A serial killer is a person who murders three or more people, with the killings taking place over a significant period of time in separate events. Their psychological gratification is the motivation for the killings, and many serial murders involve sexual contact with the victims at different points during the murder process. The United States Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) states that the motives of serial killers can include anger, thrill-seeking, financial gain, and attention seeking, and killings may be executed as such. The victims tend to have things in common, such as demographic profile, appearance, gender, or race. As a group, serial killers suffer from a variety of personality disorders. Most are often not adjudicated as insane under the law. Although a serial killer is a distinct classification that differs from that of a mass murderer, spree killer, or contract killer, there are overlaps between them.
Gary Leon Ridgway is an American serial killer known as the Green River Killer. He was initially convicted of 48 separate murders committed between the early 1980s and late 1990s. As part of his plea bargain, another conviction was added, bringing the total number of convictions to 49, making him the second-most prolific serial killer in United States history according to confirmed murders.
Robert Kenneth Ressler was an American FBI agent and author. He played a significant role in the psychological profiling of violent offenders in the 1970s and is often credited with coining the term "serial killer", though the term is a direct translation of the German term Serienmörder coined in 1930 by Berlin investigator Ernst Gennat. After retiring from the FBI, he authored a number of books on serial murders, and often gave lectures on criminology.
Atteridgeville is a township located to the west of Pretoria, South Africa. It is located to the east of Saulsville, to the west of West Park; to the north of Laudium and to the south of Lotus Gardens. The settlement was established in 1939, and is named after Mrs MP Atteridge, chairwoman of the Committee for Non-European Affairs on the Pretoria City Council at the time. The Lucas Masterpieces Moripe Stadium is located in Atteridgeville.
Moses Sithole is a South African serial killer and rapist who committed the ABC Murders. It is believed that he is so named because they began in Atteridgeville, continued in Boksburg and finished in Cleveland, a suburb of Johannesburg. However, many other sources state that the cities were not in that order, rather beginning in Cleveland, continuing in Boksburg and finishing in Atteridgeville. This has not been denied nor confirmed.
Scott Wilson Williams is a convicted American serial killer who lived in Monroe, North Carolina. He has been convicted for the murders of three women that took place over a period of nine years. He has also been convicted of crimes against two additional women who were not killed.
Maoupa Cedric Maake, known as the Wemmer Pan Killer, is a South African serial killer who was convicted of 27 murders but was suspected of killing many more.
Sipho Mandla Agmatir Thwala is a South African rapist and serial killer who was convicted in 1999 for the murders of 16 women and 10 rapes. He was sentenced to 506 years in prison. Thwala was known by the moniker the Phoenix Strangler.
David Randitsheni was a South African rapist and serial killer who in 2009 was convicted on 10 counts of murder, 17 counts of rape, 18 counts of kidnapping and one count of indecent assault. He was sentenced to 16 life sentences and 220 years in prison with the judge stipulating that he could not be considered for parole before serving at least 35 years in prison by which time he would be 80 years old. Only one of his victims was an adult ; the rest were children.
Thozamile Taki, known as The Sugarcane Killer, is a South African serial killer who killed 13 women aged 18–25, dumping their bodies in agricultural plantations. On 19 January 2011, Taki was sentenced to 13 life sentences for the murders and an additional 208 years, 16 years for each of his victims of armed robbery.
Stewart Wilken, known as the Boetie Boer, is a convicted serial killer from South Africa, who was active in the coastal city of Port Elizabeth.
Norman Afzal Simons, known as the Station Strangler, is a South African murderer, rapist and suspected serial killer in Cape Town in the late 20th century. He was convicted in 1995 of the rape and murder of 10-year-old Elroy van Rooyen in 1995 and sentenced to 25 years. He became eligible for parole in July 2023 and was released on parole and under 24-hour monitoring in November 2023.
Johannes Mashiane, nicknamed The Beast of Atteridgeville, was a South African rapist and serial killer who was responsible for the deaths of 13 victims before committing suicide in 1989. Mashiane was being chased by police in the Pretoria suburb of Marabastad when he jumped underneath a bus.
Nicholas Lungisa Ncama is a South African serial killer who was convicted in 1997 of three murders and sentenced to life in prison. His victims all came from the Port Elizabeth area of the Eastern Cape.
Madumetsa Jack Mogale, dubbed the West-End Serial Killer by police, is a South African serial killer who killed 16 people in 2008 and 2009. On 17 February 2011, Mogale was convicted on 52 of 61 charges related to 16 murders, 19 rapes, and 9 kidnappings.
Pretoria Central Prison, renamed Kgosi Mampuru II Management Area by former President Jacob Zuma on 13 April 2013 and sometimes referred to as Kgosi Mampuru II Correctional Services is a large prison in central Pretoria, within the City of Tshwane in South Africa. It is operated by the South African Department of Correctional Services.
Bulelani Mabhayi, known as The Monster of Tholeni, is a South African serial killer and rapist who has been sentenced for the murder of 20 people.
Samuel Little was an American serial killer of women who confessed to committing 93 murders between 1970 and 2005. The Federal Bureau of Investigation's Violent Criminal Apprehension Program has confirmed his involvement in at least 60 murders, the largest number of confirmed victims for any serial killer in American history. Little provided sketches for twenty-six of his victims although not all have been linked to known murders.
The Fosaville serial killer is an unidentified serial killer who murdered 13 women between 1999 and 2003 in Newlands West, an area near Durban, South Africa.
John Phuko Kgabi, known as The Ritual Killer, was a South African serial killer and a former police officer who murdered between six and at least eleven young girls in Atteridgeville and Limpopo. A sexually-motivated killer, he would cut his victims' throats and then masturbate on their corpses. Convicted and sentenced to death, he was hanged in 1980.
