This Infographic takes a dark look at the 10 most prolific killers of the past 50 years, with a breakdown of the methods employed.
Whilst not an especially pleasant topic, it is interesting to see that the most prolific killers in recent times are relatively unknown, compared to a number of serial killers and criminals who have gained far greater publicity and notoriety throughout the World despite lesser crimes, in terms of volume at least.
Dr. Harold Shipman
Harold Fredrick Shipman (14 January 1946 – 13 January 2004) was a British doctor and one of the most prolific serial killers in recorded history by proven murders with up to 250 murders being ascribed to him.
On 31 January 2000, a jury found Shipman guilty of 15 murders. He was sentenced to life imprisonment and the judge recommended that he never be released.
After his trial, The Shipman Inquiry, chaired by Dame Janet Smith, began on 1 September 2000. Lasting almost two years, it was an investigation into all deaths certified by Shipman. About 80% of his victims were women. His youngest victim was a 41-year-old man. Much of Britain's legal structure concerning health care and medicine was reviewed and modified as a direct and indirect result of Shipman's crimes. Shipman is the only British doctor who has been found guilty of murdering his patients.
Shipman died on 13 January 2004, after hanging himself in his cell at Wakefield Prison in West Yorkshire.
Giuseppe Greco
Giuseppe "Pino" Greco(January 4, 1952 – September 1985) was a hitman and high-ranking member of the Sicilian Mafia. A number of sources refer to him exclusively as Pino Greco although Giuseppe was his Christian name; "Pino" is a frequent abbreviation of the name Giuseppe.
One of the most prolific killers in criminal history, he came from the Greco Mafia clan, a prominent group from Ciaculli (he was a distant relative of Salvatore "Ciaschiteddu" Greco.) His father was also a Mafioso nicknamed Scarpa, Sicilian for "Shoe", hence Giuseppe's nickname of Scarpuzzedda; "Little Shoe".
Henry Lee Lucas
Henry Lee Lucas (August 23, 1936 – March 13, 2001) was an American serial killer convicted of murder in 11 different cases. He had claimed to have committed a number of murders (shortly after his arrest he confessed to having killed 60 people, a number he raised to 100 while in court, and outside of court he claimed to have committed up to 3000 murders) although he later recanted the confessions. He received a death sentence for the murder of an unidentified woman in Texas, but the penalty was commuted to life imprisonment on the basis of evidence that he was likely in Florida on the date of that murder.
While Lucas became known in the press as America's most prolific serial killer, he later recanted his confessions, and flatly stated "I am not a serial killer" in a letter to researcher Brad Shellady. Lucas confessed to involvement in about 600 murders, but a more widely circulated total of 350 is based on confessions deemed "believable" by a Texas-based Lucas Task Force, a group which was later criticized by then-Attorney General of Texas, Jim Mattox, and others for sloppy police work and taking part in an extended "hoax".
Beyond his recantation, some of Lucas's confessions have been challenged as inaccurate by a number of critics, including law enforcement and court officials. Lucas claimed to have been initially subjected to having been left naked in a cell with the air conditioner turned on and coercive interrogation tactics while in police custody, and to have confessed to murders in an effort to improve his living conditions. Amnesty International reported "the belief of two former state Attorneys General that Lucas was in all likelihood innocent of the crime for which he was sentenced to death".
Lucas's sentence was commuted to life in prison in 1998 by Governor George W. Bush. It was the first successful commutation of a death sentence in Texas since the re-institution of the death penalty in that state in 1982. Lucas died in prison of natural causes. Lucas still maintains a reputation, in the words of author Sarah L. Knox, "as one of the world's worst serial killers – even after the debunking of the majority of his confessions by the Attorney General of Texas".
Woo Bum-kon
Woo Bum-kon (February 24, 1955 – April 27, 1982) was a South Korean police officer who killed 56 people and wounded 35 others in several villages in Uiryeong County, Gyeongsangnam-do, South Korea, during the night from April 26 to April 27, 1982, before committing suicide.
His rampage remained the deadliest known mass murder committed by a lone gunman in modern history until theNorway attacks of July 22, 2011.
Yang Xinhai
Yang Xinhai (July 29, 1968 – February 14, 2004), also known as Wang Ganggang, Yang Zhiya, and Yang Liu, was a Chinese serial killer who confessed to committing 65 murders and 23 rapes between 1999 and 2003, and was sentenced to death and executed for 67. He was dubbed the "Monster Killer" by the media. He is the most prolific serial killer China has seen.
Pedro López
Pedro Alonso López (born October 8th, 1948 in Santa Isabel, Colombia) is a Colombian serial killer, accused ofraping and killing more than 300 girls across South America. Aside from uncited local accounts, López’s crimes first received international attention from an interview conducted by Ron Laytner, a long time freelance photojournalist who reported interviewing López in his Ambato prison cell in 1980.
Laytner’s interviews were widely published, first in the Chicago Tribune on Sunday, July 13, 1980, then in the Toronto Sun and The Sacramento Bee on July 21 1980, and later in many other North American papers and foreign publications over the years. Apart from Laytner’s account and two brief Associated Press wire reports the story was published inThe World's Most Infamous Murders by Boar and Blundell.
According to Laytner’s story, López became known as the "Monster of the Andes" in 1980 when he led police to the graves of 53 of his victims in Ecuador, all girls between nine and twelve years old. In 1983 he was found guilty of murdering 110 young girls in Ecuador alone and confessed to a further 240 murders of missing girls in neighbouring Peru and Colombia. López was released from prison in 1998.
Pedro Rodrigues Filho
Pedro Rodrigues Filho (born 1954 in Santa Rita do SapucaÃ). Nicknamed Pedrinho Matador (Killer Petey) and arrested in 1973, in 2003 he was convicted of murdering at least 71 people and sentenced to 128 years in prison. The maximum prison term that can be served in Brazil is 30 years.
Daniel Barbosa
Daniel Camargo Barbosa (22 January 1936 – 13 November 1994) was a Colombian psychopathic serial killer. It is believed that he raped and killed over 150 young girls in Colombia and Ecuador during the 1970s and 1980s.
Luis Garavito
Luis Alfredo Garavito Cubillos, a.k.a "La Bestia" ("The Beast") or "TribilÃn" (American Spanish translation of Disney's "Goofy") (born 25 January 1957 in Génova, QuindÃo, Colombia) is a Colombian rapist and serial killer. In 1999, he admitted to the rape and murder of 147 young boys. The number of his victims, based on the locations of skeletons listed on maps that Garavito drew in prison, could eventually exceed 300. He has been described by local media as "the world's worst serial killer" because of the high number of victims.
Once captured, Garavito was subject to the maximum penalty available in Colombia, which was 30 years. However, as he confessed the crimes and helped authorities locate bodies, Colombian law allowed him to apply for special benefits, including a reduction of his sentence to 22 years and possibly an even earlier release for further cooperation and good behavior. Colombian law has since increased the maximum penalty to 60 years in prison.
In subsequent years, Colombians have increasingly felt that due to Garavito's approaching early release, his sentence is not sufficient punishment for his crimes. Colombian law originally had no way to extend the sentence, because cases of serial killers like Garavito had no legal precedent in the country and thus the legal system could not properly address this case. In late 2006, however, a judicial review of the cases against Garavito in different local jurisdictions found that his sentence could be extended and his release delayed, due to the existence of crimes he did not admit to and for which he was not previously condemned.
Javed Iqbal
Javed Iqbal Mughal (8 October 1956 in Lahore, Punjab, Pakistan – 8 October 2001 in Lahore, Punjab, Pakistan) was a Pakistani serial killer who was found guilty of the sexual abuse and murder of 100 children. He was in a relationship with Logan Shirah.
via: visualevolution , wikipedia
