by R. J. Parker
Ottis Toole and Henry Lee Lucas
Ottis Toole (left) – The Devil’s Child Killer (Victims 766)
Henry Lee Lucas (right) – The Confession Killer (Victims 766)
Background
Ottis Toole was born on March 5th, 1947 in Jacksonville, Florida. As a child, he was a victim of sexual assault, molested by family and friends according to him. He claimed that his grandmother was a Satanist who exposed him to rituals, self-mutilation, and grave robbing, and called him the “Devil’s Child.” Now, before I begin, let me just say that this murderous duo was either composed of the two biggest exaggerators in history, or the worst serial killers the world has ever seen, with killings in the hundreds between them.
I would assume that all serial killers have some kind of mental illness. As for Toole, he was diagnosed with mild retardation: an IQ of only 75, dyslexia, illiteracy, ADHD, epilepsy, and he also suffered from grand mal seizures. Ottis Toole fits the classical marks in the making of a serial killer: he was a bed-wetter, an animal killer, an arsonist, got sexually excited by fire, and all this before he was a teenager. By the time he was thirteen years old he’d dropped out of school and was working as a male prostitute in drag. At a soup kitchen in 1976, Toole met Henry Lee Lucas and the two began a sexual relationship. They later claimed that while they were together they committed 108 murders with a cult called ‘The Hands of Death.’
Henry Lee Lucas was born on August 23rd, 1936 in Blacksburg, Virginia, to an alcoholic father and an alcoholic/prostitute mother. Lucas is considered by law enforcement to be the worst serial killer in American history. His mother would often beat, abuse, and ignore him. When he was ten years old, he and his brother got into a fight and his brother stabbed him in the eye; his mother did not bother getting it treated and he ended up losing his sight in that eye. Henry Lucas dropped out of elementary school in the 6th grade, ran away from home, and drifted around the state of Virginia. Lucas maintained that in the beginning, when he left home, he practiced bestiality and Zoosadism, and began committing minor thefts and burglaries around the state, for which he spent five years in prison: 1954 to 1959. In January of 1960, he got into a fight with his mother and stabbed her to death. He went to prison for another ten years and was released in 1970 as the prison was overcrowded. He drifted around the southern states working menial jobs and met Ottis Toole in 1976. They formed what they called the ‘homosexual crime team,’ and began a cross-country murder bender which left at least 108 people dead in their wake.
Arrest
Ottis Toole was arrested in April, 1983 in Jacksonville, for burning down a church, and given a fifteen-year sentence. Two months later, in June, his partner in crime, Henry Lee Lucas, was arrested for unlawful possession of a firearm. It was then that Lucas began boasting about the murderous storm orchestrated by the two of them. Initially, Toole denied any involvement, but later began backing up Lucas's confessions.
A task force was established in June of 1983 called ‘The Lucas Task Force.’ Police had to verify scores of killings that Lucas had admitted to committing which had been previously thought to be unconnected. In one case, a woman had even been denied a large insurance settlement after her husband’s death had been ruled a suicide, but once Lucas admitted to the killing of her husband – and could prove it – the insurance company paid her a settlement. The task force, including the Texas Rangers, was shocked at the number of names and files that were being collected and investigated. Lucas knew details in the files that only the killer would know. In another prison, Toole was spilling the same details, and more of his own individual crimes. In 1985, Toole and Lucas enjoyed a more laidback imprisonment, living in virtual comfort, purportedly receiving private meals and special accommodations in their prison cells because they were helping authorities close hundreds of cold cases. The police took them to various states, visiting the old crime scenes and burial sites of their many victims, all while enjoying a bit of sight-seeing, being outside their cells.
Sentencing and Death
Toole was sentenced to six life sentences and he died on September 15th, 1996, at the age of forty-nine in his prison cell from liver failure. Nobody claimed his body and he was buried in a prison cemetery. Lucas also was sentenced to life so that authorities could try to gain more information about past crimes. Lucas died in prison from heart failure at age sixty-four on March 13th, 2001.
Case Closed? Not quite.
Adam Walsh
Young Adam Walsh was only six years old, an innocent little boy, when taken from this world by a monster on July 27th, 1981. It would be twenty-seven years before his mom and dad would know who killed him. On December 16th, 2008, police announced that Ottis Toole killed little Adam. Because of his son’s murder, John Walsh became a campaigner for victim’s rights and assisted in forming the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. Mr. Walsh became host of the FOX-TV program, America’s Most Wanted. On July 25th, 2006, President George W. Bush signed into law the Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act. This act instituted a national database of convicted child molesters and sex offenders, and increased stiffer penalties for violence against children. In Adam’s memory, a program is in place for lost children in department stores known as, Code Adam.
Adam Walsh
The U.S. Department of Education reported that, in 1997, nearly 6,300 students were expelled from American schools for carrying firearms. As evidenced by many of the recent reports about school violence, several students chose to express their anger in caustic ways.
Many schools have responded to the threat of increasing violence by tightening security, installing spiked fences, motorized gates, bulletproof metal-covered doors, metal detectors, and security guards who search student desks and lockers. Some students and even faculty complain that this only makes prisons out of the schools. Most schools have hired more counselors and violence prevention coordinators.
Besides prescription drugs, few preventative efforts are being made to help students with the various psychological and emotional needs they may have before they erupt into a crisis. Teens see no alternative but violence to solve their escalating internal and, sometimes, external problems.
Revenge seems to be a common thread that runs through all of these massacres. Retribution is rooted in a sense of real or perceived injustice towards the perpetrator of the shooting. Many school shootings are generated by a desire for revenge against society, fed by a simmering anger over being denied a perceived entitlement to respect or personal recognition.
All of the teenage school shooters have been deeply influenced by mass media, usually in the form of video games and movies. Both media forms tend to be very vivid, intense, and increasingly violent. Teenagers growing up in the late 20th century and early 21st are immersed in an extremely hostile environment for the mind. This mental environment is especially hazardous for the young mind that is not fully developed, lacking the experience needed for balance and proportional decision-making.
When kids suffer abuse at home from parents and siblings, they often then go to school and suffer bullying from peers and an endless series of dictates from teachers. They begin to feel trapped as they can’t avoid abuse no matter where they are. In addition, when they see that the authority at home is part of the problem, and authority at school is either unconcerned or useless at helping them, they gradually realize that authority is fundamentally two-faced as it is not based on kind guidance as officially stated, but instead is based on controlling and exploiting the less powerful.
Consequently, these kids begin to perceive that the world is towering over them and abusing the weak. Feeling trapped and powerless, they naturally search for a way out. The easiest and most effective way to acquire power is to get a gun. Kids easily believe that using a gun is an effective method for resolving their problems. Every movie, video game, and television show they watch depicts the world through this foolish one-dimensional lens of power expression and problem resolution via deadly violence. The
se kids believe that it is acceptable to mimic these performances at a school shooting as that is what other students have done before.
The following are ten of the worst school/college/university shootings and massacres the world has ever seen.
Authors Note: I express sincere sympathy to the loved ones, families, and friends, of those who have been victimized by these senseless and worthless acts.
Virginia Tech Massacre
April 16, 2007 (33) Dead (25) Injured
Perpetrator - Seung-Hui Cho 23, English major
Background
Born on January 18th, 1984, at the time of his rampage, Cho was a senior-level undergraduate student at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State.
In middle school, he was diagnosed with a severe anxiety disorder known as Selective Mutism, as well as a major depressive disorder. After his diagnosis, he began receiving treatment, and continued to receive therapy and special education support until his junior year of high school. Two students complained to authorities about the behavior of Cho when they contacted them in separate incidents in 2005. Police questioned Cho and he was sent to a mental health facility, but no charges were filed against him.
Preliminary Activities
General District Court records show that a Montgomery County magistrate ordered Cho, then twenty-three years old, to undergo a mental evaluation in December of 2005. The magistrate found probable cause that Cho was “mentally ill,” and an “imminent danger to him and others,” seriously mentally ill enough as to be unable to care for himself.
The police spoke with acquaintances of Cho and became concerned that he might be suicidal. Officers suggested to Cho that he speak to a counselor, and Cho took their advice. Based on his meeting with the counselor, Cho went to the police department voluntarily; a temporary detention order was obtained, and Cho was taken to a mental health facility, the Carilion Saint Albans Behavioral Health Center.
During Cho's last two years at Virginia Tech, several instances of his abnormal behavior, including plays and other writings he submitted, contained references to violence that caused concern among teachers and classmates. Detectives believe that Cho Seung-Hui was obsessed with eighteen year old student Emily Hilscher, one of his first two victims. Cho apparently had become infatuated by her.
The Massacre
Dressed more like a boy scout than a mass murderer, Cho arrived at Hilscher’s dormitory room early Monday morning on April 16th. It is unclear whether Emily Hilscher had responded to her killer's approaches. Cho, jealous of Emily's boyfriend, gunned her down. Another student, Ryan Clark, rushed to help after hearing his neighbour arguing with Cho, and the twenty-two year old died alongside her.
Cho then went back to his room where he used his computer to assemble an 1800 word written statement, videos, and photographs of himself, that he then packaged up and mailed for overnight delivery to NBC news in New York via the small post office near the main gates of campus. The package was time stamped at 9:01 a.m. He then went back to his dorm room and collected his weapons.
Around 9:45 a.m., two hours after his first killings, Cho entered Norris Hall after chaining the three main exits to the building shut. He placed a note on at least one of the chained doors, claiming that any attempts to open the door would cause a bomb to explode. In Room 206, professor G.V. Loganathan was teaching advanced hydrology when he was shot and killed by Cho along with nine students; another two were injured.
In Room 207, professor Christopher James Bishop was teaching Elementary German when Cho burst into the room, shot the professor, and killed four students in the first row of the classroom, wounding another six.
In the stairwell, Cho fired at Janitor Gene Cole and missed five times, according to the janitor. Cho then moved on to Norris 204 where Cho was initially prevented from entering by barricades erected by instructors and students. Professor Liviu Librescu, a Holocaust survivor, forcibly prevented Cho from entering the room. Librescu was able to hold the door closed until most of his students escaped through the windows, but he died after being shot multiple times through the door. Student, Nicole Regina White, was also killed while another student was injured.
Cho proceeded to Room 211 where Professor Jocelyne Couture-Nowak was teaching Intermediate French. Again, people attempt to block the door, but the Professor and another student were killed.
Students, including Zach Petkewicz, barricaded the door of room 205 with a large table after substitute professor Haiyan Cheng and a student saw Cho heading toward them. Cho shot several times through the door but failed to force his way in. No one in that classroom was wounded or killed.
Hearing the commotion on the floor below, Professor Kevin Granata brought twenty students from a nearby classroom into a third-floor office where the door could be locked. He then went downstairs to investigate and Cho fatally shot him. None of the students locked in Granata's office were injured.
Virginia Tech and Blacksburg police spent three minutes dashing across campus to the scene. They then began the process of assembling a team, clearing the area, and trying to break through the doors, which took another five minutes. After they blasted through the chained doors with shotguns, Cho put a bullet through his head and died in a classroom alongside thirty of his victims.
The Weapons
In total, Cho fired 174 rounds of ammunition. Each student killed was shot at least three times each.
The police enter the scene to find Cho dead and in possession of a 9mm semi-automatic and a .22 caliber handgun, as well as multiple rounds of ammunition and several knives. Among the items found in Cho's backpack was prescription medication for treatment of psychological problems and a note denouncing “rich kids.”
The following is a list of Students and Professors who were killed, God bless all of them:
Ross Abdallah Alameddine, 20, of Saugus, Mass., a sophomore majoring in English, Business Information Technology, and French.
Christopher James "Jamie" Bishop, 35, taught German at Virginia Tech and helped oversee an exchange program with a German university.
Brian Bluhm, 25, a master's student in water resources, received his undergraduate degree in Civil Engineering at Tech.
Ryan Clark, 22, a student from Martinez, Ga., was a fifth-year student working toward a triple-degree in Psychology, Biology, and English, and carried a 4.0 grade-point average.
Austin Cloyd, 18, a freshman, was an International Studies major. Her father is C. Bryan Cloyd, a professor of Accounting and Information Systems at Virginia Tech.
Professor Jocelyne Couture-Nowak, 49, a French instructor at Virginia Tech, was instrumental in the push to create the first French school in Truro, Nova Scotia.
Daniel Perez Cueva, 21, a Peruvian student and International Relations major.
Professor Kevin Granata, 46, head of the Engineering Science and Mechanics department.
Mathew Gregory Gwaltney, 24, of Chesterfield, Va., was on the brink of finishing his master's degree in Civil and Environmental Engineering.
Caitlin Hammaren, 19, of Westtown, N.Y., a sophomore majoring in International Studies and French.
Jeremy Herbstritt, 27, a graduate student in Civil engineering from Bellefonte, Pa. He did his undergraduate work in Civil Engineering, Biochemistry, and Molecular Biology at Penn State.
Rachael Elizabeth Hill, 18, was a graduate of Grove Avenue Christian School in Henrico County and was a freshman at Virginia Tech studying Biology.
Emily Jane Hilscher, 19, a freshman from Woodville and an animal and Poultry Sciences major, was known in rural Rappahannock County as an animal lover.
Jarrett Lane, 22, of Narrows, Va., a senior majoring in Civil Engineering.
Matt La Porte, 20, a sophomore, of Dumont, N.J.. He was majoring in Political Science and leadership.
Henry J. Lee, 20, studying Computer Engineering and French.
Professor Liviu Librescu, 76, an Israeli born in Romania, survived the Holocaust and built an international reputation for his research
in aeronautical engineering. With the gunman set to enter his class, this brave professor blocked the door with his body while his students fled to safety.
Professor G.V. Loganathan, 51, an Indian-born Civil and Environmental Engineering professor.
Partahi Lumbantoruan, 34, of Medan Indonesia, a PhD student in Civil Engineering.
Lauren McCain, 20, of Hampton, Va., a freshman in International Studies.
Daniel O'Neil, 22, a graduate student in Engineering from Lincoln, R.I., was a teaching assistant.
Juan Ortiz, 26, of Bayamon, Puerto Rico, a master’s student in Civil Engineering.
Minal Panchal, 26, of Mumbai India, a master’s student in Architecture.
Erin Peterson, 18, from Centreville, Va., attended the same high school as the gunman. She was a freshman in International Studies.
Michael Pohle, 23, of Flemington, N.J., was a senior in a five-year program, majoring in Biological Sciences.
Julia Pryde, 23, a Biological Systems engineering graduate student from Middletown, N.J.
