Paul Kenneth Bernardo, also known as Paul Jason Teale, is a Canadian serial rapist and serial killer dubbed the Scarborough Rapist, the Schoolgirl Killer and, together with his former wife Karla Homolka, one of the Ken and Barbie Killers. He is known for initially committing a series of rapes in Scarborough, Ontario, a district of Toronto, between 1987 and 1990, before committing three murders with Homolka; among these victims was Karla's younger sister, Tammy Homolka.
Patricia Lynn Wetterling is an American advocate of children's safety and chair of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. Her advocacy particularly focuses on protecting children from abduction and abuse. She has become one of the most vocal critics of current sex offender registry laws, painting them as overly broad and unnecessarily causing tremendous harm to many. Her advocacy began after her son Jacob was abducted in 1989 and culminated in passage of the federal Jacob Wetterling Crimes Against Children and Sexually Violent Offender Registration Act. She was a candidate for the Minnesota Sixth District seat in the United States House of Representatives as the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party candidate in 2004 and 2006, losing to Republicans Mark Kennedy and Michele Bachmann respectively. In September 2016, the remains of her son Jacob were discovered and positively identified.
Jessica Marie Lunsford was an American nine-year-old girl from Homosassa, Florida, who was murdered in February 2005. Lunsford was abducted from her home in the early morning of February 24, 2005, by John Couey, a 46-year-old convicted sex offender who lived nearby. Couey held her captive over the weekend, during which she was raped and later murdered by being buried alive. The media extensively covered the investigation and trial of Couey.
Forensic Investigators: Australia's True Crimes is an Australian television show hosted by Lisa McCune which aired on the Seven Network. It aired for three seasons from 2004 to 2006.
Holly Kristen Piirainen was a 10-year-old American murder victim from Grafton, Massachusetts. She and her brother had been visiting their grandparents in Sturbridge, Massachusetts when Holly was murdered. Her murder remains unsolved.
Jennifer Joyce Kesse is an American woman from Orlando, Florida, who has been missing since January 23, 2006. Shortly after she vanished, Kesse's car was discovered parked around a mile from her home. Security footage recorded her kidnapper parking Kesse's car and walking away, but he could not be identified due to poor camera quality and the absence of any visible distinguishing physical features. The case received local and national press attention.
Robert Christian Boes Hansen, popularly known as the Butcher Baker, was an American serial killer active in Anchorage, Alaska, between 1972 and 1983. Hansen abducted, raped and murdered at least seventeen women. Many of the women abducted were released by Hansen into the wilderness and hunted with a Ruger Mini-14 and hunting knives. Hansen was captured in 1983 and sentenced to 461 years' imprisonment without the possibility of parole. He died in 2014 of natural causes at age 75.
The murders of Katherine and Sheila Lyon were the abduction, sexual abuse and murder of two sisters – aged 10 and 12 respectively – who disappeared from a shopping center in Wheaton, Maryland, on March 25, 1975.
Christopher Bernard Wilder, also known as the Beauty Queen Killer and the Snapshot Killer, was an Australian-American serial killer who abducted at least twelve young women and girls, killing eight of them during a six-week, cross-country crime spree in the United States in early 1984. Wilder's series of murders began in Florida on February 26, 1984, and continued across the country through Texas, Oklahoma, Colorado, Nevada and California, with attempted abductions in Washington and New York. Wilder victimized attractive young women, most of whom he would entice by promising to take their pictures. After subduing them, he would torture and rape them before shooting, stabbing with a knife, or strangling them to death. Two or more of his victims were electrocuted using a makeshift electrical cord.
Cornelius Gerhardus van Rooyen, better known as Gert van Rooyen, was a South African paedophile and serial killer who abducted, sexually assaulted and murdered at least six young girls between 1988 and 1989. He was aided in his crimes by a female accomplice, his mistress Joey Haarhoff. In early 1990, when faced with arrest after the escape of their latest kidnap victim, Van Rooyen killed Haarhoff and himself in a murder-suicide. Despite later evidence against them, the two were never formally convicted due to their deaths and the bodies of their alleged victims were never found.
Ann Gotlib was a Soviet Jewish immigrant who disappeared at the age of 12 from the premises of a Louisville, Kentucky mall. The case to find her abductor was covered heavily by the Louisville news media and stretched for the next twenty-five years until a person of interest was eventually identified.
Earl Conrad Bramblett was an American mass murderer, convicted for the killing of four members of the Hodges family in August 1994 in Vinton, Virginia. Bramblett murdered each family member in their residence before setting it on fire, and in 1997 was sentenced to death for the murders.
Morgan Dana Harrington was a 20-year-old Virginia Tech student who disappeared from the John Paul Jones Arena while attending a Metallica concert at the University of Virginia (UVA) in Charlottesville, Virginia.
Donald Albin Blom was an American convicted of the murder of Katie Poirier in 1999. A registered sex offender involved in five cases of kidnapping and sexual assault prior to Poirier's murder, he was suspected of being a serial killer by case investigators.
The murder of Krista Lea Harrison occurred on July 17, 1982, in Marshallville, Ohio, United States. The case remained unsolved for two years, until Robert Anthony Buell was convicted of her murder in 1984. In 2000, Harrison's case appeared on the fifth season of the American television show Forensic Files in an episode titled "Material Evidence."
Hannah Elizabeth Graham was an 18-year-old second-year British-born American student at the University of Virginia who went missing on September 13, 2014. She was last seen early in the morning that day, at the Downtown Mall in Charlottesville, Virginia. Five weeks later, her remains were discovered on an abandoned property in nearby Albemarle County. Jesse Matthew pleaded guilty to murdering Graham and was sentenced to life imprisonment. He was also found guilty and given three additional life sentences for other, previous crimes.
Since 1996, there has been an unusually high number of cases involving young women disappearing along U.S. Route 29 (US 29) in Virginia, or an area known as the "Route 29 Corridor". Five young women disappeared in five years between 2009 and 2014, earning it a particularly notorious reputation. Of the nine murders/disappearances, only the cases of Morgan Dana Harrington (2009), Alexis Murphy (2013) and Hannah Graham (2014) were solved ending in convictions of their murderers, the other cases are still unsolved.
Jessie Earl was a 22-year-old student who disappeared from Eastbourne, England in May 1980. It was not until 1989 that her remains were discovered in thick undergrowth on Beachy Head, where she would regularly take walks.
Sofia Lucerno Juarez was a four-year-old American child who disappeared in Kennewick, Washington in 2003. Her case involved the first use of an AMBER Alert in the state of Washington. As of 2024, Sofia's whereabouts and the circumstances of her disappearance remain unknown.
Joseph William Kappen, also known as the Saturday Night Strangler, was a Welsh serial killer who committed the rape and murder of three teenage girls in Llandarcy and Tonmawr, near his home town of Port Talbot, in 1973. Kappen is also suspected of committing a fourth murder in February 1976.
