends credence to that complaint. On May 27 police responded to a neighbor`s call that she had seen a naked, 14-year-old boy, bleeding from his buttocks, running from Dahmer on the street.
But the officers left the boy with Dahmer after he convinced them that the boy was really a 19-year-old lover with whom he had been drinking and quarreling. The woman said the officers dismissed the incident as nothing more than a homosexual spat.
The boy, Konerak Sinthasomphone, was later identified as one of Dahmer`s victims. At least four other people were murdered and dismembered by Dahmer after that night when police gave him a pass.
Three police officers were suspended Friday for their failure to pursue the complaints about Dahmer more earnestly.
”For police to give the child back to Dahmer, that is unbelievable,”
said Vernon Huls, board member of the Illinois Gay and Lesbian Task Force.
”We realize that not all police are like that, but I think that it is a graphic example of what we have run into numerous times. That is many police`s perception of gays and lesbians, that we fight and run naked through the streets. They just don`t take us seriously.”
Serial killers, whose victims have often been gay men, prostitutes or drifters, have proven to be elusive targets for police partly because they have a keen ability to choose victims whose absence will not immediately be noticed, according to police and prosecutors.
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Larry Eyler, for example, ”picked his victims carefully. They were generally transient, street-type people. They didn`t come from strong families,” said Mark Rakoczy, the former Cook County prosecutor who won a guilty verdict against Eyler for the dismemberment murder of 15-year-old Daniel Bridges of Chicago. Eyler is also suspected of killing other young men in Illinois and Indiana.
”These serial killers could pick out the corner traffic guard, but they`re much smarter than that,” Rakoczy added. ”They`re smart killers.”
With Dahmer, unlike some other serial killers, there was no trail of bodies for police to follow, further reducing his risk of getting caught, police said.
Some serial murderers surface only after their appetite for violence becomes insatiable and they increase the pace of killing, experts say.
”With repetition, the need for stimulation increases,” said Dr. J. Douglas Crowder of the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center. ”The law of diminishing returns sets in, and the killer gets less from each killing, and must kill more.
”There is less attention to the detail. The processing of the body is less systematic, and the killer is not thinking as sharply. That`s when they usually make a mistake that gets them caught.”
For police, the investigation of missing persons cases can be time-consuming and frustrating because many people reported as missing have left home willingly, or return after a short time. More than 99 percent of the 24,000 individuals reported missing in Chicago in 1990 were located or returned home, police said.
Missing persons cases are prioritized, police say, with children usually at the top of the list and adult men at the bottom.
Cmdr. John Chamberlin of the Chicago Police Department Youth Division insisted that sexual orientation does not affect a missing persons
investigation. In the case of victim Jeremiah Weinberger, he noted, a composite sketch of Dahmer had been prepared by a police artist the day before Dahmer was arrested.
But leaders of gay organizations disagree. ”Gay men tend to be more vulnerable,” said Tim Drake, director of the privacy and civil rights project of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, and formerly co-chairman of the Illinois Gay and Lesbian Task Force.
”If they disappear, they are not as likely to be reported as missing. If they are reported as missing, they are not likely to get the same type of police follow-up as a report of someone`s daughter, husband or wife would get.”
King County police Det. Thomas Jensen, a member of the Green River Task Force that has been investigating the slayings of 49 prostitutes in Washington state, agrees with Drake.
”There are certain high-risk groups, the vulnerable ones, who also happen to be low priorities-hitchhikers, prostitutes, the gay men who lead an open lifestyle or male prostitutes,” Jensen said. ”Police view these people as generally transient, and the fact that they might be missing isn`t all that unusual.”
In addition, serial killers have proven to be quite adept at eluding police for long periods.
”They are masters of manipulation and con,” said Capt. Tom Cronin, who profiles serial criminals for the Chicago police. Their ability to escape notice, Cronin said, is enhanced by ”a society that really doesn`t want to get involved.”
But serial killers are also aided by the willingness of their victims to fall for the killer`s outward charm or seductiveness, and enter their world without question, experts say.
Counselors and others who work with young gay people say a combination of factors puts certain people at risk of becoming the victims of someone like Dahmer.
”No one, especially not parents, sits down with a young gay man and says, `You`re starting to date men now. This is how you do it. This is what to be careful of. These are the kind of men to watch out for,` ” said Bill Williams, a gay activist and music instructor at Columbia College in Chicago. Many victims, gay and straight, suffer from low self-esteem.
”In my experience, people who tend to go off like this may feel they are not very important,” said Jan Crosby, court advocate for the anti-violence project at Horizon`s Community Services, a counseling center for homosexuals. ”They are more likely to take risks because it is hard for them to see that they will be around tomorrow,” she said. ”Their self-esteem may be so low that they don`t think it matters what happens to them.”
Deborah Hinde, executive director of Teen Living Program, a private, non- profit child welfare agency which had been working with Matt Turner, one of Dahmer`s victims, said the teenagers she deals with often cannot make good judgments on who to trust.
”Nobody taught them good decision-making and problem-solving skills,”
Hinde said. ”If someone offers them something wonderful, like money, and that person seems OK, they don`t know what to say yes or no to.
”Frankly, this happens a lot. When kids or young adults are on the street, national studies show that within three weeks they will become involved in some kind of illegal activity-drugs, prostitution, pornography.
”This isn`t their idea. They stay involved because this is way for them to survive. They don`t feel they have any options.”
John Green, director of Emmaus Ministries, a Christian ministry to young adult men who are on the street, said money is the main reason the young men he knows would agree to go home with someone and pose nude.
”Some are smart in who they go with, and others aren`t,” he said.
”They`ll say this guy was really crazy, but they went for the money. The real danger comes when you have people who are new to the street and haven`t figured out the difference yet. . . .
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”These young men look for someone who is a sugar daddy, who will take care of all their needs, and they don`t realize what this is going to cost them.”