WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.680 Welcome back to the Deep Dive. Today we are undertaking 00:00:03.680 --> 00:00:07.639 a really deep and frankly quite difficult exploration 00:00:07.639 --> 00:00:10.279 into the source material concerning Jeffrey Lionel 00:00:10.279 --> 00:00:12.960 Dahmer, known around the world of course as the 00:00:12.960 --> 00:00:15.140 Milwaukee Cannibal. Yeah. We're going to try 00:00:15.140 --> 00:00:17.899 and chart the progression of this, this pathology 00:00:17.899 --> 00:00:21.500 that spanned 13 years from 1978 right up to 1991. 00:00:21.859 --> 00:00:25.079 And claimed the lives of 17 men and boys. It's 00:00:25.079 --> 00:00:27.280 a very dark catalog of events we're looking at. 00:00:27.339 --> 00:00:29.620 It really is. But our mission here, I think, 00:00:29.620 --> 00:00:32.100 is clear. We need to synthesize the chronological 00:00:32.100 --> 00:00:35.520 facts, the timelines, and the psychological insights 00:00:35.520 --> 00:00:37.920 from the sources. Right. To try and understand 00:00:37.920 --> 00:00:40.679 not just what happened, but maybe get closer 00:00:40.679 --> 00:00:43.539 to the internal logic driving his actions. And 00:00:43.539 --> 00:00:46.200 crucially, where the system, you know, where 00:00:46.200 --> 00:00:48.600 intervention failed. Yeah, those missed opportunities 00:00:48.600 --> 00:00:50.979 are key. And when you look at the specific nature 00:00:50.979 --> 00:00:53.259 of these crimes, I mean, they really go beyond 00:00:53.259 --> 00:00:55.909 typical predatory behavior, don't they? Absolutely. 00:00:56.090 --> 00:00:58.590 The sources make it very clear, especially the 00:00:58.590 --> 00:01:01.689 later murders. They were defined by this calculated 00:01:01.689 --> 00:01:04.750 pathology. You see necrophilia, cannibalism, 00:01:04.750 --> 00:01:08.329 and this almost scientific obsession with permanently 00:01:08.329 --> 00:01:10.810 preserving body parts. Particularly the skeletons. 00:01:11.030 --> 00:01:13.430 Exactly, the skeletons. And what's immediately... 00:01:13.790 --> 00:01:16.069 Central, I think, to understanding Dahmer's case 00:01:16.069 --> 00:01:18.730 is this profound paradox that came out during 00:01:18.730 --> 00:01:21.709 his trial. The sanity question. Precisely. Clinically, 00:01:21.750 --> 00:01:23.689 you had multiple experts diagnosing him with 00:01:23.689 --> 00:01:25.930 severe mental illnesses. Borderline personality 00:01:25.930 --> 00:01:28.849 disorder, schizotypal personality disorder, even 00:01:28.849 --> 00:01:31.870 a psychotic disorder. A whole list. Serious diagnoses. 00:01:32.069 --> 00:01:34.989 Very serious. Yet despite this extensive catalog 00:01:34.989 --> 00:01:38.370 of, well, dysfunction, the jury ultimately found 00:01:38.370 --> 00:01:42.469 him legally sane in 1992. Right. And that contrast, 00:01:42.689 --> 00:01:45.250 the clear psychological brokenness versus the 00:01:45.250 --> 00:01:47.530 legal finding of criminal responsibility. That's 00:01:47.530 --> 00:01:49.730 the core analytical thread we really have to 00:01:49.730 --> 00:01:51.709 keep coming back to, you know. OK, so let's unpack 00:01:51.709 --> 00:01:54.409 this right from the beginning then. Jeffrey Dahmer, 00:01:54.530 --> 00:01:57.450 born in 1960. The sources paint a picture of 00:01:57.450 --> 00:02:00.489 a pretty volatile, maybe even chaotic early environment 00:02:00.489 --> 00:02:03.409 driven by intense parental instability. That's 00:02:03.409 --> 00:02:06.049 right. His father, Lionel, was a research chemist. 00:02:06.150 --> 00:02:09.150 His mother, Joyce, taught teletype machine operation. 00:02:10.129 --> 00:02:12.349 But the source material gets complicated right 00:02:12.349 --> 00:02:16.009 away, even regarding his infancy. Oh, so? Well, 00:02:16.090 --> 00:02:18.250 you have these conflicting accounts. Some suggest 00:02:18.250 --> 00:02:20.210 he was really deprived of maternal affection, 00:02:20.469 --> 00:02:22.569 you know, attention. But others claim he was 00:02:22.569 --> 00:02:25.969 actually doted upon. Huh. How do you reconcile 00:02:25.969 --> 00:02:29.229 two completely opposite accounts like that? Does 00:02:29.229 --> 00:02:31.449 that contradiction itself maybe tell us something 00:02:31.449 --> 00:02:33.930 important about the family dynamics or maybe 00:02:33.930 --> 00:02:36.110 how they remembered things later? I think it 00:02:36.110 --> 00:02:38.449 signals instability. Definitely. High tension. 00:02:38.689 --> 00:02:40.789 Yeah. Which Donner himself actually confirmed 00:02:40.789 --> 00:02:43.469 later. He remembered growing up amid constant 00:02:43.469 --> 00:02:45.849 bitter fighting between his parents. Okay. His 00:02:45.849 --> 00:02:48.870 mother, Joyce, struggled badly with hypochondria, 00:02:48.909 --> 00:02:52.389 depression. It even culminated in a suicide attempt 00:02:52.389 --> 00:02:56.090 involving a sedative, Equinel. Wow. Adamer later 00:02:56.090 --> 00:02:58.490 recalled feeling from a really young age profoundly 00:02:58.490 --> 00:03:01.289 unsure of the solidity of the family, that lack 00:03:01.289 --> 00:03:03.949 of a firm foundation. That's critical context. 00:03:04.439 --> 00:03:06.479 And the sources point to a specific physical 00:03:06.479 --> 00:03:09.080 event, a surgery, that seemed to coincide with 00:03:09.080 --> 00:03:11.319 a major behavioral shift. Yeah, it was quite 00:03:11.319 --> 00:03:13.699 a sharp pivot. He was apparently an energetic 00:03:13.699 --> 00:03:16.340 and happy child up until he had double hernia 00:03:16.340 --> 00:03:18.879 surgery shortly before he turned four. After 00:03:18.879 --> 00:03:22.340 that procedure, the descriptions change. He became 00:03:22.340 --> 00:03:27.009 notably subdued, quieter. And this quietness 00:03:27.009 --> 00:03:29.069 happened around the same time his father was 00:03:29.069 --> 00:03:31.889 spending long hours away studying and his mother 00:03:31.889 --> 00:03:34.330 was spending more and more time isolated in bed. 00:03:34.810 --> 00:03:38.050 So he essentially retreated inward, losing that 00:03:38.050 --> 00:03:40.960 early energy. And this is when the... The sort 00:03:40.960 --> 00:03:43.680 of macabre curiosity started almost right after 00:03:43.680 --> 00:03:45.740 that, beginning with his father finding some 00:03:45.740 --> 00:03:48.599 old animal bones. The sources track this fascination 00:03:48.599 --> 00:03:51.419 with death right back to age four. Incredibly. 00:03:51.599 --> 00:03:54.120 His father was working under their house, found 00:03:54.120 --> 00:03:56.740 some animal bones. Dahmer, apparently fascinated 00:03:56.740 --> 00:03:59.520 by the rattling noise they made, was oddly thrilled 00:03:59.520 --> 00:04:01.419 by these remains. He called them his fiddlesticks. 00:04:01.500 --> 00:04:04.569 Fiddlesticks. Yeah. early exposure, it seems 00:04:04.569 --> 00:04:06.289 to have established some kind of connection for 00:04:06.289 --> 00:04:09.430 him between bones, discovery, and maybe a kind 00:04:09.430 --> 00:04:11.949 of excitement. And that interest just grew, didn't 00:04:11.949 --> 00:04:14.430 it? Especially when the family moved to Bathtownship, 00:04:14.449 --> 00:04:17.470 Ohio. That gave him, what, one and a half acres 00:04:17.470 --> 00:04:20.269 of woodland to explore? Exactly. And the location 00:04:20.269 --> 00:04:22.569 offered immediate access for his developing, 00:04:22.730 --> 00:04:25.750 well, pathology. He started small, collecting 00:04:25.750 --> 00:04:28.329 large insects, things like that. But he quickly 00:04:28.329 --> 00:04:31.810 moved on to skeletons of small animals, chipmunks, 00:04:31.990 --> 00:04:34.329 squirrels. Okay. He stored them in a sort of 00:04:34.329 --> 00:04:36.649 makeshift hut he built. Yeah. Sometimes preserving 00:04:36.649 --> 00:04:39.129 remains in jars of formaldehyde. Formaldehyde, 00:04:39.129 --> 00:04:41.990 wow. Yeah. But the real escalation, the sort 00:04:41.990 --> 00:04:44.370 of crucial moment of instruction, seems to have 00:04:44.370 --> 00:04:46.750 happened when he was about 10. Ah, that's when 00:04:46.750 --> 00:04:49.370 he asked his father about bleach. What it would 00:04:49.370 --> 00:04:52.310 do to a chicken bone. Precisely. And this, looking 00:04:52.310 --> 00:04:55.050 back, is just a truly tragic miscalculation on 00:04:55.050 --> 00:04:57.509 Lionel Dahmer's part. Yeah. He saw this curiosity, 00:04:57.649 --> 00:04:59.370 maybe thought it was a potential sign of future 00:04:59.370 --> 00:05:02.870 interest in science. So Weil took the opportunity 00:05:02.870 --> 00:05:06.129 to actually teach Jeffrey how to safely bleach, 00:05:06.290 --> 00:05:09.370 clean, and preserve animal bones. Instead of 00:05:09.370 --> 00:05:12.250 maybe curbing the obsession, Lionel completely 00:05:12.250 --> 00:05:15.149 unwittingly. gave him the technical manual for 00:05:15.149 --> 00:05:17.350 the horrific cleanups and preservation rituals 00:05:17.350 --> 00:05:20.149 that would define his adult crimes. And he didn't 00:05:20.149 --> 00:05:22.149 just stick to chicken bones, did he? He immediately 00:05:22.149 --> 00:05:24.730 applied this to roadkill. He did. Straight away. 00:05:25.029 --> 00:05:27.910 Started collecting roadkill, dissecting the animals, 00:05:28.009 --> 00:05:30.269 and using those preservation techniques his father 00:05:30.269 --> 00:05:33.199 had shown him. Right. He'd dissect them. sometimes 00:05:33.199 --> 00:05:35.379 placing the skulls on top of makeshift crosses 00:05:35.379 --> 00:05:38.620 before burying the rest. It moved pretty quickly 00:05:38.620 --> 00:05:41.740 from maybe a detached scientific curiosity to 00:05:41.740 --> 00:05:44.240 something much more aggressive, darker. You really 00:05:44.240 --> 00:05:46.899 see that in the 1975 anecdote about the dog carcass. 00:05:46.980 --> 00:05:48.939 Yeah, that story is shocking. He wasn't just 00:05:48.939 --> 00:05:50.980 dissecting anymore. He was putting it on display. 00:05:51.180 --> 00:05:54.720 Right. At 15, he decapitated a dog carcass he 00:05:54.720 --> 00:05:58.500 found, nailed the body to a tree, and then impaled 00:05:58.500 --> 00:06:01.720 the skull on a stick. supposedly as a prank for 00:06:01.720 --> 00:06:04.040 a friend to find yeah but it shows this early 00:06:04.040 --> 00:06:07.360 establishment of ritual and display this desire 00:06:07.360 --> 00:06:10.240 not just to engage with death privately but to 00:06:10.240 --> 00:06:12.540 use the remains as some kind of statement maybe 00:06:12.540 --> 00:06:15.519 an object of power even if just for himself and 00:06:15.519 --> 00:06:18.370 this one friend So as he moves into high school, 00:06:18.490 --> 00:06:22.110 these morbid interests start to intertwine with 00:06:22.110 --> 00:06:24.689 his emerging sexual fantasies. The sources note 00:06:24.689 --> 00:06:27.629 he realized he was gay, but given the times, 00:06:27.689 --> 00:06:30.250 you know, in his own emotional isolation, he 00:06:30.250 --> 00:06:32.889 kept it completely secret. And his fantasies 00:06:32.889 --> 00:06:35.730 evolved quickly from just simple attraction to 00:06:35.730 --> 00:06:42.480 this intense focus on complete dominance. Okay. 00:06:43.680 --> 00:06:51.870 Okay. very dark drive and this internal chaos 00:06:51.870 --> 00:06:54.430 it manifested outwardly too didn't it through 00:06:54.430 --> 00:06:56.730 heavy drinking he called alcohol his medicine 00:06:56.730 --> 00:06:58.990 alcohol was definitely his primary coping mechanism 00:06:58.990 --> 00:07:01.089 he was known as an outcast at school but also 00:07:01.089 --> 00:07:03.850 as the class drunk hiding liquor drinking during 00:07:03.850 --> 00:07:06.509 the day right interestingly despite earning just 00:07:06.509 --> 00:07:09.629 average grades school staff noted he was highly 00:07:09.629 --> 00:07:13.550 intelligent the social masks he wore were kind 00:07:13.550 --> 00:07:16.339 of famous These pranks involving bleeding like 00:07:16.339 --> 00:07:19.000 a sheep or simulating seizures, they actually 00:07:19.000 --> 00:07:22.079 became known as doing a dommer. Going a dommer. 00:07:22.139 --> 00:07:24.879 Wow. Yeah. These were maybe attempts to get noticed, 00:07:24.899 --> 00:07:27.319 even if it was negative attention, while still 00:07:27.319 --> 00:07:30.240 maintaining this deep emotional distance. And 00:07:30.240 --> 00:07:33.139 the first known attempt to actually act on these 00:07:33.139 --> 00:07:35.379 domination fantasies happened when he was about 00:07:35.379 --> 00:07:38.079 16. It was a failed attempt, but it's very illuminating. 00:07:38.139 --> 00:07:40.139 He hid himself in some bushes with a baseball 00:07:40.139 --> 00:07:43.180 bat. He was waiting to knock out an attractive 00:07:43.180 --> 00:07:46.040 male jogger he'd seen, render him unconscious 00:07:46.040 --> 00:07:47.920 so he could, you know, make sexual use of the 00:07:47.920 --> 00:07:50.100 body. Gosh. The jogger didn't show up that day. 00:07:50.399 --> 00:07:52.420 But it illustrates that even two years before 00:07:52.420 --> 00:07:54.980 the first actual murder, the basic method was 00:07:54.980 --> 00:07:58.259 already there. Capture, subdue, use the body 00:07:58.259 --> 00:08:01.019 as a silent object. And all this instability, 00:08:01.379 --> 00:08:04.019 this internal turmoil, it just culminated in 00:08:04.019 --> 00:08:07.600 the summer of 1978. Three weeks after he graduated 00:08:07.600 --> 00:08:10.699 high school, his parents finally finalized their 00:08:10.699 --> 00:08:13.300 really bitter divorce. And they left him alone 00:08:13.300 --> 00:08:16.019 in the family home in Ohio. Yeah, that lack of 00:08:16.019 --> 00:08:18.300 parental supervision combined with what must 00:08:18.300 --> 00:08:21.259 have been an extreme emotional void. Yeah. It 00:08:21.259 --> 00:08:23.079 just created the perfect catalyst, it seems. 00:08:23.339 --> 00:08:25.180 And that's when he picked up his first victim, 00:08:25.480 --> 00:08:28.420 Stephen Hicks. Hicks was only 18. Hitchhiking 00:08:28.420 --> 00:08:30.879 to a rock concert, Dahmer picked him up, promised 00:08:30.879 --> 00:08:33.559 him a few beers. Dahmer admitted later that just 00:08:33.559 --> 00:08:35.740 the sight of Hicks, who was bare -chested apparently, 00:08:36.080 --> 00:08:38.720 stirred his sexual feelings immediately. They 00:08:38.720 --> 00:08:41.259 spent hours together listening to music, talking. 00:08:41.480 --> 00:08:43.740 Okay. But when Hicks started talking about girls, 00:08:43.940 --> 00:08:46.299 Dahmer realized, you know, he wasn't interested 00:08:46.299 --> 00:08:48.600 in them that way, that he'd be rejected. The 00:08:48.600 --> 00:08:50.679 moment Hicks tried to leave, Dahmer just couldn't 00:08:50.679 --> 00:08:53.620 allow it. That need to maintain control, possession 00:08:53.620 --> 00:08:56.779 over the desired object. Yeah. It just trumped 00:08:56.779 --> 00:08:58.879 everything else. The killing itself was sudden, 00:08:59.019 --> 00:09:01.980 but the actions immediately afterward. They confirmed 00:09:01.980 --> 00:09:03.840 the pathology we've been tracking since he was 00:09:03.840 --> 00:09:06.440 a kid, didn't they? Completely. He bludgeoned 00:09:06.440 --> 00:09:08.700 Hicks twice from behind with a 10 -pound dumbbell, 00:09:08.919 --> 00:09:11.139 then strangled him with the dumbbell bar itself. 00:09:11.320 --> 00:09:14.179 Oh, God. Then he committed sexual acts with the 00:09:14.179 --> 00:09:16.779 corpse. Yeah. Stripped the body, masturbated 00:09:16.779 --> 00:09:19.299 over it, exploring the chest and torso, those 00:09:19.299 --> 00:09:22.120 exact fixation points from his adolescent fantasies. 00:09:22.590 --> 00:09:24.809 Then he dragged the body down to the basement, 00:09:24.970 --> 00:09:28.190 indicating an immediate shift into that preservation 00:09:28.190 --> 00:09:31.350 and disposal phase. And the disposal of Stephen 00:09:31.350 --> 00:09:34.700 Hicks' body. It wasn't amateurish at all, was 00:09:34.700 --> 00:09:36.940 it? He immediately applied those techniques his 00:09:36.940 --> 00:09:39.580 father taught him, but on this gruesome human 00:09:39.580 --> 00:09:42.320 scale. It was incredibly meticulous, aphotical, 00:09:42.460 --> 00:09:45.139 which suggests a chilling level of calculated 00:09:45.139 --> 00:09:48.379 action immediately after the initial, maybe impulsive 00:09:48.379 --> 00:09:50.980 murder. Over the following weeks, he dismembered 00:09:50.980 --> 00:09:53.379 the body. Weeks. Yeah. He paired the flesh and 00:09:53.379 --> 00:09:56.220 the bones, used acid to dissolve the flesh, which 00:09:56.220 --> 00:09:57.879 he then flushed down the toilet. Oh, my goodness. 00:09:58.080 --> 00:10:00.340 The sources state he then pulverized the remaining 00:10:00.340 --> 00:10:03.000 bones with a sledgehammer before scattering them 00:10:03.000 --> 00:10:05.559 in the woods behind the house. This wasn't panic. 00:10:05.659 --> 00:10:08.360 This was forensic cleanup. It proved he understood 00:10:08.360 --> 00:10:11.159 exactly how criminal his actions were and exactly 00:10:11.159 --> 00:10:13.460 how to erase the evidence. Okay, so moving into 00:10:13.460 --> 00:10:15.779 the next phase of his life, Dahmer tried and 00:10:15.779 --> 00:10:18.840 failed repeatedly to establish any kind of normal 00:10:18.840 --> 00:10:21.220 life in the years following that first murder, 00:10:21.340 --> 00:10:23.620 right? The underlying pathology was just too 00:10:23.620 --> 00:10:25.980 strong, it seems. And the alcohol dependency 00:10:25.980 --> 00:10:28.720 was completely crippling. He enrolled at Ohio 00:10:28.720 --> 00:10:31.480 State University, apparently hoping for a business 00:10:31.480 --> 00:10:33.940 degree, but he's essentially quit studying almost 00:10:33.940 --> 00:10:36.740 immediately. Attended only a few classes, failed 00:10:36.740 --> 00:10:38.980 pretty much everything. Wow. He ended his first 00:10:38.980 --> 00:10:43.179 term with a shocking .45 GPA. Dropped out entirely 00:10:43.179 --> 00:10:46.120 due to alcohol abuse. So his father then convinced 00:10:46.120 --> 00:10:48.620 him to enlist in the army as a medical specialist 00:10:48.620 --> 00:10:52.120 in 1979. I mean, a combat medic position seems 00:10:52.120 --> 00:10:54.679 wildly unsuited for someone with his background. 00:10:54.919 --> 00:10:57.460 You'd think, wouldn't you? You might imagine 00:10:57.460 --> 00:11:00.539 that exposure to the medical field could offer 00:11:00.539 --> 00:11:02.879 some kind of professional redirection, maybe. 00:11:03.700 --> 00:11:07.340 But his constant intoxication just undermined 00:11:07.340 --> 00:11:10.139 any attempt at stability. Right. He served briefly 00:11:10.139 --> 00:11:13.529 in West Germany. Apparently, he was average initially, 00:11:13.649 --> 00:11:16.090 but his performance quickly deteriorated because 00:11:16.090 --> 00:11:20.210 he was perpetually drunk. Drunk on duty. Eventually, 00:11:20.409 --> 00:11:22.649 he was deemed unsuitable for military service 00:11:22.649 --> 00:11:25.370 and received an honorable discharge in 1981. 00:11:25.750 --> 00:11:28.409 It's this continuing pattern. High intelligence 00:11:28.409 --> 00:11:30.950 completely thwarted by crippling dependency. 00:11:31.350 --> 00:11:34.210 And this ongoing instability, it led to his father 00:11:34.210 --> 00:11:36.490 and stepmother moving him to West Allis, Wisconsin. 00:11:37.220 --> 00:11:39.179 They were hoping the influence of his paternal 00:11:39.179 --> 00:11:41.419 grandmother, Catherine Dahmer, might finally 00:11:41.419 --> 00:11:44.159 stabilize him. Catherine was perhaps the only 00:11:44.159 --> 00:11:46.379 person Dahmer felt any real affection for, according 00:11:46.379 --> 00:11:48.840 to the sources. They hoped her stricter but still 00:11:48.840 --> 00:11:51.340 caring structure might help him. And initially, 00:11:51.399 --> 00:11:53.940 it seemed maybe promising. Well, he held a job 00:11:53.940 --> 00:11:56.779 as a phlebotomist for about 10 months, even attended 00:11:56.779 --> 00:11:59.519 church with her sometimes. But then came two 00:11:59.519 --> 00:12:02.139 years of unemployment, and the dark fantasy life 00:12:02.139 --> 00:12:05.120 he'd maybe suppressed started to resurface. And 00:12:05.120 --> 00:12:07.200 this is where we see that transition from purely 00:12:07.200 --> 00:12:10.200 internal fantasy back to needing external objects 00:12:10.200 --> 00:12:13.159 again, specifically the mannequin. Yeah, the 00:12:13.159 --> 00:12:15.500 sources really highlight his need for a permanent, 00:12:15.639 --> 00:12:19.379 silent object of desire. He stole a male mannequin 00:12:19.379 --> 00:12:22.440 from a department store. Stole it? Yeah. Used 00:12:22.440 --> 00:12:24.580 it for sexual stimulation until his grandmother 00:12:24.580 --> 00:12:26.480 eventually discovered it hidden in a closet. 00:12:26.889 --> 00:12:29.330 and made him get rid of it. That mannequin was 00:12:29.330 --> 00:12:31.370 essentially a substitute for the controlled victim 00:12:31.370 --> 00:12:34.990 he craved. A really clear warning sign that the 00:12:34.990 --> 00:12:37.450 underlying pathology hadn't gone away. It had 00:12:37.450 --> 00:12:40.190 just been temporarily managed, maybe. So once 00:12:40.190 --> 00:12:42.929 the mannequin was gone, he shifted tactics again. 00:12:43.090 --> 00:12:46.009 He transitioned to using sedatives to achieve 00:12:46.009 --> 00:12:49.169 the same result, making human partners into objects. 00:12:49.509 --> 00:12:52.090 Right. He started frequenting Milwaukee's gay 00:12:52.090 --> 00:12:55.379 bars and bathhouses more. His primary frustration, 00:12:55.679 --> 00:12:57.899 according to his own accounts, was the movement 00:12:57.899 --> 00:13:01.019 and, well, the personhood of his partners. He 00:13:01.019 --> 00:13:03.500 needed them to be completely static, completely 00:13:03.500 --> 00:13:07.320 under his control. So, starting around 1986, 00:13:07.659 --> 00:13:09.860 he began administering these high -powered sedatives, 00:13:10.100 --> 00:13:14.139 Trazolem, Camazarpam, Alcyon, basically. He got 00:13:14.139 --> 00:13:16.279 them by lying to doctors, claiming he needed 00:13:16.279 --> 00:13:18.620 sleeping pills to adjust to a fictitious night 00:13:18.620 --> 00:13:22.360 shift schedule. Wow. Calculated. Very. By lacing 00:13:22.360 --> 00:13:24.059 drinks with these sedatives, he could ensure 00:13:24.059 --> 00:13:26.639 his partners were unconscious and essentially 00:13:26.639 --> 00:13:29.340 viewed as mere objects of pleasure, as he put 00:13:29.340 --> 00:13:31.799 it, rather than individuals. And this practice 00:13:31.799 --> 00:13:34.100 led directly to his first murder in Wisconsin, 00:13:34.399 --> 00:13:37.500 didn't it? Stephen Tuomi, November 1987, at the 00:13:37.500 --> 00:13:40.500 Ambassador Hotel. But Dahmer claimed he blacked 00:13:40.500 --> 00:13:42.679 out during the actual killing. Dahmer's account 00:13:42.679 --> 00:13:44.980 of this one is particularly chilling. He claimed 00:13:44.980 --> 00:13:47.080 he literally woke up the next morning to find 00:13:47.080 --> 00:13:49.860 Tuomi battered to death beneath him. His chest 00:13:49.860 --> 00:13:52.460 was crushed in and black and blue, he said. And 00:13:52.460 --> 00:13:54.320 he claimed to have no memory of delivering the 00:13:54.320 --> 00:13:56.440 killing blow. Do we believe that? The blackout? 00:13:56.539 --> 00:13:59.299 Well, whether it was true amnesia or some kind 00:13:59.299 --> 00:14:01.700 of defensive mechanism, maybe psychological denial, 00:14:02.000 --> 00:14:04.980 the result was the same. He immediately went 00:14:04.980 --> 00:14:07.559 into action, transported the body in a large 00:14:07.559 --> 00:14:09.720 suitcase back to his grandmother's house. And 00:14:09.720 --> 00:14:11.960 this marked a pivotal moment, right, where his 00:14:11.960 --> 00:14:15.580 cleanup and retention efforts became much more 00:14:15.580 --> 00:14:19.500 ambitious. Yes. This was the first really extensive 00:14:19.500 --> 00:14:22.159 dismemberment he performed in Wisconsin. And 00:14:22.159 --> 00:14:24.450 he did it at his grandmother's house. In the 00:14:24.450 --> 00:14:26.730 basement, presumably. Oh, gosh. He attempted 00:14:26.730 --> 00:14:29.450 to preserve the head. He boiled the flesh off 00:14:29.450 --> 00:14:32.889 the skull using this highly toxic mix of Soilax, 00:14:33.009 --> 00:14:35.190 which is an industrial strength detergent used 00:14:35.190 --> 00:14:38.450 for cleaning concrete and bleach. Soilax and 00:14:38.450 --> 00:14:41.190 bleach. Yeah. It really highlights his comfort 00:14:41.190 --> 00:14:43.250 level with using these harsh industrial chemicals 00:14:43.250 --> 00:14:45.789 to erase human remains. The attempt actually 00:14:45.789 --> 00:14:47.649 failed, though. The skull became too brittle 00:14:47.649 --> 00:14:50.710 for display, so he had to pulverize it. And incredibly, 00:14:50.950 --> 00:14:52.970 he used his grandmother's house for two more 00:14:52.970 --> 00:14:56.120 victims. after Tuomi, James Dockstader and Richard 00:14:56.120 --> 00:14:59.220 Guerrero, before the foul smells and his drinking 00:14:59.220 --> 00:15:02.419 finally forced him out. That's right. His grandmother 00:15:02.419 --> 00:15:04.539 eventually gave him an ultimatum in September 00:15:04.539 --> 00:15:08.679 1988. She just couldn't handle the smell coming 00:15:08.679 --> 00:15:11.080 from the basement and the garage and his constant 00:15:11.080 --> 00:15:13.500 heavy drinking. Understandable. So he moved into 00:15:13.500 --> 00:15:16.500 his own small apartment. But, tragically, just 00:15:16.500 --> 00:15:20.120 two days after moving out, he was arrested for 00:15:20.120 --> 00:15:22.679 sexually assaulting a 13 -year -old Laotian boy. 00:15:23.100 --> 00:15:24.840 This seems like it should have been the major 00:15:24.840 --> 00:15:27.620 intervention point. The system had him. He was 00:15:27.620 --> 00:15:30.820 evaluated, diagnosed with serious issues, but 00:15:30.820 --> 00:15:32.960 ultimately he was paroled relatively quickly. 00:15:33.259 --> 00:15:35.580 It's a huge failure point in the timeline. The 00:15:35.580 --> 00:15:38.200 psychological evaluations noted deep alienation, 00:15:38.240 --> 00:15:41.039 impulsivity, a schizoid personality profile, 00:15:41.320 --> 00:15:44.440 serious red flags. Despite pleading guilty but 00:15:44.440 --> 00:15:46.879 insane initially, he later changed his plea. 00:15:47.450 --> 00:15:49.389 He was sentenced to five years probation and 00:15:49.389 --> 00:15:52.149 one year in the House of Correction in 1989 for 00:15:52.149 --> 00:15:54.470 second -degree sexual assault and incising a 00:15:54.470 --> 00:15:56.850 child. Critically, he served only about 10 months 00:15:56.850 --> 00:15:58.750 and was paroled early. And he was required to 00:15:58.750 --> 00:16:02.899 register as a sex offender. Yes. He was. Which 00:16:02.899 --> 00:16:05.440 makes later events even more frustrating. This 00:16:05.440 --> 00:16:07.740 was a massive missed opportunity to potentially 00:16:07.740 --> 00:16:10.600 confine him long term based on clearly demonstrated 00:16:10.600 --> 00:16:13.159 pathology and danger. And the tragic irony, the 00:16:13.159 --> 00:16:15.960 absolute horror, is that between his conviction 00:16:15.960 --> 00:16:19.919 for that assault and the actual sentencing, he 00:16:19.919 --> 00:16:23.019 murdered again. Anthony Sears. Anthony Sears, 00:16:23.059 --> 00:16:25.860 a 24 -year -old aspiring model, was murdered 00:16:25.860 --> 00:16:29.659 in March 1989. And this was the first victim 00:16:29.659 --> 00:16:33.259 whose body parts, specifically the head and genitals 00:16:33.259 --> 00:16:35.720 Dahmer successfully managed to retain permanently. 00:16:36.000 --> 00:16:38.000 How did he preserve them? He preserved them in 00:16:38.000 --> 00:16:41.039 acetone, kept them in a locked wooden box, which 00:16:41.039 --> 00:16:42.980 he then stored in his work locker at the chocolate 00:16:42.980 --> 00:16:45.480 factory. The need for physical possession for 00:16:45.480 --> 00:16:48.139 a permanent trophy had reached this new, horrifying 00:16:48.139 --> 00:16:51.549 threshold. The secrecy around that box. It just 00:16:51.549 --> 00:16:53.389 speaks volumes about his cunning, doesn't it? 00:16:53.429 --> 00:16:55.210 It really does. There's an anecdote where his 00:16:55.210 --> 00:16:56.929 father, Lionel, actually noticed the lockbox 00:16:56.929 --> 00:16:59.149 at one point and, concerned, asked Jeffrey what 00:16:59.149 --> 00:17:01.649 was inside. What did Dahmer say? He reacted really 00:17:01.649 --> 00:17:04.730 defensively, angrily, claimed it just contained 00:17:04.730 --> 00:17:07.609 pornography. Lionel, maybe expecting what he 00:17:07.609 --> 00:17:10.849 saw as his adult son's privacy, backed off. didn't 00:17:10.849 --> 00:17:13.450 push it wow that simple act of backing off allowed 00:17:13.450 --> 00:17:16.269 the to remain concealed it just highlights the 00:17:16.269 --> 00:17:18.670 level of calculated secrecy dahmer was capable 00:17:18.670 --> 00:17:21.650 of in this calculated secrecy it allowed him 00:17:21.650 --> 00:17:23.829 to eventually move into the oxford apartments 00:17:23.829 --> 00:17:28.630 apartment 213 in may 1990 which became the setting 00:17:28.630 --> 00:17:31.609 for the final darkest phase of his crimes right 00:17:31.609 --> 00:17:34.690 he chose 924 north 25th street partly because 00:17:34.690 --> 00:17:36.690 it was cheap but also because it was in a high 00:17:36.690 --> 00:17:39.529 crime area he figured unusual activity might 00:17:39.529 --> 00:17:42.279 be conspicuous there. Smart in a twisted way. 00:17:42.460 --> 00:17:44.460 And he brought Anthony Sears' preserved remains 00:17:44.460 --> 00:17:47.460 with him to the new apartment. This move marked 00:17:47.460 --> 00:17:50.599 a dramatic, terrifying escalation. Twelve of 00:17:50.599 --> 00:17:52.700 his 17 known victims were killed in that single 00:17:52.700 --> 00:17:55.359 apartment over just a 14 -month period. Raymond 00:17:55.359 --> 00:17:57.279 Smith was the first victim at the new address, 00:17:57.579 --> 00:18:00.180 and this is where Dahmer introduced another element 00:18:00.180 --> 00:18:02.880 to his ritual, the Polaroid photography. Yes, 00:18:02.880 --> 00:18:04.799 he began taking pictures of the victims' bodies, 00:18:05.000 --> 00:18:07.779 often posed in various suggestive post -mortem 00:18:07.779 --> 00:18:11.349 positions. Why? Did he say why? He explained 00:18:11.349 --> 00:18:13.950 it later as my way of remembering their appearance, 00:18:14.089 --> 00:18:16.650 their physical beauty. It wasn't just about possessing 00:18:16.650 --> 00:18:19.049 the physical body anymore, but also possessing 00:18:19.049 --> 00:18:21.470 the memory and the image of the body permanently. 00:18:22.170 --> 00:18:24.470 Raymond Smith's skull was the first one he successfully 00:18:24.470 --> 00:18:27.410 spray painted, likely silver or gray, and retained 00:18:27.410 --> 00:18:29.650 for his growing collection. His obsession with 00:18:29.650 --> 00:18:32.890 retention, with keeping parts, led to some pretty 00:18:32.890 --> 00:18:35.690 spectacular, though horrifying, failures, didn't 00:18:35.690 --> 00:18:38.910 it? It really demonstrates his sort of DIY approach 00:18:38.910 --> 00:18:42.130 to forensic preservation. Absolutely. It's bizarre. 00:18:42.349 --> 00:18:44.450 After killing Edward Smith, he tried to freeze 00:18:44.450 --> 00:18:47.309 the entire skeleton for months. He hoped this 00:18:47.309 --> 00:18:49.430 would remove moisture and allow for permanent 00:18:49.430 --> 00:18:52.329 preservation. Did it work? No. When freezing 00:18:52.329 --> 00:18:54.789 proved ineffective, he actually tried to dry 00:18:54.789 --> 00:18:57.650 the skull in the oven. In the oven? Yes, and 00:18:57.650 --> 00:19:00.029 it exploded. He later confessed to feeling rotten 00:19:00.029 --> 00:19:02.269 about this failure because he couldn't retain 00:19:02.269 --> 00:19:05.829 any parts of Smith's body. It shows this profound 00:19:05.829 --> 00:19:07.890 disappointment he felt when the ritual failed 00:19:07.890 --> 00:19:10.349 to yield the desired object, the trophy. And 00:19:10.349 --> 00:19:13.829 then came the shift into full cannibalism, starting 00:19:13.829 --> 00:19:16.329 with Ernest Miller, the dance student he killed 00:19:16.329 --> 00:19:19.890 in September 1990. Miller was killed by slashing 00:19:19.890 --> 00:19:22.869 his carotid artery. After that, Dahmer moved 00:19:22.869 --> 00:19:25.549 into actual consumption. He wrapped portions 00:19:25.549 --> 00:19:28.650 of Miller's heart, liver, biceps, and thigh muscle 00:19:28.650 --> 00:19:31.069 in plastic and put them in his freezer. And his 00:19:31.069 --> 00:19:33.690 rationale for this? Initially, he described it 00:19:33.690 --> 00:19:36.170 as just starting out of curiosity. But it quickly 00:19:36.170 --> 00:19:38.390 evolved into this chilling belief that consumption 00:19:38.390 --> 00:19:41.650 made the victims even more a permanent part of 00:19:41.650 --> 00:19:44.349 me, a way to fully internalize them. And the 00:19:44.349 --> 00:19:47.259 detail regarding the thigh muscle? It just illustrates 00:19:47.259 --> 00:19:49.619 the utterly grotesque reality of what he was 00:19:49.619 --> 00:19:51.740 doing. It does. The sources note he found the 00:19:51.740 --> 00:19:53.920 thigh muscle so tough he could hardly chew it, 00:19:53.980 --> 00:19:56.259 which forced him to start using commercial meat 00:19:56.259 --> 00:19:58.700 tenderizer. Oh, my God. That level of, like, 00:19:58.759 --> 00:20:01.759 culinary preparation? Yeah. It just underscores 00:20:01.759 --> 00:20:03.900 the complete and utter dehumanization of the 00:20:03.900 --> 00:20:06.880 victim. After this, he was finally successful 00:20:06.880 --> 00:20:09.240 in boiling the remaining flesh off Miller's skeleton 00:20:09.240 --> 00:20:12.680 using Soilax. He retained that first full skeleton 00:20:12.680 --> 00:20:15.210 for what was becoming his grand project. That 00:20:15.210 --> 00:20:19.069 grand project, this ultimate desire for a permanent, 00:20:19.230 --> 00:20:22.990 silent, completely submissive partner. It led 00:20:22.990 --> 00:20:25.509 him to that horrifying drilling experiment in 00:20:25.509 --> 00:20:28.930 April 1991 with Errol Lindsay, right? This really 00:20:28.930 --> 00:20:31.450 represents the absolute apex of his delusional 00:20:31.450 --> 00:20:34.789 control fantasies. His goal here was incredibly 00:20:34.789 --> 00:20:38.109 specific and terrifying. He didn't want to kill 00:20:38.109 --> 00:20:39.910 the victim instantly anymore. What did he want? 00:20:40.220 --> 00:20:42.220 He wanted to drill a small hole into the skull 00:20:42.220 --> 00:20:44.599 and inject hydrochloric acid directly into the 00:20:44.599 --> 00:20:47.599 frontal lobe. His aim was to induce a permanent, 00:20:47.759 --> 00:20:50.859 unresistant, submissive state. He was attempting 00:20:50.859 --> 00:20:54.500 literal surgical zombification, creating a living 00:20:54.500 --> 00:20:57.500 doll. But the procedure, it proved instantly 00:20:57.500 --> 00:21:00.039 fatal, didn't it? Or almost instantly fatal in 00:21:00.039 --> 00:21:01.819 Lindsay's case. The instance with Errol Lindsay 00:21:01.819 --> 00:21:04.019 is one of the most haunting details in the entire 00:21:04.019 --> 00:21:06.259 source material, I think. Lindsay actually woke 00:21:06.259 --> 00:21:08.400 up after the drilling procedure. He woke up? 00:21:08.539 --> 00:21:11.119 Yes. Disoriented, he reportedly asked Dahmer, 00:21:11.240 --> 00:21:13.319 I have a headache. What time is it? Oh, God. 00:21:13.599 --> 00:21:15.319 Dahmer immediately had to drug him again and 00:21:15.319 --> 00:21:17.819 scramble him. It proved his method was a fatal 00:21:17.819 --> 00:21:20.299 failure, but not before providing this moment 00:21:20.299 --> 00:21:23.140 of terrible, lucid horror for the victim. Just 00:21:23.140 --> 00:21:26.180 unbelievable. However, maybe the most egregious 00:21:26.180 --> 00:21:29.299 failure of intervention of the system followed 00:21:29.299 --> 00:21:32.640 just a month later. The Conorac synthosomphone 00:21:32.640 --> 00:21:36.900 disaster. This entire event. It's just a textbook 00:21:36.900 --> 00:21:39.799 example of systemic negligence, arguably layered 00:21:39.799 --> 00:21:42.299 with racial bias. Conorac sent this orphan who 00:21:42.299 --> 00:21:45.319 was only 14 years old. He was lured back to Dahmer's 00:21:45.319 --> 00:21:48.000 apartment, drugged, and then Dahmer performed 00:21:48.000 --> 00:21:50.299 the drilling procedure on him. And crucially, 00:21:50.420 --> 00:21:52.819 Conorac was the younger brother of the boy Dahmer 00:21:52.819 --> 00:21:55.140 had sexually assaulted back in 1988. The same 00:21:55.140 --> 00:21:57.910 family. Yes. A fact the police would have immediately 00:21:57.910 --> 00:22:00.269 discovered if they had simply run a basic background 00:22:00.269 --> 00:22:03.049 check on Dahmer, who, remember, was a registered 00:22:03.049 --> 00:22:05.549 sex offender living at that address. Unbelievable 00:22:05.549 --> 00:22:08.150 negligence. Conorax somehow managed to stumble 00:22:08.150 --> 00:22:10.890 outside the apartment building. Naked, disoriented, 00:22:11.230 --> 00:22:14.210 bleeding. Yes. Three concerned local women, all 00:22:14.210 --> 00:22:16.190 black, found him in the street and called 911 00:22:16.190 --> 00:22:19.369 immediately. Okay. Officers John Balcerzak and 00:22:19.369 --> 00:22:22.369 Joseph Gabers responded. Dahmer quickly intercepted 00:22:22.369 --> 00:22:25.150 them, lied smoothly, claimed Conorac was his 00:22:25.150 --> 00:22:27.569 19 -year -old intoxicated boyfriend, gave a fake 00:22:27.569 --> 00:22:30.549 name, John Henmung, and said they'd just had 00:22:30.549 --> 00:22:33.450 a lover's quarrel. And the women who found him, 00:22:33.529 --> 00:22:36.710 they tried to intervene. They tried desperately. 00:22:36.890 --> 00:22:39.369 They pointed out that Conorac was clearly injured, 00:22:39.609 --> 00:22:43.190 bleeding from the rectum, not just drunk. They 00:22:43.190 --> 00:22:45.650 pleaded with the officers. But the officers... 00:22:46.759 --> 00:22:49.839 They were convinced by Dahmer, by his composure, 00:22:49.859 --> 00:22:52.059 and he showed them some photos. He showed them 00:22:52.059 --> 00:22:55.319 two semi -nude Polaroids he had, supposedly proving 00:22:55.319 --> 00:22:58.079 they were lovers. The officers bought his story. 00:22:58.259 --> 00:23:01.140 They dismissed the women, with one officer harshly 00:23:01.140 --> 00:23:04.299 telling them to butt out. Oh, come on. Officer 00:23:04.299 --> 00:23:06.740 Gabers even noted later there was a strange scent 00:23:06.740 --> 00:23:09.420 reminiscent of excrement coming from the apartment, 00:23:09.640 --> 00:23:11.880 which was, of course, the decomposing body of 00:23:11.880 --> 00:23:14.539 another victim, Tony Hughes, lying in the bedroom. 00:23:14.839 --> 00:23:17.359 Did they even look inside? According to reports, 00:23:17.599 --> 00:23:19.579 they merely peeked their heads around the bedroom 00:23:19.579 --> 00:23:22.000 door. Didn't see anything amiss, apparently. 00:23:22.240 --> 00:23:25.339 They then helped Dahmer escort the clearly incapacitated 00:23:25.339 --> 00:23:28.339 boy back inside the apartment, telling Dahmer 00:23:28.339 --> 00:23:30.220 to take good care of him. They left him there 00:23:30.220 --> 00:23:32.680 with Dahmer. They left him there. And the subsequent 00:23:32.680 --> 00:23:35.519 radio traffic just confirms the total callousness 00:23:35.519 --> 00:23:37.819 and failure to follow basic procedure. What did 00:23:37.819 --> 00:23:40.319 it say? The patrol unit radio dispatch, kind 00:23:40.319 --> 00:23:43.410 of joking about the incident. said the intoxicated 00:23:43.410 --> 00:23:46.289 Asian naked male was returned to his sober boyfriend. 00:23:46.710 --> 00:23:48.829 And there was a quip about one partner needing 00:23:48.829 --> 00:23:51.750 to get de -loused at the station. That's sickening. 00:23:51.930 --> 00:23:54.549 The failure was absolute. Dahmer immediately 00:23:54.549 --> 00:23:57.170 injected Conorac with more acid as soon as the 00:23:57.170 --> 00:23:59.930 police left, which was fatal. He dismembered 00:23:59.930 --> 00:24:02.049 both Conorac and Tony Hughes the very next day. 00:24:02.309 --> 00:24:04.829 This case, understandably, later triggered a 00:24:04.829 --> 00:24:07.309 huge public outcry about racial profiling and 00:24:07.309 --> 00:24:09.430 police incompetence in Milwaukee. After this. 00:24:09.980 --> 00:24:12.900 This disaster, Dahmer entered his final, almost 00:24:12.900 --> 00:24:17.700 frenzied spree, didn't he? In July 1991, killing 00:24:17.700 --> 00:24:19.960 four more men in rapid succession, including 00:24:19.960 --> 00:24:22.960 Oliver Lacey and Joseph Braidhoft. It seems like 00:24:22.960 --> 00:24:24.740 he was rushing towards some kind of culmination, 00:24:24.819 --> 00:24:27.039 the construction of his final altar. He described 00:24:27.039 --> 00:24:28.859 his state of mind at the time as being driven 00:24:28.859 --> 00:24:31.259 by an incessant and never -ending desire to be 00:24:31.259 --> 00:24:33.980 with someone at whatever cost. The final murders, 00:24:34.019 --> 00:24:36.319 it seems, became the necessary sacrifices for 00:24:36.319 --> 00:24:38.890 his ultimate vision. He was actively constructing 00:24:38.890 --> 00:24:41.210 a private physical monument to his own power. 00:24:41.390 --> 00:24:44.089 Can you describe this grand vision, the altar? 00:24:44.269 --> 00:24:46.769 What did the sources say it looked like? In his 00:24:46.769 --> 00:24:48.569 apartment, he was setting up this black table. 00:24:48.730 --> 00:24:52.269 He adorned it with incense, a large blue globe 00:24:52.269 --> 00:24:55.250 lamp he had. And on this table, he was arranging 00:24:55.250 --> 00:24:58.210 an altar consisting of seven skulls and two complete 00:24:58.210 --> 00:25:01.029 skeletons, those of Ernest Miller and Oliver 00:25:01.029 --> 00:25:04.410 Lacey. Seven skulls and two skeletons? Yes. He 00:25:04.410 --> 00:25:06.430 confessed that this entire structure was dedicated 00:25:06.430 --> 00:25:11.009 to... Myself. He intended it as a place for meditation, 00:25:11.390 --> 00:25:13.630 a source from which he believed he could draw 00:25:13.630 --> 00:25:15.789 a sense of power and self -affirmation. Wow. 00:25:16.170 --> 00:25:19.009 He told investigators chillingly, if this arrest 00:25:19.009 --> 00:25:21.490 had happened six months later, that's what they 00:25:21.490 --> 00:25:23.950 would have found, fully assembled. So if the 00:25:23.950 --> 00:25:27.029 earlier killings were maybe attempts at possession, 00:25:27.250 --> 00:25:30.130 finding the right method. The final few were 00:25:30.130 --> 00:25:32.690 essentially just ritualistic steps to build the 00:25:32.690 --> 00:25:35.069 self -affirming monument. Is that the idea? That 00:25:35.069 --> 00:25:37.230 seems to be the core analytical point emerging 00:25:37.230 --> 00:25:39.910 from the sources, yes. The murder, the mutilation, 00:25:40.029 --> 00:25:43.069 the cannibalism. Those were the means. The construction 00:25:43.069 --> 00:25:45.529 phase, if you will. not the ultimate end goal. 00:25:45.589 --> 00:25:48.329 The final goal was this sanctuary, this physical 00:25:48.329 --> 00:25:51.250 manifestation of his dominance, his power, and 00:25:51.250 --> 00:25:53.529 his ability to transform human life into permanent 00:25:53.529 --> 00:25:55.690 silent objects that affirmed his own sense of 00:25:55.690 --> 00:25:58.190 self. The entire House of Horrors finally came 00:25:58.190 --> 00:26:01.990 crashing down on July 20, 1991, and it was thanks 00:26:01.990 --> 00:26:04.609 to the heroic actions of one man, Tracy Edwards. 00:26:05.109 --> 00:26:08.170 Edwards, who was 32 at the time, accepted Dahmer's 00:26:08.170 --> 00:26:11.460 offer of $100 to pose for nude pictures. But 00:26:11.460 --> 00:26:13.920 as soon as he entered apartment 213, Edwards 00:26:13.920 --> 00:26:16.220 immediately noticed the overwhelming foul odor. 00:26:16.400 --> 00:26:20.440 He saw the 57 -gallon blue drum, bottles of hydrochloric 00:26:20.440 --> 00:26:23.680 acid. Red flags everywhere. Big time. Dahmer 00:26:23.680 --> 00:26:26.359 then placed one handcuff on Edwards' wrist, started 00:26:26.359 --> 00:26:29.059 rocking back and forth, chanting something unintelligible. 00:26:29.220 --> 00:26:31.259 Then he brandished a large butcher knife and 00:26:31.259 --> 00:26:33.339 told Edwards he intended to eat his heart. That 00:26:33.339 --> 00:26:36.559 final explicit threat, that must have been what 00:26:36.559 --> 00:26:38.680 provided the terror, the adrenaline for Edwards 00:26:38.680 --> 00:26:41.470 to act. It seems so. Edwards displayed incredible 00:26:41.470 --> 00:26:43.910 presence of mind. He managed to trick Dahmer, 00:26:44.049 --> 00:26:46.509 saying he needed to use the bathroom again. When 00:26:46.509 --> 00:26:48.430 Dahmer momentarily looked away or was slightly 00:26:48.430 --> 00:26:51.349 off balance, Edwards seized the chance. He punched 00:26:51.349 --> 00:26:53.650 Dahmer hard. Good for him. And managed to get 00:26:53.650 --> 00:26:55.990 out the unlocked front door, still wearing the 00:26:55.990 --> 00:26:58.930 handcuff, and flagged down the first police car 00:26:58.930 --> 00:27:02.269 he saw. Officers Ruth and Miller responded. When 00:27:02.269 --> 00:27:03.630 they went back to the apartment with Edwards, 00:27:03.849 --> 00:27:05.730 Mueller found the crucial piece of evidence, 00:27:05.950 --> 00:27:08.809 didn't he? In the bedside dresser drawer. That's 00:27:08.809 --> 00:27:11.029 right. Mueller was looking for the key to the 00:27:11.029 --> 00:27:14.089 handcuff Edwards was still wearing. When he opened 00:27:14.089 --> 00:27:16.950 the nightstand drawer, he found scores of explicit 00:27:16.950 --> 00:27:21.630 graphic Polaroid photographs detailing the dismemberment 00:27:21.630 --> 00:27:25.589 process, bodies posed, all taken right there 00:27:25.589 --> 00:27:28.049 in that bedroom. Oh, man. He immediately showed 00:27:28.049 --> 00:27:31.069 them to his partner, Robert Ruth, uttering that 00:27:31.069 --> 00:27:33.930 now infamous line, these are for real. These 00:27:33.930 --> 00:27:36.549 are for real? Yeah. When Domber realized the 00:27:36.549 --> 00:27:38.589 photographs had been discovered, he apparently 00:27:38.589 --> 00:27:41.589 fought the officers, lunged at them, but was 00:27:41.589 --> 00:27:43.470 quickly overpowered and arrested. And the rest 00:27:43.470 --> 00:27:45.650 of the crime scene discovery just confirmed everything 00:27:45.650 --> 00:27:47.410 in the photos and everything we've been discussing. 00:27:47.710 --> 00:27:50.470 The chief medical examiner, Jeffrey Jensen, later 00:27:50.470 --> 00:27:53.329 stated this scene was more like dismantling someone's 00:27:53.329 --> 00:27:55.829 museum than an actual crime scene. The inventory 00:27:55.829 --> 00:27:59.029 was just horrifying. Four severed heads found 00:27:59.029 --> 00:28:01.779 in the kitchen. seven bleached skulls in the 00:28:01.779 --> 00:28:04.500 bedroom closet and on shelves, two human hearts 00:28:04.500 --> 00:28:07.059 in the freezer, preserved penises in the fridge, 00:28:07.220 --> 00:28:10.039 and three torsos actively dissolving in that 00:28:10.039 --> 00:28:12.299 57 -gallon drum of acid in the corner of the 00:28:12.299 --> 00:28:15.180 bedroom. It was essentially a factory of death 00:28:15.180 --> 00:28:17.599 and preservation. Unbelievable. Dahmer confessed 00:28:17.599 --> 00:28:20.099 almost immediately, didn't he? Over 60 hours 00:28:20.099 --> 00:28:22.559 of interviews, waived his right to a lawyer. 00:28:22.819 --> 00:28:25.029 He confessed readily. Said he wanted to put an 00:28:25.029 --> 00:28:27.549 end to it. He detailed everything. The necrophilia 00:28:27.549 --> 00:28:30.710 involving viscera sometimes. His explicit reasons 00:28:30.710 --> 00:28:33.329 for cannibalism again to make the victims even 00:28:33.329 --> 00:28:35.529 more a permanent part of me. He seemed almost 00:28:35.529 --> 00:28:38.289 relieved in a strange way that it was over. He 00:28:38.289 --> 00:28:40.569 was indicted on 15 counts of murder in Wisconsin 00:28:40.569 --> 00:28:43.210 and eventually a 16th count for Stephen Hicks 00:28:43.210 --> 00:28:45.349 back in Ohio, which led to the pivotal legal 00:28:45.349 --> 00:28:49.109 event, the 1992 sanity trial, which centered 00:28:49.109 --> 00:28:51.009 squarely on that paradox we discussed earlier. 00:28:51.519 --> 00:28:53.799 Was he mentally ill beyond control, or was he 00:28:53.799 --> 00:28:57.339 calculating insane? Exactly. Wisconsin law required 00:28:57.339 --> 00:29:00.380 a separate trial phase to determine sanity, since 00:29:00.380 --> 00:29:03.680 Dahmer pled guilty, but insane. The defense centered 00:29:03.680 --> 00:29:06.859 its entire argument on the concept of irresistible 00:29:06.859 --> 00:29:10.440 impulse stemming from profound clinically diagnosed 00:29:10.440 --> 00:29:13.039 mental illness. Right. They argued that the sheer 00:29:13.039 --> 00:29:15.619 overwhelming nature of his necrophilic drives, 00:29:15.960 --> 00:29:18.779 his paraphilias and his compulsions meant he 00:29:18.779 --> 00:29:21.559 simply could not conform his conduct to the requirements 00:29:21.559 --> 00:29:24.769 of the law. Defense expert Dr. Fred Berlintz 00:29:24.769 --> 00:29:27.089 specifically testified that Donner was legally 00:29:27.089 --> 00:29:30.390 insane due to the extremity of his paraphilia 00:29:30.390 --> 00:29:32.150 that he couldn't control the impulse to possess 00:29:32.150 --> 00:29:34.789 and kill. And they leaned heavily on those existing 00:29:34.789 --> 00:29:37.849 diagnoses. Borderline schizotypal. Absolutely. 00:29:38.309 --> 00:29:40.710 Borderline personality disorder, schizotypal 00:29:40.710 --> 00:29:43.250 personality disorder, conditions often involving 00:29:43.250 --> 00:29:45.910 intense emotional instability, distorted thought 00:29:45.910 --> 00:29:48.789 patterns, difficulty with reality testing. They 00:29:48.789 --> 00:29:50.650 painted him as a victim of his own sickness. 00:29:51.160 --> 00:29:53.559 a sickness he discovered, not chose, as one defense 00:29:53.559 --> 00:29:55.700 attorney put it. But the prosecution, they focused 00:29:55.700 --> 00:29:58.200 entirely on the cunning, the meticulous nature 00:29:58.200 --> 00:30:01.079 of the cleanups, the secrecy. Prosecutor Michael 00:30:01.079 --> 00:30:04.640 McCann hammered that point home. Describe Dahmer 00:30:04.640 --> 00:30:07.859 as manipulative, calculating, fully capable of 00:30:07.859 --> 00:30:10.660 controlling his actions when he needed to. Their 00:30:10.660 --> 00:30:14.359 key witness, forensic psychiatrist Dr. Park Dietz, 00:30:14.440 --> 00:30:16.920 presented what turned out to be the most compelling 00:30:16.920 --> 00:30:19.500 counterargument, especially regarding the alcohol 00:30:19.500 --> 00:30:22.559 use. What was Dietz's argument about the alcohol? 00:30:22.839 --> 00:30:26.119 Dietz argued that if Dahmer had a true compulsion, 00:30:26.259 --> 00:30:29.500 meaning an overwhelming, irresistible urge he 00:30:29.500 --> 00:30:31.720 couldn't stop to kill, he wouldn't need to get 00:30:31.720 --> 00:30:34.220 drunk first to follow through. Ah, okay, so the 00:30:34.220 --> 00:30:36.460 drinking wasn't fueling the compulsion. Exactly. 00:30:37.019 --> 00:30:39.460 Dietz successfully argued that Dahmer drank to 00:30:39.460 --> 00:30:41.559 overcome his inhibition against killing, the 00:30:41.559 --> 00:30:43.799 part of him that knew it was wrong. He knew the 00:30:43.799 --> 00:30:45.859 difference between right and wrong. Look at the 00:30:45.859 --> 00:30:56.900 evidence. All of these actions demonstrated a 00:30:56.900 --> 00:30:59.599 clear understanding of criminality and a massive 00:30:59.599 --> 00:31:02.380 calculated effort to avoid consequences. And 00:31:02.380 --> 00:31:04.759 Dietz also brought up Dahmer's interest in certain 00:31:04.759 --> 00:31:07.750 movie villains. Yes. Dietz noted that Dahmer 00:31:07.750 --> 00:31:10.250 strongly identified with powerful evil figures 00:31:10.250 --> 00:31:12.710 in films like The Exorcist III, specifically 00:31:12.710 --> 00:31:15.269 The Gemini Killer and Emperor Palpatine from 00:31:15.269 --> 00:31:17.789 Return of the Jedi. Dietz suggested this showed 00:31:17.789 --> 00:31:19.970 a conscious identification with, and pursuit 00:31:19.970 --> 00:31:22.930 of, power and control, rather than Dahmer just 00:31:22.930 --> 00:31:25.369 being a passive victim of random, uncontrollable 00:31:25.369 --> 00:31:28.880 impulses. And the jury... They ultimately agreed 00:31:28.880 --> 00:31:30.859 with the prosecution, didn't they? Ruled him 00:31:30.859 --> 00:31:34.240 legally sane. They did. On all 15 Wisconsin counts. 00:31:34.500 --> 00:31:37.660 Though it wasn't unanimous initially, two jurors 00:31:37.660 --> 00:31:39.680 dissented on every count during deliberations 00:31:39.680 --> 00:31:42.079 before eventually agreeing. Right. He was subsequently 00:31:42.079 --> 00:31:45.519 sentenced to 16 consecutive life terms, totaling 00:31:45.519 --> 00:31:49.119 941 years imprisonment. At his sentencing, Dahmer 00:31:49.119 --> 00:31:51.480 actually addressed the court. He stated he wished 00:31:51.480 --> 00:31:53.720 for his own death, confirmed his murders weren't 00:31:53.720 --> 00:31:56.059 motivated by hatred, and said he believed he 00:31:56.059 --> 00:31:58.960 deserved the maximum sentence. So Donner was 00:31:58.960 --> 00:32:01.059 sent to Columbia Correctional Institution in 00:32:01.059 --> 00:32:03.779 Portage, Wisconsin. Initially, he was kept in 00:32:03.779 --> 00:32:06.339 solitary confinement, mainly for his own safety, 00:32:06.519 --> 00:32:08.920 right? But he requested a transfer after about 00:32:08.920 --> 00:32:11.839 a year. That's right. He asked to be moved into 00:32:11.839 --> 00:32:15.380 a general population work detail. He was assigned 00:32:15.380 --> 00:32:17.660 work cleaning the prison toilet block and the 00:32:17.660 --> 00:32:20.329 gym area. Okay. And during this period in prison, 00:32:20.509 --> 00:32:23.250 he seemed to display a pretty marked psychological 00:32:23.250 --> 00:32:26.670 shift. He became a born -again Christian, was 00:32:26.670 --> 00:32:28.930 actually baptized in the prison whirlpool in 00:32:28.930 --> 00:32:32.509 May of 1994. Baptized in the prison whirlpool. 00:32:32.589 --> 00:32:36.029 Wow. He seemed to have sort of accepted his fate, 00:32:36.109 --> 00:32:38.710 maybe even questioning his own right to continue 00:32:38.710 --> 00:32:41.309 living. He often discussed death with the minister 00:32:41.309 --> 00:32:43.890 who baptized him, Roy Ratcliffe, and also with 00:32:43.890 --> 00:32:45.910 his mother, Joyce, who had reconnected with him 00:32:45.910 --> 00:32:48.619 by phone. Apparently, whenever Joyce expressed 00:32:48.619 --> 00:32:50.880 concern for his safety in prison, he'd dismiss 00:32:50.880 --> 00:32:53.079 it. Say things like, it doesn't matter, Mom. 00:32:53.279 --> 00:32:55.940 I don't care if something happens to me. He stated 00:32:55.940 --> 00:32:57.900 in one prison interview that if a person doesn't 00:32:57.900 --> 00:32:59.640 feel accountable to God, then what's the point 00:32:59.640 --> 00:33:02.400 of trying to modify your behavior? It seems he 00:33:02.400 --> 00:33:04.480 found some kind of peace, perhaps, in accountability, 00:33:04.720 --> 00:33:07.220 even if that ultimately meant accepting death. 00:33:07.380 --> 00:33:10.119 And death came. Brutally and abruptly, November 00:33:10.119 --> 00:33:14.180 28, 1994. He was on that work detail in the prison 00:33:14.180 --> 00:33:17.319 gym showers area with two other inmates, Jesse 00:33:17.319 --> 00:33:20.500 Anderson and Christopher Scarber. They were left 00:33:20.500 --> 00:33:23.279 unsupervised by guards for about 20 minutes. 00:33:24.259 --> 00:33:27.240 Unsupervised? Yes. Christopher Scarber, who himself 00:33:27.240 --> 00:33:29.980 suffered from schizophrenia and apparently believed 00:33:29.980 --> 00:33:32.500 he was receiving divine commands, attacked both 00:33:32.500 --> 00:33:34.980 Dahmer and Anderson. He bludgeoned them with 00:33:34.980 --> 00:33:37.259 a 20 -inch metal bar he'd taken from the prison 00:33:37.259 --> 00:33:40.200 weight room. inflicted extreme head trauma on 00:33:40.200 --> 00:33:42.440 both. Dahmer was pronounced dead just an hour 00:33:42.440 --> 00:33:44.839 later, wasn't he? And Scarver... Scarver immediately 00:33:44.839 --> 00:33:47.859 returned to his cell after the attack, calmly 00:33:47.859 --> 00:33:49.960 told a guard, God told me to do it. God told 00:33:49.960 --> 00:33:52.440 me to do it. Scarver also later claimed that 00:33:52.440 --> 00:33:54.880 Dahmer's final words, as Scarver approached him, 00:33:54.920 --> 00:33:57.299 were, I don't care if I live or die, go ahead 00:33:57.299 --> 00:33:59.900 and kill me, which suggests a kind of final, 00:33:59.960 --> 00:34:02.940 complete resignation, if true. The reaction from 00:34:02.940 --> 00:34:06.000 the victim's families was... Understandably mixed, 00:34:06.099 --> 00:34:08.719 I suppose. Some celebrated the sort of vigilante 00:34:08.719 --> 00:34:11.179 justice, others maybe didn't. His mother's reaction 00:34:11.179 --> 00:34:13.840 was quite bitter, wasn't it? Yes. Joyce Flint's 00:34:13.840 --> 00:34:16.079 reported reaction was simply, now is everybody 00:34:16.079 --> 00:34:19.079 happy? A very bitter response to the news. The 00:34:19.079 --> 00:34:21.099 fallout from his crimes beyond the immediate 00:34:21.099 --> 00:34:23.760 horror really highlighted some major societal 00:34:23.760 --> 00:34:26.420 issues, didn't it? Specifically, the racial tensions, 00:34:26.619 --> 00:34:29.159 particularly brought to the forefront by the 00:34:29.159 --> 00:34:31.260 police handling of the Conorac Synthesum phone 00:34:31.260 --> 00:34:34.119 case. Absolutely. The vast majority of his victims, 00:34:34.260 --> 00:34:37.679 14 out of 17, were ethnic minorities, with nine 00:34:37.679 --> 00:34:41.260 being black men or boys. The catastrophic failure 00:34:41.260 --> 00:34:43.659 of the Milwaukee police to properly investigate 00:34:43.659 --> 00:34:46.809 when they had Conorac right there. It highlighted 00:34:46.809 --> 00:34:49.570 and severely exacerbated the already significant 00:34:49.570 --> 00:34:51.929 racial tension in Milwaukee, which was known 00:34:51.929 --> 00:34:53.630 as one of the most segregated cities in the U 00:34:53.630 --> 00:34:55.889 .S. at the time. And officers Belshazzar and 00:34:55.889 --> 00:34:58.170 Gabrish, what happened to them? They were initially 00:34:58.170 --> 00:35:01.030 fired after a public outcry and an internal investigation. 00:35:01.670 --> 00:35:03.489 However, they later appealed and were actually 00:35:03.489 --> 00:35:06.090 reinstated with back pay, though neither returned 00:35:06.090 --> 00:35:08.590 to street patrol immediately. Wow. And the physical 00:35:08.590 --> 00:35:10.570 evidence of his crimes, the apartment building 00:35:10.570 --> 00:35:13.269 itself. It was systematically erased. The Oxford 00:35:13.269 --> 00:35:15.989 Apartments building at 924 North 25th Street 00:35:15.989 --> 00:35:18.489 was demolished just over a year after his arrest 00:35:18.489 --> 00:35:21.789 in November 1992. The site remains a vacant lot 00:35:21.789 --> 00:35:24.909 to this day. And his belongings, the tools, the 00:35:24.909 --> 00:35:27.550 freezer, all that stuff. There was a concerted 00:35:27.550 --> 00:35:30.409 effort by a local civic group, Milwaukee Civic 00:35:30.409 --> 00:35:33.550 Pride. They raised funds, including a significant 00:35:33.550 --> 00:35:36.510 $100 ,000 gift from a philanthropist named Joseph 00:35:36.510 --> 00:35:39.670 Zilber, specifically to purchase all of Dahmer's 00:35:39.670 --> 00:35:41.750 possessions that had been seized as evidence. 00:35:42.030 --> 00:35:44.570 Why? To preserve them? No, exactly the opposite. 00:35:44.650 --> 00:35:46.389 They bought everything, the tools, the freezer, 00:35:46.570 --> 00:35:48.969 the infamous blue drum, even the photographs 00:35:48.969 --> 00:35:51.050 specifically to ensure they were all destroyed 00:35:51.050 --> 00:35:53.710 and buried in an undisclosed landfill. The goal 00:35:53.710 --> 00:35:55.809 was to prevent any of it from ever entering the 00:35:55.809 --> 00:35:58.559 macabre murderabilia collector's market. That 00:35:58.559 --> 00:36:01.119 seems like a responsible move. And even after 00:36:01.119 --> 00:36:03.599 his death, there was that final kind of gruesome 00:36:03.599 --> 00:36:07.199 footnote, the dispute between his parents over 00:36:07.199 --> 00:36:09.980 his brain. Yeah, it's quite something. Dahmer's 00:36:09.980 --> 00:36:12.400 body was cremated according to his will, but 00:36:12.400 --> 00:36:14.320 his brain was preserved for a time because his 00:36:14.320 --> 00:36:16.679 parents disagreed vehemently about what should 00:36:16.679 --> 00:36:18.579 happen to it. What was the disagreement? His 00:36:18.579 --> 00:36:21.539 mother, Joyce. wanted the brain studied. She 00:36:21.539 --> 00:36:23.380 hoped scientists could find some neurological 00:36:23.380 --> 00:36:27.059 or biological explanation, some abnormality that 00:36:27.059 --> 00:36:29.619 might explain his horrific pathology. And his 00:36:29.619 --> 00:36:32.460 father? His father, Lionel, argued strongly against 00:36:32.460 --> 00:36:34.820 it. He just wanted the entire chapter closed. 00:36:35.300 --> 00:36:37.760 To cremate the brain, along with the rest of 00:36:37.760 --> 00:36:40.760 the remains, put an end to it all. After about 00:36:40.760 --> 00:36:43.079 a year -long court battle, the court ultimately 00:36:43.079 --> 00:36:46.309 sided with Lionel's wishes. Dahmer's brain was 00:36:46.309 --> 00:36:50.150 finally cremated in December 1995. So let's bring 00:36:50.150 --> 00:36:52.369 it back then to that original fundamental question 00:36:52.369 --> 00:36:55.289 that really defined his trial. If the prosecution 00:36:55.289 --> 00:36:58.090 was correct, if Dahmer was fundamentally driven 00:36:58.090 --> 00:37:01.429 by calculating control, how does that square 00:37:01.429 --> 00:37:04.530 with his final elaborate project, that self -dedicated 00:37:04.530 --> 00:37:07.250 altar he was building, intended as a source of 00:37:07.250 --> 00:37:09.489 power and a place for meditation? Well, the initial 00:37:09.489 --> 00:37:11.289 impulse to kill might well have been driven by 00:37:11.289 --> 00:37:13.670 desire. by paraphilia, as the defense argued. 00:37:13.829 --> 00:37:16.050 But the control argument, I think, is solidified 00:37:16.050 --> 00:37:17.369 by everything that happened after the death, 00:37:17.469 --> 00:37:20.070 the post -mortem ritual. The ultimate goal wasn't 00:37:20.070 --> 00:37:22.369 just fleeting sexual gratification with a corpse. 00:37:22.550 --> 00:37:25.530 That seemed almost secondary sometimes. The real 00:37:25.530 --> 00:37:28.550 goal was the permanence of possession. And achieving 00:37:28.550 --> 00:37:31.909 that required methodical cleanup, chemical preservation, 00:37:32.429 --> 00:37:35.030 meticulous arrangement, and eventually display. 00:37:35.800 --> 00:37:38.460 We saw him start trying this right from the pulverized 00:37:38.460 --> 00:37:40.900 bones of Hicks, even the preserved dog skull 00:37:40.900 --> 00:37:43.420 he called a prank. So the elaborate structure 00:37:43.420 --> 00:37:45.739 of the altar, the seven skulls, the two complete 00:37:45.739 --> 00:37:48.780 skeletons, the incense, dedicating it to... myself 00:37:48.780 --> 00:37:51.579 it suggests that the entire sequence the murder 00:37:51.579 --> 00:37:55.059 the mutilation the cannibalism it was all merely 00:37:55.059 --> 00:37:58.880 the necessary ritualistic steps required to construct 00:37:58.880 --> 00:38:01.579 that ultimate self -affirming structure and really 00:38:01.579 --> 00:38:03.320 looks that way when you synthesize the sources 00:38:03.320 --> 00:38:05.780 it wasn't just control over the victim in the 00:38:05.780 --> 00:38:07.920 moment of death it was achieving permanent control 00:38:07.920 --> 00:38:10.440 over their very essence transforming their physical 00:38:10.440 --> 00:38:12.820 remains into components of a personal monument 00:38:12.820 --> 00:38:15.860 to his own twisted pathology yeah if he viewed 00:38:15.860 --> 00:38:18.559 himself as park died suggested as this powerful, 00:38:18.699 --> 00:38:21.679 almost Sith Lord -like villain, then the altar 00:38:21.679 --> 00:38:24.079 was his cathedral, his shrine. The chilling implication 00:38:24.079 --> 00:38:26.900 then is that the horror wasn't just the act of 00:38:26.900 --> 00:38:29.840 murder itself, but the meticulous, calculated, 00:38:30.059 --> 00:38:32.380 almost industrial construction phase that followed. 00:38:32.780 --> 00:38:36.539 All required, in his mind, to affirm his monstrous 00:38:36.539 --> 00:38:39.559 identity. A truly profound and deeply disturbing 00:38:39.559 --> 00:38:42.480 realization that the preservation the construction 00:38:42.480 --> 00:38:45.019 was just as important, maybe more important to 00:38:45.019 --> 00:38:46.920 him in the end, than the act of killing itself. 00:38:47.659 --> 00:38:49.679 Thank you for guiding us through this incredibly 00:38:49.679 --> 00:38:52.260 detailed and, frankly, very difficult source 00:38:52.260 --> 00:38:54.579 material today. Thank you. Yeah, a necessary 00:38:54.579 --> 00:38:56.940 deep dive, I think, into the anatomy of a truly 00:38:56.940 --> 00:38:57.639 extreme obsession.