English 1301-23 - Killing: Nurture or Nature?

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The name Coed Killer came from his next six murders: Cute, young, college-going teen hitchhikers that Kemper had picked up to “offer transportation” to, but what fun is that. The first two of the unlucky victims were Mary Ann Pesce and Anita Luchessa, two Fresno State students who were on their way to Stanford University. Kemper promised to take them there, but after an hour long journey, he took the girls to a secluded area in the wilderness where he fatally stabbed the girls then raped their corpses, threw them in the trunk of his 1969 Ford, and went back to his apartment. These murders led to the similar murders of Aiko Koo, Cindy Schall, Rosalind Thorpe, and Alice Liu. As random as all of these terrible murders seemed, Kemper was leading up to his biggest, and closest to heart, murder yet.

Good Friday, 1973, Kemper planned on waiting for his mother to come home from a party, but accidently fell asleep. He was awakened by the sound of his mother in another room. He then entered her room to find her sitting in bed reading a paperback book. She saw him walk in and said, “I suppose you’re going to want to sit up all night and talk now,” to which he replied, “No, good night,” and beat her to death with a claw hammer. He decapitated her then used her head for sex and a dart board. Once he was done with her, he called her friend, Sally Hallett, over to the house. Upon arrival Kemper strangled her and left the scene and evidence behind. The entire time Kemper was planning and performing the murder of his mom, the memories of the abuse, humiliation, and unfairness that his mother had left him were stuck in his head. His mother had left a permanent scar on young Kemper’s ego which led to his horrific murders.

A poor and abusive childhood for Kemper resulted in an unexpected anger and violence towards women. Like most serial killers, until Kemper was arrested and had time to explain his terrible childhood, people just thought he was insane. Childhood is the last thing society thinks of when talking about necrophiliac serial killers, when it should be the first. Rarely should you assume that people randomly go crazy and start killing. Nurture is one word that can make or break the path that a person takes in life, for the better or worse, good or bad. Nurture is where it starts.

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Works Consulted:

Philbin, Tom. Killer Book of Serial Killers: Incredible Stories, Facts and Trivia from the World of Serial Killers, 2009

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edmund_Kemper