by Suruthi Bala
their sexual desire or behavior causes another person’s psychological distress, injury, or death
their desire for sexual behaviors involve unwilling targets unable to give legal consent, for example, children, animals, or corpses
If someone with a paraphilic interest in children, animals, or corpses were to act on their sexual interests in the UK, all three would be criminal offenses. In the US whether bestiality or necrophilia is a crime varies quite significantly from state to state. Why, exactly, bestiality has been illegal in Virginia since 1661 but only illegal in Vermont since 2017, and as of 2021 it’s still not illegal in Wyoming, is beyond us. If you want to know why Washington was forced to introduce bestiality laws in 2006, check out our horsey sidebar on page 198.
WHY THE LONG WAIT TO CRIMINALIZE FUCKING A HORSE?
Did you know that bestiality was not illegal in the State of Washington from 1975 until 2006? It had previously been covered under the same set of laws that outlawed sodomy, but those were repealed in 1975 to decriminalize consensual, homosexual, or heterosexual sex acts involving adult humans.
But if lawmakers thought they could just forget about the animals they were wrong. Bestiality was once again made illegal in Washington after the now notorious Enumclaw case. We really don’t want to get into the details, but basically a man decided to break into a farm in the city of Enumclaw in King County, Washington, and forced a horse to have sex with him. Turns out this wasn’t a great idea at all, and he died shortly afterward from some quite serious internal injuries. We know exactly what happened to him, though, because he had actually filmed the entire thing to distribute as part of his bestiality porn collection…
But anyway! The DSM-5 differentiates between paraphilias that are just seen as a bit weird and those that cause some sort of distress or harm. For the latter, it specifically lists eight such disorders:
1 Exhibitionistic disorder: exposing oneself or doing sexual things in front of other people
2 Fetishistic disorder: recurrent, intense sexual arousal from use of an inanimate object or from a very specific focus on a non-genital body part (or parts) that causes significant distress or functional impairment
3 Frotteuristic disorder: touching or rubbing someone who does not want to be touched or rubbed against with your genitals
4 Pedophilic disorder: recurrent intense sexually arousing fantasies, urges, or behaviors involving prepubescent or young adolescents, usually under the age of 13
5 Transvestic disorder: recurrent intense sexual arousal from cross-dressing, or dressing as the opposite gender, and in which that person’s urge to do so causes significant distress or impairment in their daily life
6 Voyeuristic disorder: getting off by watching an unsuspecting person who is disrobing, naked, or engaged in sexual activity
7 Sexual masochism disorder: recurring and intense sexual arousal in response to enduring moderate or extreme pain, suffering, or humiliation
8 Sexual sadism disorder: experiencing persistent and intense sexual arousal from causing or fantasizing about the physical or mental suffering of another person, with or without their consent
As you can see, it’s quite the list—it is controversial—and the discussion of any of these conditions would no doubt give us a fascinating insight into the realm of human behavior and sexual desire. But in this chapter, we are going to focus on that last disorder—sexual sadism—and how killers operating with this particular paraphilia are the epitome of absolute nightmare fuel when it comes to true crime.
And it’s not just us who think so. Sexually sadistic serial killers are, as former FBI agent Robert Hazelwood called them in his 1990 paper “The Sexually Sadistic Criminal and His Offenses,” “the most dangerous, destructive, elusive, brutal, and cunning of all aberrant offenders.”
But before we get into it, let’s make one thing clear—when we’re talking about sexually sadistic offenders, we’re not talking about BDSM culture.
Sexual Sadism
Sadism and masochism—when carried out within the confines of a consenting BDSM relationship between adults, using safe words, boundaries and agreements—is of course completely A-OK. Get the locks, get the paddles, get the blindfolds, and go for it!
And while it’s true that those who take part in such sexual activities as doms may very well be sexual sadists, it doesn’t mean that they have sexual sadism disorder—and it certainly doesn’t mean that they’re killers. Sexual sadism, like most things, exists on a spectrum, and for some the consensual role-play of BDSM is all they need to get their kicks.
Sexually sadistic offenders and killers, though, unlike the regular folk of the kink community, live out their sadistic sexual fantasies on other people without consent. They act with the direct aim of gratifying themselves and enhancing their own sexual arousal from observing the pain, humiliation, terror, torture, and even death of their victim. These guys are a very specific group of twisted individuals. The reason we’re making such a big deal about definitions is not just because we’re annoying and super anal, but also because of something else we need to clarify: not all sex offenders are sexual sadists.
As we mentioned at the start of this chapter, 75 percent of male serial killers are motivated by sex, but research carried out by psychiatrist Dr. Richard Kruger in 2010 found that of the thousands and thousands of sex offenders in US prisons, roughly only 10 percent were full-blown sexual sadists.
How does that work? I hear you ask. Surely all rapists are sadists? Well, no; all rapists are despicable, but as explained by psychiatrist Dr. Allen J. Frances in his 2012 paper “Sexual Sadism: Avoiding Its Misuse in Sexually Violent Predator Evaluations,” they are not all sadists.
To understand this, we need to distinguish between physical cruelty used during the commission of a crime like rape and murder, and sadism. An opportunistic rapist, for example, will resort to violence and murder if needed to get what he wants. He may have biastophilia, a paraphilia in which sexual arousal is dependent on the act of assaulting a non-consenting person, whereas the sexual sadist intentionally and methodically tortures the victim for the sole purpose of self-sexual arousal.
Trying to wrap our heads around what makes this kind of killer tick is deeply unpleasant; we know that. But it’s vital to understanding why they do what they do. To really try and get inside the head of a sexual sadist, we think the best way is to follow the guidance of criminologist Dr. Lee Mellor, as described on his podcast Murder Was the Case.
So, take a second and think about your own sexual fantasy… Go on…
Back with us? Good. Now, we’re guessing that a big part of your fantasy was not just what you were doing to someone, but also their response to it—the look on their face; the sounds they were making; how they were responding to you. This is a vital part of everyone’s sexual fantasies.
For sadists, they want to see fear, pain, and humiliation—that’s what turns them on. And if their victim stopped responding to the violence (i.e., stopped screaming in terror and pain), the sadist would stop being aroused. They would then escalate the torture and brutality in order to restart their captive’s fear response so that they could reach sexual gratification.
We know it’s a lot to take in, but check out our sidebar where we examine the “sexually sadistic cycle” Dr. Mellor describes to see how this works.
SEXUAL SADISM’S CYCLICAL CIRCUS
In an episode on sexual sadists on his podcast Murder Was the Case, Dr. Lee Mellor describes the cycle that a sexually sadistic offender traps his victim in:
STEP 1, Infliction of negative stimuli: This is the act of the torture itself.
STEP 2, Watching the reaction of fear, terror, and humiliation: This step is what actually delivers the sexual sadist their sexual kick. Sexual gratification for the sadist does not come from step 1, but rather from seeing the reaction of their victim to the horrible thing they are doing.
STEP 3, Experience of feeling an enhanced self-concept: This stage is the existential kick; the sadi
st feels better about themselves. They enjoy their feeling of superiority and they want to inflict more pain to keep getting the rush and thrill from steps 2 and 3.
Escalation
The cycle of torture and pleasure is addictive for a sexually sadistic offender. Just like how our non-murder-y brains light up when we’re given the right sexy stimuli, the sadist’s brain (which seems to have its wires crossed between pain and sex) goes into overdrive at the sight and sound of fear. The 2012 study “Increased Fronto-temporal Activation During Pain Observation in Sexual Sadism” even revealed that sexual sadists differ from non-sadists at a neurological level when it comes to witnessing pain in others. This study found that sexual sadists showed increased activity in the left amygdala (the brain’s reward center) in response to pictures of pain, whereas non-sadists did not.
We’ll come back to exploring what is going on in the brain of a sexual sadist later in this chapter. For now, what we need to focus on is that once the sadist gets into this cycle, they want to sustain their sexual high, and it hooks them like a drug. And just like with a drug, the sadist also starts to develop a tolerance to others’ pain and suffering. Soon they find that they need an increasingly heightened reaction from a victim in order to get the same sexual kick. This is when we start to see the torture intensify.
With sexual sadists, once they move from fantasy to hands-on offending, their path of perversion will only get more destructive. Their acts of sexual sadism will grow increasingly bizarre and violent over time. And although sexual sadists are not necessarily primarily motivated by murder—because they want a living victim to extract pleasure from—their insatiable sexual attraction to sadistic behavior, and their often rapid escalation in search of that sexual high, usually leads them to kill.
Some of the most notorious sexual sadists include Andrei Chikatilo (a.k.a. the Rostov Ripper); Dennis Rader (a.k.a. BTK); Bob Berdella (a.k.a. the Kansas City Butcher); Peter Kurten (a.k.a. the Vampire of Dusseldorf); and Robin Gecht and the Ripper Crew of Chicago.
All these men are examples of truly ghoulish killers, and they all make us to want to hide in our houses forever. But over at RedHanded HQ, we’ve decided that there is one offender who stands whips and chains above the rest; one person who scared the fuck out of us like no one else. David Parker Ray (a.k.a. the Toy Box Killer) has invaded more of our post-research nightmares and sent more chills down our spines than any other criminal we have ever encountered in all the years we’ve been neck-deep in true crime. (Which is really fucking annoying because you know he’d just have bloody loved that!)
David Parker Ray, as you are about to discover, symbolizes the sexually sadistic psychopath better than anyone else. In 2001 he was sentenced to 224 years in prison for a string of horrendous abductions, and although he was never actually convicted of murder, this was not due to a lack of brutality or an insufficient number of women vanishing around him. Despite the fact that they never found the bodies, the FBI and the New Mexico State Police remain absolutely convinced that Ray is indeed a serial killer who most likely murdered upwards of 50 victims, gaining him his nickname the Toy Box Killer.
David Parker Ray: Scrap Metal Sex Toys
On March 22, 1999, residents of the New Mexican town of Elephant Butte (and yes, that is the actual name of the actual town) were horrified to see a woman covered in blood, running down the street screaming for help. She was completely naked except for a large metal collar wrapped around her neck connected to a six-foot chain that was dragging behind her.
When the police arrived, the woman, who had taken refuge in an elderly couple’s home, told them that her name was Cynthia Vigil Jaramillo and that she had been held captive, tortured, and raped by the couple who lived at 513 Bass Road. The police sent a patrol car to the address while they took Cynthia to the nearest hospital. Once her injuries had been seen to and the collar had been removed from around her neck, Cynthia Jaramillo told the police her harrowing story…
She was a sex worker and three days earlier she had been standing in a parking lot in Albuquerque waiting for business. It was then that she was approached by a man who offered her $20 for oral sex. Cynthia agreed and went with him to his parked RV. Once in the vehicle, the john told Cynthia that he was actually an undercover police officer and that she was under arrest for solicitation. This man was of course none other than David Parker Ray—and he was not a policeman.
Straight away we see Ray start to tick the classic boxes of a homicidal sexual sadist. They tend to follow a very specific pattern of behaviors, and one of the most common—according to forensic psychologist Dr. J. Reid Meloy—is impersonating law enforcement in the commission of an offense. So, check.
As we continue with this disturbing story, you’ll see a macabre game of pervert bingo unfolding with regards to the other key traits. Check out the full list in our sidebar on page 206.
TRAITS-OF-THE-SEXUALLY-SADISTIC-KILLER
BINGO
Above average intelligence.
Commits crimes that are carefully planned and well thought out.
Murdered victim is concealed.
A history in the military and an attraction to jobs in policing.
Rape almost always leads to murder.
Offender records his activities meticulously.
Socially adept; uses his charisma and personality to lure the victim.
Abduction of victim to a pre-selected location.
Attack is methodical and repeated from one victim to another.
Has a partner who assists with the offenses.
Emotional detachment during attacks.
Rehearsal fantasy is a prerequisite.
With Cynthia now handcuffed and restrained in the back of the motor-home, Ray and his girlfriend Cindy Hendy (you really couldn’t make these names up), who had been hiding in the RV, started the 150-mile drive back to Elephant Butte. Once they arrived at 513 Bass Road, Cynthia was forced into the house and led through the couple’s house of horrors at gunpoint. Her blood froze as she saw that each room was filled with more bizarre and horrific-looking torture devices than the last.
After the nightmare tour was over, Cynthia was tied up and a tape recording started to play. It was Ray’s calm, cold voice, and the tape started with “Hello there, bitch.”
The Tape
Now, we simply cannot include a full transcript of what was said on that tape in this book because it would take up at least 20 pages, and because you’d probably be sick. So we’ll break it down for you and give you the SparkNotes version condensed from the court transcripts.
On the recording Ray explains to his captive that she has been abducted and is being kept prisoner for his sexual pleasure and for that of “his lady.” He states that the tape was made on July 23, 1993, a full six years before Cynthia Vigil Jaramillo was taken, and he confirms that he has been kidnapping women for years. The listener is then told that she will be kept like an animal—fed, watered, cleaned, and allowed to use the bathroom—but that she will be shown no mercy and that she will not like what is about to happen to her.
In his chillingly matter-of-fact voice, Ray then drones on (as if he’s making an instructional tape for a new employee at McDonalds) saying that the captive will be trained to tolerate pain, raped multiple times a day, and made to perform oral sex on both him and his lady. He calls this process his “enlightening crash course in sex.” Then like some deranged Bond villain, Ray explains to his hostage what he calls his “safe method of disposal:” he tells her he will inject her with a combination of sodium pentothal and phenobarbital and this will leave her with no memory of what had been done to her. If she causes trouble, though, he says he’ll kill her.
Ray then gives a detailed list of what he likes and what he doesn’t, and warns his victim that if she gets it wrong she will be punished with electric shocks. He even describes a metal frame that he would strap his victims into so that they would be totally immobile while they were raped by him, his mates, and his dog. Yes, you
read that right: his dog.
Then in a bizarre twist, the victim is then told that she will be made to fill in a medical questionnaire, answering questions like how many children she has and when she last menstruated. Finally, the tape ends with: “Be smart and be a survivor. Don’t talk without permission. Be very quiet, and by all means, show proper respect. Have a nice day.”
This straight-outta-Saw audio was just one piece of horrendous evidence that police found at 513 Bass Road, but going back to our sadist traits from page 206, we can see that this tape reveals how Ray ticks yet more boxes on this nightmare list. He clearly engaged in a hell of a lot of detailed rehearsal fantasy (the recording of the tape itself tells us that). He was extremely meticulous in his planning (this will become even more obvious once we enter the “toy box”). And he clearly repeated a highly methodical approach from victim to victim (the police found stacks of those medical questionnaires indicating years of countless victims).
What’s also interesting to note is that Ray has an accomplice (yet more bingo!), but this “lady” he refers to on the tape can’t be Cindy Hendy. They didn’t meet until 1998, six years after the tape was made. But for now, let’s get back to Cynthia.
The Ice(pick) Capades
The horror of the tape she had just heard was only the beginning of Cynthia’s torment. As outlined in the book Slow Death by James Fielder, after the recording finished she was chained to a bed in the living room and repeatedly electrocuted while Ray calmly photographed the entire ordeal. He then sat down next to Cynthia and presented her with a series of photographs showing numerous other women who had endured the same fate. As we can see from the tape and this disgusting little trip down memory lane, Ray got off on the psychological torment of his victims in the same way he enjoyed their physical pain.
