What do you think?
Rate this book
The Man Who Could Not Kill Enough: The Secret Murders of Jeffrey Dahmer
The Milwaukee Journal reporter who broke the Dahmer story spans the entire case, describing the dramatic scene when police first entered Dahmer's apartment; the fascinating science of forensics and how it was used to identify 16 victims; Dahmer's childhood; the personal stories of the victims' families; and much more. 16 pages of photographs.
256 pages, Paperback
First published June 1, 1992
134 people are currently reading
1899 people want to read
About the author
Anne E. Schwartz
4 books7 followersWith more than 35 years’ experience, Anne E. Schwartz is an award-winning print and broadcast journalist, author, and internationally recognized trainer and advisor on strategic communication and public relations practices for Law Enforcement, Prosecutors, Tribal Police, Fire/EMS and others in Criminal Justice and Public Safety. With hundreds of presentations and training sessions internationally, Anne has a unique background in how to manage communications in a variety of scenarios as an expert in providing communication strategies in officer involved deaths and ensuing civil unrest.
In 1991, as a crime reporter for the former Milwaukee Journal newspaper, she broke the story of serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer and wrote the book, “The Man Who Could Not Kill Enough: The Story of Milwaukee’s Jeffrey Dahmer.” Anne and the reporting team were nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. An updated edition of the book was released in 2021 as “Monster: The True Story of the Jeffrey Dahmer Murders” with a new preface and final chapter, available for the first time in both audio and digital editions. Anne is featured in dozens of documentaries on the Dahmer case, on global TV networks and streaming services.
She has partnered with the U.S. Department of State Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement (INL), Department of Justice (DOJ), American Bar Association (ABA), United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and the National Association of Attorneys General (NAAG) to share communications best practices with criminal justice professionals in the U.S. and abroad. She has deployed to the countries of Albania, Armenia, North Macedonia, and the Republic of Maldives to provide training on best practices in criminal justice communications strategies. Anne has conducted training seminars for prosecutors and judges from Bosnia, Lebanon and Uzbekistan through the ABA Rule of Law Initiative. She is a communications/media trainer for the Wisconsin Department of Justice, and she is an Adjunct Professor in strategic communications at the National Criminal Justice Training Center at Fox Valley Technical College.
Prior to embarking on a full-time teaching and consulting career, as Communications Director for the Wisconsin DOJ, Anne led the team that developed an award-winning public service campaign, “Dose of Reality,” to create awareness of prescription opiate abuse. She received a national Telly Award for the project in 2016. The program continues today and has been replicated by attorneys general in multiple states. At the Milwaukee Police Department (MPD), she developed the Office of Media & Communications and served as its civilian Commander for nearly a decade. She received a national Webby award in 2013 in the Government category for creating and developing MPD’s website, a project that led the way for other law enforcement agencies to communicate by building their own sites and employing social media. Anne’ work was featured at South By South West (SXSW) in 2016 in the panel, “Municipal Policing: Transparency, Truth and Trust.”
She co-authored, "Strategic Approaches to Improve Communications Initiative: A White Paper for Law Enforcement Executives" and “Strategic Communication: A Toolkit for Police Executives” for the U.S. DOJ Office of Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS). She subsequently provided training to police executives nationwide and in Canada on the strategies outlined in the publications. In 2019, she researched and co-authored the “National Association of Attorneys General Mass Casualty Disaster Manual,” to assist Attorneys General in responding to crisis.
Anne lives in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. When she is not managing a crisis, she rides her Harley-Davidson Fat Boy motorcycle.
In 1991, as a crime reporter for the former Milwaukee Journal newspaper, she broke the story of serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer and wrote the book, “The Man Who Could Not Kill Enough: The Story of Milwaukee’s Jeffrey Dahmer.” Anne and the reporting team were nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. An updated edition of the book was released in 2021 as “Monster: The True Story of the Jeffrey Dahmer Murders” with a new preface and final chapter, available for the first time in both audio and digital editions. Anne is featured in dozens of documentaries on the Dahmer case, on global TV networks and streaming services.
She has partnered with the U.S. Department of State Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement (INL), Department of Justice (DOJ), American Bar Association (ABA), United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and the National Association of Attorneys General (NAAG) to share communications best practices with criminal justice professionals in the U.S. and abroad. She has deployed to the countries of Albania, Armenia, North Macedonia, and the Republic of Maldives to provide training on best practices in criminal justice communications strategies. Anne has conducted training seminars for prosecutors and judges from Bosnia, Lebanon and Uzbekistan through the ABA Rule of Law Initiative. She is a communications/media trainer for the Wisconsin Department of Justice, and she is an Adjunct Professor in strategic communications at the National Criminal Justice Training Center at Fox Valley Technical College.
Prior to embarking on a full-time teaching and consulting career, as Communications Director for the Wisconsin DOJ, Anne led the team that developed an award-winning public service campaign, “Dose of Reality,” to create awareness of prescription opiate abuse. She received a national Telly Award for the project in 2016. The program continues today and has been replicated by attorneys general in multiple states. At the Milwaukee Police Department (MPD), she developed the Office of Media & Communications and served as its civilian Commander for nearly a decade. She received a national Webby award in 2013 in the Government category for creating and developing MPD’s website, a project that led the way for other law enforcement agencies to communicate by building their own sites and employing social media. Anne’ work was featured at South By South West (SXSW) in 2016 in the panel, “Municipal Policing: Transparency, Truth and Trust.”
She co-authored, "Strategic Approaches to Improve Communications Initiative: A White Paper for Law Enforcement Executives" and “Strategic Communication: A Toolkit for Police Executives” for the U.S. DOJ Office of Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS). She subsequently provided training to police executives nationwide and in Canada on the strategies outlined in the publications. In 2019, she researched and co-authored the “National Association of Attorneys General Mass Casualty Disaster Manual,” to assist Attorneys General in responding to crisis.
Anne lives in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. When she is not managing a crisis, she rides her Harley-Davidson Fat Boy motorcycle.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 131 reviews
October 5, 2022
Skulls in locker, cannibalism, sexual urges, drilling, making zombies, necrophilia, disorders, paraphilia, watching videos, getting excited about fish eggs, drinking alcohol all of the time, into a dysfunctional family, trying to create a shrine, showering with corpses, going into the occult, having delusions, chanting and rocking, picking up roadkill, having obsessions, murders, lobotomies, defleshing, masturbating two, three times a day as a youngster, going and trying to get a mannequin home so he could play sex with a mannequin, masturbating into open parts of a human being’s body, calling taxidermists, going to graveyards, going to funeral homes, wearing yellow contacts, posing people who are dead that he killed for pictures, masturbating all over the place.
This is Jeffrey Dahmer.
Okay, so this was first published in 1991 under the title ‘The Man Who Could Not Kill Enough’, and now updated with new content and a new title, ‘Monster: The True Story of the Jeffrey Dahmer Murders’. Incidentally, Ryan Murphy’s latest limited Netflix series is called ‘Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story’, but Anne Schwartz’s book was not used as its basis.
(The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel explains that “The update arrived in 2021, though she didn’t consult on the Murphy show and said the new title was a publisher decision. She is part of another Netflix series arriving in October — a more documentary-style approach called ‘Conversations with a Killer: The Jeffrey Dahmer Tapes’.” This is interesting, because I am sure I read in Schwartz’s book that these recorded sessions of Dahmer were sealed by court order and declared never to be made public.)
Schwartz herself has weighed in on the controversy generated by the Murphy show being aired without apparent consultation with the victims’ families or due consideration of the retraumatisation involved. It is argued that the show pokes a big stick into the simmering tinderbox of the intersectionality of race and class. The Dahmer case, of course, adds sexual orientation into the marginalisation mix. Ironically, it is this very issue of media ‘intrusion’ or ‘insensitivity’ that caused such a furore at the time with Dahmer.
An ambiguous paragraph on p 234 seems to make a tenuous link between Dahmer and the impact of the George Floyd case on community/police relations about a decade later. The unwary reader, however, is likely to think Floyd was killed in Milwaukee when it was actually Minneapolis:
Milwaukee continues the struggle to rebuild its sense of community after citywide crises: first in 1991 following the discovery of Dahmer's crimes, and then post-2020 when the death of George Floyd in police custody strained already fractured police-community relations.
In an interview with The Independent of the UK, Schwartz griped that Murphy’s show takes ‘artistic licence’ with many of the key facts. (I do not consider having Glenda Cleveland staying in the same building as Dahmer instead of at an adjacent building as playing ‘hard and fast’ with the facts; that seems solely an instance of artistic economy. Glenda, of course, tried to alert the cops to Dahmer but was repeatedly ignored, so is an important character.)
I have yet to watch the show, but what I have seen and heard does seem to indicate that it sticks largely with the known facts. Murphy is always a stickler for detail and production design, so one can only imagine that his ‘Monster’ is impeccable.
A detail that got me worried was the Netflix poster with Evan Peters sporting evil yellow eyes. Really, are we going to play the ‘demon in human disguise’ card here? (Then again, anything is possible with Murphy, given the schlocky excesses of shows like Nip/Tuck, American Horror Story, American Crime Story, Scream Queens and Ratched.)
However, towards the end of Schwartz’s book I was amazed (and dismayed) to read that it emerged in the trial that one of Dahmer’s favourite movies was ‘Return of the Jedi’, with him fancying himself as an incarnation of Emperor Palpatine, to the extent that he even bought yellow-tinted contact lenses ... It is the kind of subtle detail that Murphy loves to play with, given his reputation as a schlockmeister.
(As an aside, I am sure that in the novelisation of the Star Wars movie the Ewoks were portrayed as vicious little bastards who roasted and dined on the Stormtroopers they had killed, but I doubt that has anything to do with Dahmer.)
What seems to have gone under the radar with the release of Netflix’s ‘Monster’ is the trailer for Luca Guadagnino’s adaptation of ‘Bones and All’, based on the book by Camilles DeAngelis, featuring Taylor Russell and Timothée Chalamet as star-crossed cannibals. No doubt the movie will be a huge hit as it reunites Guadagnino (‘Call Me by Your Name’) with Chalamet, but the more troubling subtext here is the romanticisation of a paraphilia like cannibalism.
Interestingly, ‘paraphilia’ is the term loosely used in Dahmer’s trial, as no number of medical experts could come up with a single definition of Dahmer’s particular deviancy. That a jury deemed him to be sane and rational on all the murder counts seems a bit eyebrow-raising in hindsight. Defence attorney Gerald Boyle said Dahmer was a dead man after the verdict saw him sent to prison. Indeed, he was beaten to death by a fellow inmate about two years’ later.
Boyle opined that medical science lost a unique opportunity to figure out what made a person like Dahmer tick. Schwartz, usually a stickler for facts in her book, brushes this aside by stating that no one really wants to get into the mind of such a monster, do they? Maybe she has a point.
The title is a complete misnomer, as Dahmer is largely relegated to the background. There are no direct quotes from his initial confession or anything else he said to lend some much-needed context. (Evan Peters has stated that one of Murphy’s ‘golden rules’ for ‘Monster’ was never to show or tell anything from Dahmer’s point of view, but to retain the focus on the victims.)
Instead, the book is rather a fascinating account of breaking a major news story like this in the days before internet or, God help us, social media. Which seems like the Dark Ages. Schwartz’s claim to fame, as it were, was that she broke the story as a reporter for the Milwaukee Journal.
She received a tip off during the initial raid and was the first non-police person to enter Dahmer’s apartment when the initial grisly discoveries were made (Schwartz primly declares she purposefully did not look inside the fridge or freezer as she did not want to be haunted by those images for the rest of her life. The first police officers on the scene were not so lucky.)
While this book is a great example of reportage, it is often repetitive and clunkily written. It is one of those rare instances where I wished the writer had taken a more novelistic or fictional approach in recounting that defining experience, and then used it as a linchpin throughout the entire book.
This is Jeffrey Dahmer.
Okay, so this was first published in 1991 under the title ‘The Man Who Could Not Kill Enough’, and now updated with new content and a new title, ‘Monster: The True Story of the Jeffrey Dahmer Murders’. Incidentally, Ryan Murphy’s latest limited Netflix series is called ‘Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story’, but Anne Schwartz’s book was not used as its basis.
(The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel explains that “The update arrived in 2021, though she didn’t consult on the Murphy show and said the new title was a publisher decision. She is part of another Netflix series arriving in October — a more documentary-style approach called ‘Conversations with a Killer: The Jeffrey Dahmer Tapes’.” This is interesting, because I am sure I read in Schwartz’s book that these recorded sessions of Dahmer were sealed by court order and declared never to be made public.)
Schwartz herself has weighed in on the controversy generated by the Murphy show being aired without apparent consultation with the victims’ families or due consideration of the retraumatisation involved. It is argued that the show pokes a big stick into the simmering tinderbox of the intersectionality of race and class. The Dahmer case, of course, adds sexual orientation into the marginalisation mix. Ironically, it is this very issue of media ‘intrusion’ or ‘insensitivity’ that caused such a furore at the time with Dahmer.
An ambiguous paragraph on p 234 seems to make a tenuous link between Dahmer and the impact of the George Floyd case on community/police relations about a decade later. The unwary reader, however, is likely to think Floyd was killed in Milwaukee when it was actually Minneapolis:
Milwaukee continues the struggle to rebuild its sense of community after citywide crises: first in 1991 following the discovery of Dahmer's crimes, and then post-2020 when the death of George Floyd in police custody strained already fractured police-community relations.
In an interview with The Independent of the UK, Schwartz griped that Murphy’s show takes ‘artistic licence’ with many of the key facts. (I do not consider having Glenda Cleveland staying in the same building as Dahmer instead of at an adjacent building as playing ‘hard and fast’ with the facts; that seems solely an instance of artistic economy. Glenda, of course, tried to alert the cops to Dahmer but was repeatedly ignored, so is an important character.)
I have yet to watch the show, but what I have seen and heard does seem to indicate that it sticks largely with the known facts. Murphy is always a stickler for detail and production design, so one can only imagine that his ‘Monster’ is impeccable.
A detail that got me worried was the Netflix poster with Evan Peters sporting evil yellow eyes. Really, are we going to play the ‘demon in human disguise’ card here? (Then again, anything is possible with Murphy, given the schlocky excesses of shows like Nip/Tuck, American Horror Story, American Crime Story, Scream Queens and Ratched.)
However, towards the end of Schwartz’s book I was amazed (and dismayed) to read that it emerged in the trial that one of Dahmer’s favourite movies was ‘Return of the Jedi’, with him fancying himself as an incarnation of Emperor Palpatine, to the extent that he even bought yellow-tinted contact lenses ... It is the kind of subtle detail that Murphy loves to play with, given his reputation as a schlockmeister.
(As an aside, I am sure that in the novelisation of the Star Wars movie the Ewoks were portrayed as vicious little bastards who roasted and dined on the Stormtroopers they had killed, but I doubt that has anything to do with Dahmer.)
What seems to have gone under the radar with the release of Netflix’s ‘Monster’ is the trailer for Luca Guadagnino’s adaptation of ‘Bones and All’, based on the book by Camilles DeAngelis, featuring Taylor Russell and Timothée Chalamet as star-crossed cannibals. No doubt the movie will be a huge hit as it reunites Guadagnino (‘Call Me by Your Name’) with Chalamet, but the more troubling subtext here is the romanticisation of a paraphilia like cannibalism.
Interestingly, ‘paraphilia’ is the term loosely used in Dahmer’s trial, as no number of medical experts could come up with a single definition of Dahmer’s particular deviancy. That a jury deemed him to be sane and rational on all the murder counts seems a bit eyebrow-raising in hindsight. Defence attorney Gerald Boyle said Dahmer was a dead man after the verdict saw him sent to prison. Indeed, he was beaten to death by a fellow inmate about two years’ later.
Boyle opined that medical science lost a unique opportunity to figure out what made a person like Dahmer tick. Schwartz, usually a stickler for facts in her book, brushes this aside by stating that no one really wants to get into the mind of such a monster, do they? Maybe she has a point.
The title is a complete misnomer, as Dahmer is largely relegated to the background. There are no direct quotes from his initial confession or anything else he said to lend some much-needed context. (Evan Peters has stated that one of Murphy’s ‘golden rules’ for ‘Monster’ was never to show or tell anything from Dahmer’s point of view, but to retain the focus on the victims.)
Instead, the book is rather a fascinating account of breaking a major news story like this in the days before internet or, God help us, social media. Which seems like the Dark Ages. Schwartz’s claim to fame, as it were, was that she broke the story as a reporter for the Milwaukee Journal.
She received a tip off during the initial raid and was the first non-police person to enter Dahmer’s apartment when the initial grisly discoveries were made (Schwartz primly declares she purposefully did not look inside the fridge or freezer as she did not want to be haunted by those images for the rest of her life. The first police officers on the scene were not so lucky.)
While this book is a great example of reportage, it is often repetitive and clunkily written. It is one of those rare instances where I wished the writer had taken a more novelistic or fictional approach in recounting that defining experience, and then used it as a linchpin throughout the entire book.
November 30, 2011
JEFFREY DAHMER AND THE PROBLEM OF FREE WILL
Jeffrey Dahmer, the one-man abattoir, whose terrible life was a monument to waste, pain and squalor, makes us confront, once again, the business of being a human being and what that actually amounts to. Specifically, do we, in fact, have any free will or are we meat puppets?
Jeffrey killed 17 young men. From May to July 1991 he was killing one a week. He was trying to perfect a method of turning a young man into a sex zombie. There was a lot of trial and error involved.
You know, you have free will to go to Sainsbury's and not Tesco's, but you don't have free will to choose whether to eat or not. It's very clear JD had a compulsion. It's also clear that what drives people crazy about these kinds of murderers is when they are called MAD not BAD. Lawyers distinguish between the “irresistible impulse” and “the impulse not resisted”. For a lot of people, MAD is saying oh, well, they couldn't help themselves, they have no responsibility. Send that boy to a secure mental hospital and give him therapy. Because the legal system is an either/or thing. The jury can't decide that you're 75% bad and 25% mad. (Send his legs to the mental hospital and the rest of him to Sing Sing.)
So people want to say that Jeffrey had the free will not to do what he did. The people who want Jeffrey to be considered as BAD and say he had the free will choice not to murder young men are arguing something like – well, you know, we'd ALL like to have a couple of sex zombies, but we have to understand that that would be WRONG, and most of us DO understand that. But this guy Dahmer, he thought the rules didn't apply to him. He was a very bad man.
The free-willers must run into problems when they come across people who are really mad, like extreme schizophrenics. Herbert Mullin in 1973 thought that killing people would stop the next big earthquake hitting California, so he went around randomly killing people. I mean to say, that's definitely mad, not bad.
So there is such a thing as mad, and the mad are the puppets of their madness. They don't have free will. Laing argued in the 70s that people chose to be mad as a logical response to an impossible situation in their life. He hasn't had many followers.
If there is no free will there is no evil. An animal cannot be evil. A pit bull terrier who savages a child is not evil. Free will is an essential aspect of being human, though , isn’t it? It would be so humiliating to think we actually didn’t have it, that it was a comforting myth.
But.
Is free will such a good thing? Our most revered human institutions explicitly work to eradicate free will from their members and announce that this is a good thing – the armed forces, who wish orders to be obeyed without question, and whose basic training is designed to turn young men into machines; and the Church whose motto is "not my will but thine" i.e. God's.
WHAT WAS JEFFREY THINKING?
How do we figure a guy like Jeffrey Dahmer? How was his mind working when he brought a new guy back to his apartment and started plying him with drugs and alcohol? He could have been thinking -
- this is wrong. I really want to turn this guy into a sex zombie but I mustn’t because it’s really horrible. I’m just like an alcoholic. I hate myself and I should never have been born
or
- this is wrong, I really want to turn this guy into a sex zombie but I mustn’t because I’ll get caught
Or
- this is wrong, but I just can't help it, I'm completely addicted. If gay sex zombies already existed I wouldn't be in this situation. People just don't understand.
or
- people think turning guys into sex zombies is wrong but I just don’t see it that way. I’m a cool guy with a whole different set of morals than those brainwashed idiots. I do have morals, I’m not an animal, I just don't have conventional morals.
More specifically –
- it would be wrong if I caused these guys any pain but I’m not going to do that. They’ll drift off to sleep and they won’t feel a thing.
MY HEAD HURTS
The idea of free will hurts people's heads in many ways.
from Psychology – A Student’s Handbook by M Eysenck, p 33
This issue of free will versus determinism has occupied philosophers and psychologists for centuries. According to determinists, people’s actions are totally determined by the external and internal forces operating on them. Those who believe in free will argue that matters are more complicated…. More psychologists believe in determinism than in free will.
From Die for Me , p 182. Leonard Lake taped himself speaking to one of his female victims ;
No, I’m not asking if I can hit you. I can very much hit you, very easily… I don’t want to hit you, Kathi. No, let me take that back. Erotically, it would turn me on I would get a great thrill out of it. But let’s say I’m trying to keep a little bit of sanity, okay? I’m having a little war within myself between what I want to do and what I think I should do.
From the blurb on Addiction is a Choice by Jeffrey Schaler
Politicians and the media tell us that people who take drugs, including alcohol or nicotine, cannot help themselves. They are supposedly victims of the disease of 'addiction', and they need 'treatment'. The same goes for sex addicts, shopping addicts, food addicts, gambling addicts, or even addicts to abusive relationships.
This theory, which grew out of the Temperance movement and was developed and disseminated by the religious cult known as Alcoholics Anonymous, has not been confirmed by any factual research. Numerous scientific studies show that 'addicts' are in control of their behavior.
Instead of looking at drug addiction as a disease, Dr. Schaler proposes that we view it as willful commitment or dedication, akin to joining a religion or pursuing a romantic involvement. While heavy consumption of drugs is often foolish and self-destructive, it is a matter of personal choice.
So there are profound legal, psychological and medical problems about free will, and then there's the big one, God and the matter of evil and suffering. Check :
- There is enormous and constant suffering in the world caused by human beings and by natural disasters and disease.
- If God was omnipotent and loving he would stop this.
- Since it continues without stopping, God is either not omnipotent, or not loving.
The solution is, therefore, that God COULD stop all the suffering, but he chooses not to, NOT because he is unloving (perish the thought) but because to do so would turn us all into puppets, we would have no free will, we would not be able to decide to make ourselves a few sex zombies.
And who would want to live in such a world like that?
Me.
Jeffrey Dahmer, the one-man abattoir, whose terrible life was a monument to waste, pain and squalor, makes us confront, once again, the business of being a human being and what that actually amounts to. Specifically, do we, in fact, have any free will or are we meat puppets?
Jeffrey killed 17 young men. From May to July 1991 he was killing one a week. He was trying to perfect a method of turning a young man into a sex zombie. There was a lot of trial and error involved.
You know, you have free will to go to Sainsbury's and not Tesco's, but you don't have free will to choose whether to eat or not. It's very clear JD had a compulsion. It's also clear that what drives people crazy about these kinds of murderers is when they are called MAD not BAD. Lawyers distinguish between the “irresistible impulse” and “the impulse not resisted”. For a lot of people, MAD is saying oh, well, they couldn't help themselves, they have no responsibility. Send that boy to a secure mental hospital and give him therapy. Because the legal system is an either/or thing. The jury can't decide that you're 75% bad and 25% mad. (Send his legs to the mental hospital and the rest of him to Sing Sing.)
So people want to say that Jeffrey had the free will not to do what he did. The people who want Jeffrey to be considered as BAD and say he had the free will choice not to murder young men are arguing something like – well, you know, we'd ALL like to have a couple of sex zombies, but we have to understand that that would be WRONG, and most of us DO understand that. But this guy Dahmer, he thought the rules didn't apply to him. He was a very bad man.
The free-willers must run into problems when they come across people who are really mad, like extreme schizophrenics. Herbert Mullin in 1973 thought that killing people would stop the next big earthquake hitting California, so he went around randomly killing people. I mean to say, that's definitely mad, not bad.
So there is such a thing as mad, and the mad are the puppets of their madness. They don't have free will. Laing argued in the 70s that people chose to be mad as a logical response to an impossible situation in their life. He hasn't had many followers.
If there is no free will there is no evil. An animal cannot be evil. A pit bull terrier who savages a child is not evil. Free will is an essential aspect of being human, though , isn’t it? It would be so humiliating to think we actually didn’t have it, that it was a comforting myth.
But.
Is free will such a good thing? Our most revered human institutions explicitly work to eradicate free will from their members and announce that this is a good thing – the armed forces, who wish orders to be obeyed without question, and whose basic training is designed to turn young men into machines; and the Church whose motto is "not my will but thine" i.e. God's.
WHAT WAS JEFFREY THINKING?
How do we figure a guy like Jeffrey Dahmer? How was his mind working when he brought a new guy back to his apartment and started plying him with drugs and alcohol? He could have been thinking -
- this is wrong. I really want to turn this guy into a sex zombie but I mustn’t because it’s really horrible. I’m just like an alcoholic. I hate myself and I should never have been born
or
- this is wrong, I really want to turn this guy into a sex zombie but I mustn’t because I’ll get caught
Or
- this is wrong, but I just can't help it, I'm completely addicted. If gay sex zombies already existed I wouldn't be in this situation. People just don't understand.
or
- people think turning guys into sex zombies is wrong but I just don’t see it that way. I’m a cool guy with a whole different set of morals than those brainwashed idiots. I do have morals, I’m not an animal, I just don't have conventional morals.
More specifically –
- it would be wrong if I caused these guys any pain but I’m not going to do that. They’ll drift off to sleep and they won’t feel a thing.
MY HEAD HURTS
The idea of free will hurts people's heads in many ways.
from Psychology – A Student’s Handbook by M Eysenck, p 33
This issue of free will versus determinism has occupied philosophers and psychologists for centuries. According to determinists, people’s actions are totally determined by the external and internal forces operating on them. Those who believe in free will argue that matters are more complicated…. More psychologists believe in determinism than in free will.
From Die for Me , p 182. Leonard Lake taped himself speaking to one of his female victims ;
No, I’m not asking if I can hit you. I can very much hit you, very easily… I don’t want to hit you, Kathi. No, let me take that back. Erotically, it would turn me on I would get a great thrill out of it. But let’s say I’m trying to keep a little bit of sanity, okay? I’m having a little war within myself between what I want to do and what I think I should do.
From the blurb on Addiction is a Choice by Jeffrey Schaler
Politicians and the media tell us that people who take drugs, including alcohol or nicotine, cannot help themselves. They are supposedly victims of the disease of 'addiction', and they need 'treatment'. The same goes for sex addicts, shopping addicts, food addicts, gambling addicts, or even addicts to abusive relationships.
This theory, which grew out of the Temperance movement and was developed and disseminated by the religious cult known as Alcoholics Anonymous, has not been confirmed by any factual research. Numerous scientific studies show that 'addicts' are in control of their behavior.
Instead of looking at drug addiction as a disease, Dr. Schaler proposes that we view it as willful commitment or dedication, akin to joining a religion or pursuing a romantic involvement. While heavy consumption of drugs is often foolish and self-destructive, it is a matter of personal choice.
So there are profound legal, psychological and medical problems about free will, and then there's the big one, God and the matter of evil and suffering. Check :
- There is enormous and constant suffering in the world caused by human beings and by natural disasters and disease.
- If God was omnipotent and loving he would stop this.
- Since it continues without stopping, God is either not omnipotent, or not loving.
The solution is, therefore, that God COULD stop all the suffering, but he chooses not to, NOT because he is unloving (perish the thought) but because to do so would turn us all into puppets, we would have no free will, we would not be able to decide to make ourselves a few sex zombies.
And who would want to live in such a world like that?
Me.
January 24, 2016
Not just another book on Jeff Dahmer. The writing is a little clumsy in spots, but the author was the first on the scene when the police were first searching his apartment; she even walked through the place herself. She was able to follow the story headline by headline as they proceeded through the firestorm surrounding the handling of Konarek Sinthasomphone's near-escape from Dahmer, all the way through the trial and victim's impact statements. It includes one detail of the crimes I never read before, which made me drop the book in my lap.
October 1, 2022
"What was in his head? is a question that continues to haunt me. Professionals have speculated that the public really does not want to know what makes a Jeffrey Dahmer tick."
Dahmer is one of those serial killers that I'm fascinated by. Fascinated in a way where how can someone so sick get away with harming men for years before getting caught. I've read other books about him and his murders and I've also watched documentaries but I always feel that there is more to learn. Another thing these books have taught me is that I shouldn't be so trusting of others.
This was more than just a Dahmer book. It filled us in on his crimes and how he was almost caught a few times. We get little glimpses of his life when he was younger and in the military. When you read more about his life, all the warning signs were there but people seemed to ignore them. While you dig apart those insights we also get to see how reporters get their stories, and how the cops failed Dahmer's victims.
There were certain things in here that really pissed me off. I just can't believe that the cops swept some of the things that Jeffrey did under the rug which lead to men losing their lives. The Police department didn't do their jobs correctly because of the neighborhood and the ethnicity of these men. It's sad that those things are still going on to this day. Just think of all the lives that could have been saved if they properly did their jobs.
Monster was an okay book with some great insight into the inner workings of the press and how they secure their information. How they outdo one another to get the top story. Dahmer was a monster for sure and this was the first time that I got to fully read his court statement. He showed zero remorse throughout his trial and this book portrayed that very clearly.
Dahmer is one of those serial killers that I'm fascinated by. Fascinated in a way where how can someone so sick get away with harming men for years before getting caught. I've read other books about him and his murders and I've also watched documentaries but I always feel that there is more to learn. Another thing these books have taught me is that I shouldn't be so trusting of others.
This was more than just a Dahmer book. It filled us in on his crimes and how he was almost caught a few times. We get little glimpses of his life when he was younger and in the military. When you read more about his life, all the warning signs were there but people seemed to ignore them. While you dig apart those insights we also get to see how reporters get their stories, and how the cops failed Dahmer's victims.
There were certain things in here that really pissed me off. I just can't believe that the cops swept some of the things that Jeffrey did under the rug which lead to men losing their lives. The Police department didn't do their jobs correctly because of the neighborhood and the ethnicity of these men. It's sad that those things are still going on to this day. Just think of all the lives that could have been saved if they properly did their jobs.
Monster was an okay book with some great insight into the inner workings of the press and how they secure their information. How they outdo one another to get the top story. Dahmer was a monster for sure and this was the first time that I got to fully read his court statement. He showed zero remorse throughout his trial and this book portrayed that very clearly.
May 25, 2016
You are on the balcony, taking some rest after studying for an exam when you notice out the window that there is a man standing beside the light post in front of the building. You will get terrified when you witness him killing a girl. You will get in a panic more when you see him deeply staring and snickering at you. It occurs to you that the man could be a serial killer just the like of the characters you watch in movies. Then, your hair will stand on end when you notice that he points his finger at the ground floor of the apartment building where you stay in. What do you think the man is doing with his finger?
Actually, this is a psychopath test, quite popular among my Korean students, to determine if you have what it takes to be like Jeffrey Dahmer. (laughs) Read your answer later.
In the past, to determine if one had the tendency to be a criminal was through the shapes of the skull. Cesare Lombroso, the founder of the Italian School of Positivist Criminology and considered as the father of scientific criminology, argued that criminality was inherited and that the “born criminal” could be identified by physical defects, which confirmed as criminal as“ savage,” or “ atavistic”. According to him, you were cut out to be one if you have the following traits: large jaws, forward projection of jaw, low sloping forehead, high cheekbones, flattened or upturned nose, handle-shaped ears, hawk-like noses or fleshy lips, hard shifty eyes, scanty beard or baldness, insensitivity to pain, and long arms relative to lower limbs. (http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/e... theory is considered as a pseudo-science. In short, it has no scientific basis.
When American serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer made an earth-shattering headline across the globe in 1992, the people were flummoxed how they could know if someone they met on daily basis had the tendency to be like him. They could not get around the fact that someone quiet, reserved like him would be able to bestially kill more than 17 people, mostly Blacks, and preserve them in his own house in that no one in the neighborhood had had the idea of his heinous crime. So, many self-proclaimed experts from different scientific fields bombastically expressed their views ad nauseam until the people got cross-eyed to whose expertise they had to defer. Eventually, there is one thing they were in common- no one can guess whether a person is a psychopath or not because there are many behavioral patterns. However, Dahmer’s behavioral patterns were unfairly used as the bases, particularly by parents, to preclude a child’s psychopathic tendency. So, you have the tendency to be Jeffrey Dahmer if you did or do all of the following :
1.You made fun of animals by torturing them when you were still as young as in elementary because you were amazed at the internal organs of a living species. Besides, you wanted to collect their bones and skeletons.
2.You barely got along with anybody.
3.You started drinking scotch at early age.
4.You started to read porn magazines as well as porn videos at early age, so you jerked off many times in a day.
5.You always had financial problem.
6.You cannot express your sexual preference because of your conventionally filial atmosphere, so you are in the habit of frequenting at gay bars.
7.You fantasize people whom you want to sleep with.
8.You were a drop-out student.
9.You come from a broken family.
Although I was teeming with prejudice, I understood, with the help of my background in clinical psychology, that Jeffrey Dahmer was both a victim and suspect. He was a victim of what is so-called ‘naked existence’ as how Victor Frankl put it in his book Man’s Search for Meaning, when his parents did not cater to him the atmospheric LOVE he wanted to feel and be exposed to. The divorce and conjugal misunderstanding between his parents also added to the fuel of his emptiness. In other words, Dahmer grew up in a world that he was ALONE, where no one guided and admonished him for his delinquent behaviors. Therefore, whatever the bad foundation built at his early age was the trunk of his life later on in that he became a serial killer. So, who should have been responsible for Dahmer’s life? Himself or his significant others, particularly his parents?
I am not a true-crime votary, but I had interest in Dahmer’s life story when my best friend kept on telling me about him. His name became immortal when I found out that American novelist Joyce Carol Oates wrote Zombie based on him. Fortunately, I found this biography
All I would say is that this book is perfect. First, the author is a known and trusted journalist who happened to be the first one to be tipped off when Dahmer’s skeleton in the closet was found. Second, it is full of clear but blood-curdling accounts of how and why Dahmer became a serial killer- from the time he showed latent behavioral patterns to the time when he was killed. Finally, in all fairness, it knocked my socks off; I could not sleep at that night while reading it. I made sure that I heretically locked my door and windows as what I usually did when I was young whenever I watched crime stories.
The only thing that I cringed at is the author’s nettlesome partiality for the policemen who were said to be incompetent in their job because they missed the fact that the man they were supposed to take over to the authority turned out to be Dahmer’s victim. She argued that policemen were not perfect and had no any idea of what a serial killer’s behavioral patterns are. Also, she reasoned that it was not easy to be in that line of duty since they stay up late to monitor around the city at nights.
These are the answers to the psychopath test above. You are normal if your answer is that he memorizes your face. You are a psychopath if you think that he counts what floor you live in.
Actually, this is a psychopath test, quite popular among my Korean students, to determine if you have what it takes to be like Jeffrey Dahmer. (laughs) Read your answer later.
In the past, to determine if one had the tendency to be a criminal was through the shapes of the skull. Cesare Lombroso, the founder of the Italian School of Positivist Criminology and considered as the father of scientific criminology, argued that criminality was inherited and that the “born criminal” could be identified by physical defects, which confirmed as criminal as“ savage,” or “ atavistic”. According to him, you were cut out to be one if you have the following traits: large jaws, forward projection of jaw, low sloping forehead, high cheekbones, flattened or upturned nose, handle-shaped ears, hawk-like noses or fleshy lips, hard shifty eyes, scanty beard or baldness, insensitivity to pain, and long arms relative to lower limbs. (http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/e... theory is considered as a pseudo-science. In short, it has no scientific basis.
When American serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer made an earth-shattering headline across the globe in 1992, the people were flummoxed how they could know if someone they met on daily basis had the tendency to be like him. They could not get around the fact that someone quiet, reserved like him would be able to bestially kill more than 17 people, mostly Blacks, and preserve them in his own house in that no one in the neighborhood had had the idea of his heinous crime. So, many self-proclaimed experts from different scientific fields bombastically expressed their views ad nauseam until the people got cross-eyed to whose expertise they had to defer. Eventually, there is one thing they were in common- no one can guess whether a person is a psychopath or not because there are many behavioral patterns. However, Dahmer’s behavioral patterns were unfairly used as the bases, particularly by parents, to preclude a child’s psychopathic tendency. So, you have the tendency to be Jeffrey Dahmer if you did or do all of the following :
1.You made fun of animals by torturing them when you were still as young as in elementary because you were amazed at the internal organs of a living species. Besides, you wanted to collect their bones and skeletons.
2.You barely got along with anybody.
3.You started drinking scotch at early age.
4.You started to read porn magazines as well as porn videos at early age, so you jerked off many times in a day.
5.You always had financial problem.
6.You cannot express your sexual preference because of your conventionally filial atmosphere, so you are in the habit of frequenting at gay bars.
7.You fantasize people whom you want to sleep with.
8.You were a drop-out student.
9.You come from a broken family.
Although I was teeming with prejudice, I understood, with the help of my background in clinical psychology, that Jeffrey Dahmer was both a victim and suspect. He was a victim of what is so-called ‘naked existence’ as how Victor Frankl put it in his book Man’s Search for Meaning, when his parents did not cater to him the atmospheric LOVE he wanted to feel and be exposed to. The divorce and conjugal misunderstanding between his parents also added to the fuel of his emptiness. In other words, Dahmer grew up in a world that he was ALONE, where no one guided and admonished him for his delinquent behaviors. Therefore, whatever the bad foundation built at his early age was the trunk of his life later on in that he became a serial killer. So, who should have been responsible for Dahmer’s life? Himself or his significant others, particularly his parents?
I am not a true-crime votary, but I had interest in Dahmer’s life story when my best friend kept on telling me about him. His name became immortal when I found out that American novelist Joyce Carol Oates wrote Zombie based on him. Fortunately, I found this biography
All I would say is that this book is perfect. First, the author is a known and trusted journalist who happened to be the first one to be tipped off when Dahmer’s skeleton in the closet was found. Second, it is full of clear but blood-curdling accounts of how and why Dahmer became a serial killer- from the time he showed latent behavioral patterns to the time when he was killed. Finally, in all fairness, it knocked my socks off; I could not sleep at that night while reading it. I made sure that I heretically locked my door and windows as what I usually did when I was young whenever I watched crime stories.
The only thing that I cringed at is the author’s nettlesome partiality for the policemen who were said to be incompetent in their job because they missed the fact that the man they were supposed to take over to the authority turned out to be Dahmer’s victim. She argued that policemen were not perfect and had no any idea of what a serial killer’s behavioral patterns are. Also, she reasoned that it was not easy to be in that line of duty since they stay up late to monitor around the city at nights.
These are the answers to the psychopath test above. You are normal if your answer is that he memorizes your face. You are a psychopath if you think that he counts what floor you live in.
October 8, 2022
I didn't like how she slipped and called Konerak and Jamie men. They were 14 year old boys. She also mentioned how some of the victims had been arrested for prostitution. Seemed victim blamey. She also came across as very supportive of the police department. Especially after what happened to Konerak. Would not recommend.
October 19, 2022
Reading this book was a whole different experience than watching the Netflix series. The first hand perspective of what it was really like being at the crime scene and in that court room really is terrifying. I also feel like this book gives a voice and stories to the victims which they deserve.
January 21, 2022
Thorough account of the Dahmer case published shortly after his arrest and trial 30 years ago. The author does WAY too much victim blaming, going so far as to include an appendix with the victims names, ages, and a list of crimes they had been arrested for earlier. The latter column was unnecessary and went way too far. She even says her editor at the paper refused to print the arrest records of the victims. I feel like including it in the book is a slap in the face to the victims families.
January 29, 2021
Estoy impactado.
Es un libro muy crudo y directo. Fue escrito por la primer periodista que tuvo contacto con el caso Jeffrey Dahmer, incluso tuvo oportunidad de caminar por la escena de los crímenes antes de que las evidencias fueran removidas, solo unos momentos después de que "El carnicero de Milwaukee" fuese detenido por los policías. En el libro se hace un recorrido por toda la investigación periodística sobre Jeffrey, desde su infancia, su crecimiento, y su trayectoria de asesinatos. Se ahonda en el método en el que operaba para no ser descubierto, todos sus antecedentes penales y los de sus victimas, los impactos sociales del caso mas famoso de Milwaukee, las luchas de medios, los estragos en los policías que tuvieron que ver con Jeffrey, las familias de las victimas, el juicio; en fin se habla de todo lo que se pueda hablar sobre el caso y sus impactos en la comunidad de Milwaukee y el mundo. Es bastante detallado, explicito y directo. Me dejo reflexionando sobre hasta que punto una persona puede llegar a cometer ciertos actos inimaginables.
"… si alguien tan aparentemente mediocre como Jeffrey Dahmer puede ser tan peligroso, ¿qué hay de los demás que nos rodean? ¿Qué sabemos realmente de las otras personas?"
Es un libro muy crudo y directo. Fue escrito por la primer periodista que tuvo contacto con el caso Jeffrey Dahmer, incluso tuvo oportunidad de caminar por la escena de los crímenes antes de que las evidencias fueran removidas, solo unos momentos después de que "El carnicero de Milwaukee" fuese detenido por los policías. En el libro se hace un recorrido por toda la investigación periodística sobre Jeffrey, desde su infancia, su crecimiento, y su trayectoria de asesinatos. Se ahonda en el método en el que operaba para no ser descubierto, todos sus antecedentes penales y los de sus victimas, los impactos sociales del caso mas famoso de Milwaukee, las luchas de medios, los estragos en los policías que tuvieron que ver con Jeffrey, las familias de las victimas, el juicio; en fin se habla de todo lo que se pueda hablar sobre el caso y sus impactos en la comunidad de Milwaukee y el mundo. Es bastante detallado, explicito y directo. Me dejo reflexionando sobre hasta que punto una persona puede llegar a cometer ciertos actos inimaginables.
"… si alguien tan aparentemente mediocre como Jeffrey Dahmer puede ser tan peligroso, ¿qué hay de los demás que nos rodean? ¿Qué sabemos realmente de las otras personas?"
November 5, 2018
If you want to research about Dahmer, this is not the book (read 'The Shrine of Jeffrey Dahmer' instead). If you want to learn about the media and the police after his arrest then, by all means, read this. As I said before, this is NOT the book to read if you want to learn about Dahmer himself or his crimes. Most of the things mentioned about what he did are inaccurate (as most publications are about him). I found this book particularly boring and would not really recommend it to anyone.
December 6, 2021
It was meh. I’ve read better true crime, but also worse. Could’ve been shorter. Pretty repetitive throughout. But learned a lot about a monster.
March 8, 2025
It's a tad difficult to rate this book. On one hand, it did not offer anything really new that one cannot find by reading books such as A Father's Story, Dahmer Detective: The Interrogation and Investigation That Shocked The World or even The Shrine of Jeffrey Dahmer. It mainly rehashed known information when it comes to the murders, arrest and following trial of Dahmer. However, what is unique to this books specifically, is that Schwartz gives a viewer's angle into how media treated the case. Not only Anne recalled how she was first on a scene, but also how journalists felt about the situation that was unfolding and that they were meant to report upon. Special interest in regards to this can be found among the chapters where Anne talks about her personal view into the Milwaukee police at the time, due to being married to a police officer.
Author also tries to give us social commentary in painting for us the split in the community after Dahmer was arrested and what it eventually devolved to at its peak. While I don't particularly find that a necessary thing to touch upon, I also can see why Schwartz was compelled to give context about the grander scheme of things.
All in all, a worthy read for any interested in the Dahmer case.
Author also tries to give us social commentary in painting for us the split in the community after Dahmer was arrested and what it eventually devolved to at its peak. While I don't particularly find that a necessary thing to touch upon, I also can see why Schwartz was compelled to give context about the grander scheme of things.
All in all, a worthy read for any interested in the Dahmer case.
Read
September 28, 2025DNF pg 108. I found this boring and more about the cops and reporters, but my main reason for giving up is I know the story already. This isn't my first book on Dahmer and after loving (I watched it twice) the docuseries I decided there are too many other books to read.
September 26, 2022
Being born and raised in Wisconsin and then living in Milwaukee specifically for nearly a decade, Jeffrey Dahmer was a household name, and I thought this book brought a new perspective on it - namely, the media.
Anne E. Schwartz was the reporter to break this story making it an extremely unique viewpoint. She talks about how much the Dahmer story and murders evolved as the case was cracked open (there were instances where her story didn’t match with the story I’ve heard throughout my life, and it made me question whose truth was the actual truth??), and the twisted routes the media would take to be the first to break the next nugget.
My biggest qualm is that Schwartz is a bit too pro-cop in her telling, despite the clear evidence that the MPD was operating with racism and homophobia at their core, and had ample time to intervene sooner had they even considered the situations brought to them.
Anne E. Schwartz was the reporter to break this story making it an extremely unique viewpoint. She talks about how much the Dahmer story and murders evolved as the case was cracked open (there were instances where her story didn’t match with the story I’ve heard throughout my life, and it made me question whose truth was the actual truth??), and the twisted routes the media would take to be the first to break the next nugget.
My biggest qualm is that Schwartz is a bit too pro-cop in her telling, despite the clear evidence that the MPD was operating with racism and homophobia at their core, and had ample time to intervene sooner had they even considered the situations brought to them.
February 21, 2022
Gerald Boyle, the defense lawyer of Jeffrey Dahmer sums him up in his closing argument. "Jeffrey Dahmer the human being." "Skulls in locker, cannibalism, sexual urges, drilling... showering with corpses, ...get a mannequin home so he could play sex with a mannequin, masturbating into open parts of a human being's body.... posing people who are dead that he killed for pictures."(p212) This is Jeffrey Dahmer and much more.
The gruesome things that he did to people were very disturbing. I wanted to read a book that examined why he did what he did. Schwartz was a reporter and the first person on the scene when Jeffrey Dahmer was arrested for murder. I didn't expect most of the story to revolve around her and her experience, but this book spends too much of its brief length discussing the impact Dahmer's crimes had on race relations in Milwaukee. That aspect of the case was interesting, but there wasn't enough about Dahmer himself. Schwartz spent too much time on her relations with the police force, the community's reactions and environment, and a dated sequence of her involvement in the case. The author mentions his parents' bitter arguments and divorce, and that the event may have been pivotal in Dahmer's development, but she hardly spends any time on it. What were the fights about? Why did the parents argue only over custody of the younger son? There just wasn't enough detail. Those were interesting but a much better approach would have to been to look into the mind of Jeffrey Dahmer an expose the why of what he did. If you are interested in each murder, you will not get a better book on the subject, and they are very disturbing. It gives great detail and many perspectives from everything that surrounded Dahmer's murders. If you are looking into the psychology of Jeffrey Dahmer's mind look elsewhere.
The gruesome things that he did to people were very disturbing. I wanted to read a book that examined why he did what he did. Schwartz was a reporter and the first person on the scene when Jeffrey Dahmer was arrested for murder. I didn't expect most of the story to revolve around her and her experience, but this book spends too much of its brief length discussing the impact Dahmer's crimes had on race relations in Milwaukee. That aspect of the case was interesting, but there wasn't enough about Dahmer himself. Schwartz spent too much time on her relations with the police force, the community's reactions and environment, and a dated sequence of her involvement in the case. The author mentions his parents' bitter arguments and divorce, and that the event may have been pivotal in Dahmer's development, but she hardly spends any time on it. What were the fights about? Why did the parents argue only over custody of the younger son? There just wasn't enough detail. Those were interesting but a much better approach would have to been to look into the mind of Jeffrey Dahmer an expose the why of what he did. If you are interested in each murder, you will not get a better book on the subject, and they are very disturbing. It gives great detail and many perspectives from everything that surrounded Dahmer's murders. If you are looking into the psychology of Jeffrey Dahmer's mind look elsewhere.
April 4, 2025
I wanted to know more about the Jeffrey Dahmer murders but this was mostly just the same information repeated multiple times throughout the book.
It centered mostly around the one reporter and her journey through the case as it was going on with recaps of what was said in interviews with Jeffrey, the victims' families, and cops.
Was not my most interesting read. This was not my cup of tea and seemed more interesting than I thought it would be because I enjoy true crime.
It does not read like a pod cast like I thought it would.
It centered mostly around the one reporter and her journey through the case as it was going on with recaps of what was said in interviews with Jeffrey, the victims' families, and cops.
Was not my most interesting read. This was not my cup of tea and seemed more interesting than I thought it would be because I enjoy true crime.
It does not read like a pod cast like I thought it would.
December 27, 2021
Many true crime books are written by the journalist who broke the story. A lot of them labor under the dubious assumption that we're interested in what it's like to BE a journalist. Unless you've lived a life as interesting as Dr. H.S. Thompson, we don't care about your personal life. Just tell us the damn story.
April 9, 2022
this book being a pulitzer prize nominee has got to be a joke considering this is one of, if not the worst true crime i've ever read
October 9, 2022
I wanted to read this after finishing the recent Netflix series due to it having been written by the first journalist on the scene the night Dahmer was arrested. I thought it would be an interesting perspective, and as someone who works in news, it was. (Including how breaking news was covered in the years before emails, cellphones, social media!) A lot of the book focused on how the case was covered by news outlets, from that first day through the end of the trial, as well as how it affected the community at large, how it shed a spotlight on racism and homophobia in the early 90s, and how Dahmer managed to continuously evade every single roadblock that our legal system is supposed to have in place to stop people like him. (It’s even worse than how it was portrayed in the series.) My one quibble would be that the reporter/author tries too hard at times to excuse away the utter ineptitude of some of the law enforcement involved, most specifically the episode where the officers took Dahmer’s word over witnesses and returned a literal child to him. She mentions cultivating several sources in the police department in her years as reporter prior to the Dahmer case breaking, so it may have been an instance of being too close to be fully objective.
Overall, an interesting read, especially if you have a news background. It does go into a lot of the more gruesome details of the case, so if you’re sensitive to that, I wouldn’t pick this up.
Overall, an interesting read, especially if you have a news background. It does go into a lot of the more gruesome details of the case, so if you’re sensitive to that, I wouldn’t pick this up.
March 5, 2024
It should come as no surprise that I read a lot about mass murderers. I like true crime more than fictional stories, even though I wrote a book about a female serial killer told through her perspective. MONSTER is an eye-opener. We all think we know what Jeffrey Dahmer did, and perhaps we do. Anne Schwartz was the first reporter on the scene when Dahmer's killing site was uncovered and she was the last reporter still writing about him when he was sentenced to 957 consecutive life sentences.
Schwartz joins the ranks of female writers delving into the darkness of a serial killer's mind. What she shares with Ann Rule's THE STRANGER BESIDE ME about Ted Bundy and Diane Fanning's THROUGH THE WINDOW about the cross-country killer, Tommy Lynn Sells. What else these writers share is personal contact with the killers. By getting to know them, Schwartz, Rule, and Fanning take the reader into the minds of the monsters and bring to life the victims of the unspeakable crimes. I could not do that. I can make up a story, but I don't think I could spend time with a known serial killer.
Hats off to you ladies. You rock.
Schwartz joins the ranks of female writers delving into the darkness of a serial killer's mind. What she shares with Ann Rule's THE STRANGER BESIDE ME about Ted Bundy and Diane Fanning's THROUGH THE WINDOW about the cross-country killer, Tommy Lynn Sells. What else these writers share is personal contact with the killers. By getting to know them, Schwartz, Rule, and Fanning take the reader into the minds of the monsters and bring to life the victims of the unspeakable crimes. I could not do that. I can make up a story, but I don't think I could spend time with a known serial killer.
Hats off to you ladies. You rock.
February 16, 2023
"Oh, my God. How horrible! How awful! Tell me more." This quote sums up the entire book. I commend the author, who was one of the first reporters at the initial discover at Jeffrey Dahmer's apartment, for her tact in reporting as much detail as she did, while also doing it in a way that does not glorify the acts. It is written very much like a long newspaper report. I also like how some of the chapters are focused one the media portion of the case, and how crazy it was for the reporters. She acknowledges how insensitive some of them were for the sake of the story. This book is NOT for the squeamish though.
August 15, 2025
Wow, how insanely disrespectful towards the victims, their families, and anyone else who was affected by the actions of this man. I ended up DNF at about halfway through because the language used and how she paints things comes across as victim, blaming and excusing police behavior and boot licking. A lot of the information within this book is not correct at all so I would not recommend this book to anyone who’s wanting to learn more about this case because you’re not gonna get accurate information. I cannot begin to explain how furious this book made me to focus on the victims criminal record and then to paint the police as the victims instead disgusting.
June 17, 2023
3.5 stars, I liked this a lot still though. I just know too much about dahmer and am extra critical of books on him
January 10, 2022
Meh. Interesting topic but the writing was pretty poor. Boring and dry. I love true crime, and this was the first Dahmer book I read, but I can’t recommend because of the dull writing.
December 7, 2021
Overall: 3 stars. This book is a bit of a jumbled mess organizationally but has some very interesting points to make about the case, the media’s role in the justice system, and racism in law enforcement
Pros: This book was written shortly after the murders and then updated in 2020, giving it the benefits of both immediacy and hindsight in its analysis. In addition to covering the case, the author raises several interesting and meaningful points about 1) how journalism and the media fit into the justice system, 2) the conflicts between the public’s right to know and the privacy needed in a criminal investigation, and 3) the role of homophobia and racism in cases like this and in law enforcement in general (she spends a lot of time discussing the black community’s reaction to the trial and concerns of police bias and makes a brief connection to the George Floyd murder also in Milwaukee - one which I wish she had explored further). I’ve read a lot of true crime, and while most touch on the public’s reaction and how the media covers the cases, this book is really a deep dive into public perception of crime and the media’s coverage of it.
Cons: Maybe reading this as a print/ebook rather than listening as an audiobook would have helped it seem less disorganized, but I’m not convinced. The author bounces around chronologically, interspersing the retelling of Dahmer’s life and crimes with her own career stories as a reporter, eventually backtracking to the original point she was making. I’m honestly surprised that, as a career journalist, her writing was so chaotic.
The author also frequently uses the pronoun “he” over and over again, and in a case where everyone is masculine (the criminal, the victims, the cops, the lawyers, etc) that gets confusing. I figured out who the “he” was within a couple sentences each instance, but it would have made for greater clarity in her writing to just pay attention to changing subjects.
Finally, the author’s ego is really on display here in an off-putting way. I recognize she has a right to be proud as a woman in a male-dominated field, but hearing multiple times about how she’s the only one to get this scoop or that story first is a bit tone-deaf considering the subject matter.
Overall, it’s an interesting read with some really thoughtful points, but I can’t give it higher than 3 stars with its flaws.
Pros: This book was written shortly after the murders and then updated in 2020, giving it the benefits of both immediacy and hindsight in its analysis. In addition to covering the case, the author raises several interesting and meaningful points about 1) how journalism and the media fit into the justice system, 2) the conflicts between the public’s right to know and the privacy needed in a criminal investigation, and 3) the role of homophobia and racism in cases like this and in law enforcement in general (she spends a lot of time discussing the black community’s reaction to the trial and concerns of police bias and makes a brief connection to the George Floyd murder also in Milwaukee - one which I wish she had explored further). I’ve read a lot of true crime, and while most touch on the public’s reaction and how the media covers the cases, this book is really a deep dive into public perception of crime and the media’s coverage of it.
Cons: Maybe reading this as a print/ebook rather than listening as an audiobook would have helped it seem less disorganized, but I’m not convinced. The author bounces around chronologically, interspersing the retelling of Dahmer’s life and crimes with her own career stories as a reporter, eventually backtracking to the original point she was making. I’m honestly surprised that, as a career journalist, her writing was so chaotic.
The author also frequently uses the pronoun “he” over and over again, and in a case where everyone is masculine (the criminal, the victims, the cops, the lawyers, etc) that gets confusing. I figured out who the “he” was within a couple sentences each instance, but it would have made for greater clarity in her writing to just pay attention to changing subjects.
Finally, the author’s ego is really on display here in an off-putting way. I recognize she has a right to be proud as a woman in a male-dominated field, but hearing multiple times about how she’s the only one to get this scoop or that story first is a bit tone-deaf considering the subject matter.
Overall, it’s an interesting read with some really thoughtful points, but I can’t give it higher than 3 stars with its flaws.
June 19, 2024
Good reporting, but repetitive and clunky. Seems to go through a never-ending story of back & forth. Just watch the Netflix series.
June 6, 2020
As John Wayne Gacy once said, "If Jeffery Dahmer isn't insane, than who is?!!
I, like everyone else, knew who Jeffrey Dahmer was. But did not know all the details. Whelp.... I got them. I've known people I thought were out there. They weren't ....this guy was. Not only were the crimes horrid...but his crimes had major effects on the public towards law enforcement. I think Dahmer's psychological issues were mostly based on his feelings about his own homosexuality. And I think the most tragic mistake was made because law enforcement lacked understanding about the gay community and probably felt uncomfortable being in a situation they believed was a domestic dispute between two gay men. But there is NO denying that pretty much complete incompetence cost a child his life. And as far as Dahmer was concerned, I'm not sure racism was his motivation. I don't believe Dahmer chose more black men because he was racist. I think he just may have had a little of the ole jungle fever.(as some people like to call it) The nature of the killings mixed with the shatty police work and the racial and homosexual rage makes for one crazy story. But I will say, this book does give you quite a bit of detail. So it's not for the squeamish. And apparently it was published before his murder in prison because the book ends after the trial. No info at all about his incarceration or death. I do believe he was crazy. I think he was very angry and embarrassed about his homosexuality. He definitely had some MAJOR mental issues, but I believe he knew exactly what he was doing. And completely understood the consequences. A very sick individual indeed. And I think that I realized why I like to read true crime. It makes me realize how well grounded and....well..... NORMAL I am! I may have my quirks, but I'm just fine compared to guys like this.
I, like everyone else, knew who Jeffrey Dahmer was. But did not know all the details. Whelp.... I got them. I've known people I thought were out there. They weren't ....this guy was. Not only were the crimes horrid...but his crimes had major effects on the public towards law enforcement. I think Dahmer's psychological issues were mostly based on his feelings about his own homosexuality. And I think the most tragic mistake was made because law enforcement lacked understanding about the gay community and probably felt uncomfortable being in a situation they believed was a domestic dispute between two gay men. But there is NO denying that pretty much complete incompetence cost a child his life. And as far as Dahmer was concerned, I'm not sure racism was his motivation. I don't believe Dahmer chose more black men because he was racist. I think he just may have had a little of the ole jungle fever.(as some people like to call it) The nature of the killings mixed with the shatty police work and the racial and homosexual rage makes for one crazy story. But I will say, this book does give you quite a bit of detail. So it's not for the squeamish. And apparently it was published before his murder in prison because the book ends after the trial. No info at all about his incarceration or death. I do believe he was crazy. I think he was very angry and embarrassed about his homosexuality. He definitely had some MAJOR mental issues, but I believe he knew exactly what he was doing. And completely understood the consequences. A very sick individual indeed. And I think that I realized why I like to read true crime. It makes me realize how well grounded and....well..... NORMAL I am! I may have my quirks, but I'm just fine compared to guys like this.
May 26, 2018
This is not truly a book about Jeffery Dahmer. That's fine - it was interesting to learn about the effect that Dahmer and his capture had on the city of Milwaukee in general and the author specifically. But it's not really a book that attempts to go very deeply into Dahmer's psychology, which is how it's billed.
All this wouldn't have stopped the book from being enjoyable if it wasn't so apologetic beyond belief towards the police. The police really, really do not deserve to have Anne Schwartz defending them in this case. She really does try to make you feel sympathetic towards the policemen who allowed Dahmer to get away with his crimes, and specifically towards the three men who returned one of Dahmer's victims to his apartment. It doesn't work!! Yes, the police are still better than Dahmer... but that's just such a low bar, especially when he was so clearly playing on their homophobic and racist inclinations to get away with his actions. The author even attempts to excuse their statements of "let's go back to the station and get a delousing" (after they thought they were interacting with a gay couple) in a way that just crosses the line.
I gave it two stars because the book is well-written and there a few chapters there with merit, like the author's description of meeting the families of the victims and hearing their impact statements as well as the chapter about discussing Dahmer with Brian Masters and Dennis Nilssen's opinions on the case. But on the whole - the extremely apologetic stance towards the police really does make it a borderline unreadable book and I can't say I recommend it.
All this wouldn't have stopped the book from being enjoyable if it wasn't so apologetic beyond belief towards the police. The police really, really do not deserve to have Anne Schwartz defending them in this case. She really does try to make you feel sympathetic towards the policemen who allowed Dahmer to get away with his crimes, and specifically towards the three men who returned one of Dahmer's victims to his apartment. It doesn't work!! Yes, the police are still better than Dahmer... but that's just such a low bar, especially when he was so clearly playing on their homophobic and racist inclinations to get away with his actions. The author even attempts to excuse their statements of "let's go back to the station and get a delousing" (after they thought they were interacting with a gay couple) in a way that just crosses the line.
I gave it two stars because the book is well-written and there a few chapters there with merit, like the author's description of meeting the families of the victims and hearing their impact statements as well as the chapter about discussing Dahmer with Brian Masters and Dennis Nilssen's opinions on the case. But on the whole - the extremely apologetic stance towards the police really does make it a borderline unreadable book and I can't say I recommend it.
January 19, 2023
I don't know why I read this. I wish I hadn't. I think I just wanted some insight into how a person becomes so evil. I felt like I should burn some sage, and the book, after finishing. Also, it is not very well-written.
October 8, 2012
If you've ever chanced upon a Wikipedia article about Jeffrey Dahmer and found yourself wanting to know more about the shocking and horrifying details of this Milwaukee massacre this is a book for you. Not only does it feed your curiosity with the brutal sensationalism of heads in refrigerator, close-calls with law enforcement and a lengthy and disturbing confession it's written by a journalist who covers all aspects of the case from a media standpoint. Beyond the hype of the murders, the book also presents coverage of the victim's distraught families viewpoints, politics of the police force and officers that were involved at the time, the cold and uncaring media's maddening mission to exploit the story, and even the smallest details like the cost of the trial. It does a great job to painting an nearly complete picture of Milwaukee at the time but tends to be a bit disorganized; sometimes even repeating the same information from chapter to chapter.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 131 reviews