Inside the Life of Aileen Wuornos
In 1990 seven percent of serial killers were women (Aamodt, 2014). Aileen Wuornos is notorious for killing seven men in the years 1989 to 1990 along a Florida interstate. This research paper will take a look at Aileen’s early life from a child to her teen years as well as her adult life and how the events of her life have affected her psychologically. Aileen faced many life altering events in her life that sculpted her into the person she was and died as.
Description
Aileen’s Early Life
Aileen Wuornos was born February 29th 1956 in Rochester, Michigan. Aileen lived with her grandparents until the age of fifteen. Growing up until eleven years old Aileen believed that her grandparents, Lauri and Britta were
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I did not realize how unfortunate of a life she really lived. It made me sad to see how much caregivers of a child can affect the child’s quality of life. Throughout this paper I often wondered if someone else would have raised Aileen would she still have killed seven men or have been even remotely as violent as she was. I wonder this because I reviewed photos of the victims, all were older white men in their 40’s to 60’s. I believe that maybe Aileen committed these murders sublimely to gain control of her grandfather. I found Aileen interesting to write about as she is one of the United States first forty female serial killers but often referred to as the first because of just how many men she killed. Additionally I have two cousins abandoned by their mother at a young age that live a rocky life. So writing this paper helped me understand how to help them stay on the right path and what type of support they may need now and in their futures. I think Aileen could have reached out for help. I feel that when the abuse began by her grandfather she should have gone for help but unfortunately she did not. This changed Aileen’s life forever. If at fourteen Aileen wouldn’t have begun prostituting she may not have learned to dissociate her body and still had emotions as an adult and therefore not turned violent. Writing this paper has really influenced me by solidifying the …show more content…
First perspective is biological, Aileen suffered from borderline personality disorder. According to Paris the author of Borderline Personality Disorder some of the symptoms include reckless impulsive behavior, unstable relationships, and problems with regulating emotions (2005). These symptoms could have caused Aileen to have mini- psychotic episodes. She may have faced things like delusional thoughts that could have caused her to believe the men she was with were going to rape her. In her mind she was justified to commit the murder of seven men as self-defense. Next is psychodynamic, this psychological perspective caused a lot of problems for Aileen. In Aileen’s childhood she faced excessive amounts of abuse at the hands of her grandparents. As well as abandonment by her mother and father at a very young age. These events made Aileen an angry and violent person that ended in her committing murder. Behaviorally, Aileen learned that violence was okay. She learned to disconnect herself from her body in order to cope with the bad things happening to her so that she did not have to feel them. She did not have a nurturing caregiver so she never learned how to treat others decently. This made Aileen believe it was okay to be treated poorly by others and to treat others bad herself. Next is the cognitive perspective, Aileen was not a good problem solver. Her thoughts automatically turned
His dead body was found in the woods near Daytona Beach, Florida, shot with a twenty two caliber rifle. “She ended up shooting six .22 caliber bullets into him” (McDuff 202). This is just one of the many catastrophes performed by a woman serial killer. Serial killers are a problem in the United States, murdering on average 2000 people each year (Indiana University np). “In fact, serial murder in the United States alone makes up more than three-quarters of the estimated world total” (Innes 5). Although women serial killers are not very common, they still have a huge impact on the death toll of innocent victims. In order to understand how woman serial killers operate, it is important to understand their motives, the different classifications
Aileen was born in 1956 to her 16 year old mother. She was not born with any physical or mental disabilities. At the time of her birth her father was incarcerated for child molestation and he was also believed to be a schizophrenic, he hung himself in jail and Aileen never met him. When Aileen was 3 years old her mother abandoned her and her 4 year old brother and left them with her own parents who legally adopted them. The family struggled economically and by age 11 Aileen would engage in sexual activities for food, drugs and alcohol. Home life was not easy for Aileen as she claims to be sexually abused by her alcoholic grandfather and beaten by her grandmother. She would also engage in
Over the course of one year, from 1989 to 1990, Aileen Wuornos murdered seven men. As one of the first female serial killers, Ms. Wuornos prompted psychologists and criminologists to investigate the reason why women kill serially, as their motives differ from men. Historically, female serial killers murder by poison, which is considered less messy, therefore preferred by women, and their motives are typically financial. Aileen Wuornos murdered her victims with a gun and her motives differ from the norm. Through the application of the ideas of the attachment theory and the life course theory, further exploration into the causes of Aileen Wuornos’ crimes is achieved.
The following criminal analysis shows why Aileen Wuornos was convicted for the murder of six men and what lead up to these actions. These actions were not in self-defense, but out of cold blood. This profile will analyze the following: what lead up to the murder of these men, what Wuornos’s intents were, the evidence and patterns, her personality and characteristics, and her behavior. These facts and evidence will show Wuornos’s intent and motive, and whether or not she was insane. This woman was not born to be a killer, but something in her life drove her to commit these horrible crimes, and this profile will analyze how exactly she did it and why.
People were shocked to hear everything the elderly lady, Dorothea Puente, was capable of. Investigators weren’t suspicious of her even after corpses were found on her property because she didn’t fit the typical serial killer profile. The average serial killer is a white male in his mid to late 20’s. More than 90% of serial killers are men according to research done by criminologists James A. Fox and Jack Levin, and among these 73% were white. Only 4% had graduated with a bachelor’s degree. Victims were 67% female, with children, prostitutes, and the elderly and other common victims while 20% were males who had been raped by their attackers.
This journal is written 3 authors: Assistant Professor of Criminal Justice at the University of Central Florida and received his doctorate from the University of Cincinnati, Steven T. Holmes. Dean of the California School of Forensic Studies at Alliant International University, Eric W. Hickey, Ph.D. and Emeritus Professor in the Department of Justice Administration at the University of Louisville, Ronald M. Holmes, M.A. They constructed different types of females who are serial killers and discussed homicidal behavioral traits. It begins with differentiating
Aileen Wuornos was born Aileen Carol Pittman, on February 29, 1956 in Rochester, Michigan. At the time of her birth, her mother, Diane Wuornos was 17 years old. Her mother married, Leo Dale Pittman, when she was 15 years old, on June 4, 1954. Aileen’s older brother Keith was born in February of 1955. When Aileen was less than 2 years old her mother, Diane, divorced
“Women cannot be murderers.” Even though this was not explicitly stated in the newspapers, The Boston Herald in its article “Lizzie Borden” conveys the perception that the feminine ways associated with women would make it impractical for women to commit murder. Lizzie Borden, a young lady accused of brutally killing her stepmother and father with multiple blows to their heads with a hatchet was described as a religious, sincere, and modest human being in The Boston Herald’s article covering Lizzie’s life before and after the murders. During Lizzie’s youth, she suffered from isolation because of her reserved personality and belief that nobody appreciated her presence, but in womanhood turned her life around and attain friendships who vouched for her good character during the time of the investigation. The Boston Herald’s article “Lizzie Borden: Her School and Later Life - A Noble Woman, Though Retiring”, successfully persuades the reader of Lizzie Borden’s innocence with the focus on her femininity through diction and logic.
Aileen Wuornos was born on February 29, 1956, in Rochester, Michigan. Aileen was abused as a child and this led up to her life of sex and murder. Having been involved in previous instances with the law, she made a living as a prostitute on Florida's highways, and in 1989 she killed a man who had picked her up. She then went on to kill at least five other men, that was confirmed in court, and was eventually caught, convicted and placed on death row in Florida. Though her sanity was questioned, Wuornos was executed by lethal injection in 2002.
The media today, is highly selective in their constructions of offences, offenders and victims. Media representations of crime are moulded and women are portrayed in a way that is entertainment driven and is appealing to the audience. Despite the fact that women seldom stalk, murder outsiders or commit sequential murders- in fact they are rarely vehement, “accounting for only ten percent of convicted violent offenders- those who do so are highly newsworthy because of their novelty” (Jewkes 2011, p. 123) Present day media admits that because fierce women are comparatively uncommon, they are all the more appealing and diabolical to the audience as a result. The essay shall discuss the reason and presentation in the media of female offenders, female victims and women specific crimes.
A trait that stands out in the book is the symptom of bodily memories. In Melinda’s case, during a frog dissection in her science class, she remembers the opening up and even says, “She doesn’t say a word. She is already dead. A scream starts in my gut – I can feel the cut, smell the dirt, feel the leaves in my hair.” (81). One of the other symptoms that Melinda has is self-harm. The first time that this is shown in the book, Melinda says this, “I open up a paper clip and scratch it across the inside of my left wrist. Pitiful. If a suicide attempt is a cry for help, then what is this? A whimper, a peep?” (87). Melinda also has a hard time talking to her parents about the rape to which she says, “How can I talk to them about that night? How can I start?” (72). Some victims recover from such a traumatic experience, while others don’t and live a lifetime of depression and must undergo intense therapy. In Melinda’s case, she finds redemption by talking to her parents and the guidance counselor, and putting her faith into her teachers, friends, and her art project at school. Because rape can affect anybody anywhere, everyone should be aware of the circumstances, and how to deal with it.
IV. Personal History Aileen Wuornos grew up in Rochester, Michigan. She attended elementary and high school, however, she quit in the 9th grade and did not get her diploma.
The objective of this case study is to examine the personality of one of the most notorious serial killers in modern history, Ted Bundy. Ted Bundy was alleged to have humiliated, tortured and murdered at least 50 women. Possibility more, but the true number will never be known. Because Ted Bundy kept the true number of his victims to himself and refused to inform authorities of the exact number of his horrific deeds, before he was executed on January 24, 1989 (Wikipedia, n.d.).
Aileen Wuornos is believed to be Americas first female serial killer. She was sentenced to death for killing seven men (Thefamouspeople). Wuornos was born on February 9th, 1956 and was executed on October 9th 2002 (Thefamouspeople). Although Wuornos was her real name, she was also known as “Sandra Ketsch, Susan Lynn Blahovec, Lee Blahovec, Cammie Marsh Greene, and Lori Kristine Grody” (Thefamouspeople, p. 1). Wuornos life had been affected by criminal behavior from birth. Her father, Leo Dale, was a psychopath and a child molester who was incarcerated at her birth (Thefamouspeople). In addition to her father's lifestyle, Wuornos had been molested by her father, grandfather, and had sexual relations with her brother (Thefamouspeople). Wuornos was not able to rely on the females in her life either. After her father died, her mother, Diana Wuornos, abandoned
Ted Bundy is a notorious serial killer, necrophilia, and rapist in the late 20th century. He was estimated to have killed 100 females and has admitted to killing 36. Bundy was a child that was unwanted by his mother, Louise Cowell, since he was conceived out of wedlock. Louise Bundy’s parents were very religious and when Louise fell pregnant they felt humiliated. Therefore, they decided to adopt Ted and lie to him about who his parents were in order the pregnancy a secret. This essay will talk about Ted Bundy’s early childhood, his victims and capture, and his trail.