Jeffrey Dahmer: A Modern Day Serial Killer

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Jeffrey Dahmer was a modern day serial killer. His heinous, sadistic, and evil crimes landed him in jail for life where he was killed by a fellow inmate shortly after reporting to jail. The question to pose is why he committed these monstrous acts.
I believe that Jeffrey Dahmer was a psychopath. According to the Table 3.2 handout on Characteristics of a Psychopath, a psychopath displays superficial charm and good "intelligence", and lack of remorse or shame as well as a few other qualities. Dahmer used his charm to lure young men from bars to his home where he would then commit his crimes. He also never displayed any type of remorse for his actions. I think if he had remorse, he would’ve stopped after his first crime. Living with guilt is difficult, it takes a psychopath to live with 17 victims. I also think that his crimes are culpable and that he knew he was …show more content…

Just because he wasn’t displaying it openly doesn’t mean he didn’t feel anything. Also, Dahmer, might have been suffering from a mental illness as well as psychopathy. In the testimony of Dahmer’s Psychologist, she mentions that he was suffering from a mental illness called necrophilia. Which is sexual relations or attractions towards corpses. Although this may be true, I still don’t think that having this mental illness would cause a man to commit more than 15 crimes just for his need to have sexual relations with dead bodies because he did more than just kill them and have sex. He mutilated the bodies in various ways. Park Dietz, a highly regarded forensic psychiatrist, mentions that Dahmer wore condoms when having sexual relations with the bodies and many times was drunk which shows his lack of sexual desire and aversion to what he was doing (Adler 104-05). I don’t think any society anywhere would deem this behavior as normal, nor would they accept it as some kind of mental illness. These were deliberate acts he

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