R.J. Parker: The Serial Killer Compendium

Bobbie Sue Terrell, at the age of twenty-two, began her nursing career in 1976. Shortly afterwards she married Daniel Dudley, but her happiness was shattered when she learned she could not have any children. She reacted to the news with a combination of anger and depression, which did not seem to go away even after they adopted a boy. As her depression and violent anger increased, she was forced to seek professional help and was put under the treatment of strong tranquilizers. The medication further deteriorated Terrell’s situation. She fed a nearly lethal dose of the tranquilizers to her own son. Fortunately, the boy survived, but this incident marked the end of her marriage.

Abandoned, confused, and suffering from manic depression, Terrell admitted herself to a mental hospital for the treatment of schizophrenia. After a year, she was released and was able to return to her profession as a nurse. She remained unable, however, to control her emotions that worsened in the stressful environment of the hospital. Her unusual behavior culminated in 1984 with the sudden death of ninety-nine-year-old Aggie Marsh, Terrell’s first known victim. Within thirteen days, Terrell succeeded in killing twelve elderly people by injecting them with lethal doses of insulin. On November twenty-fourth, 1984, local police received an anonymous call claiming that a serial killer was operating in the hospital staff. Upon arrival, they found Terrell suffering from a severe knife wound on her side that had been allegedly inflicted by the serial killer. Investigators, however, could find no other staff that could support Terrell’s story. Although Terrell’s mental history and her suffering from the Munchausen Syndrome by proxy was brought to light, it was not until 1985 that all the pieces were put together. She was finally arrested in 1985 and charged with murder. For the next three years, she was subjected to a number of psychological tests, all of which pointed towards her insanity. She was finally charged with a single count of murder, found guilty, and sentenced to sixty-five years in prison.

The Unexplained Killer

The motive of the ‘unexplained’ serial killer has never been satisfactorily understood even after the perpetrator was discovered and arrested. A female perpetrator can fit the category of the unexplained if she is “a woman who systematically murders for reasons that are wholly inexplicable or for a motive that has not been made sufficiently clear for categorization.” In the great majority of these situations, even the killer herself is unable to identify an understandable motive for her crimes.

Christine Falling, as is often the case with serial killers, had a disruptive and impoverished childhood. She was born in Florida in 1963, to sixteen year-old Ann and sixty-five year old Thomas Slaughter. Falling was developmentally disabled, prone to obesity, suffered from fits of epilepsy and aggression, and was never able to acquire developmental skills beyond those of a sixth grader.

Due to the extreme poverty of her parents, Falling and her older sister were given up for adoption to the Falling family. Not long afterwards, the two girls found themselves in a children’s home due to their constant conflicts with their adoptive parents. By that time, Falling had already demonstrated her violent nature, her favorite pastime being the torturing and killing of cats to see if they really had nine lives. At the age of twelve, Falling left the children’s home. Two years later she married a man ten years older than her, but the marriage soon collapsed after a series of violent encounters between the couple. That sparked off new and mysterious behavior in Falling. Within the next couple of years she visited the hospital multiple times with an endless series of medical conditions that medical staff was never able to diagnose. Despite the fact that Falling was apparently suffering from mental illnesses, she had gained a status as a good baby-sitter.

At the age of seventeen, however, Falling began to attack and murder the children that were placed under her care. On February twenty-eighth, 1980, Cassidy Johnson, two years old, died from what was assumed encephalitis. Autopsy reports showed that the girl had actually succumbed to a brutal skull injury. The police interviewed Falling, but since no evidence could be brought against her, the matter was not pursued. Shortly afterwards, Falling moved to Lakeland, Florida, where she killed another baby under her care.

Even though the death of four-year-old Jeffrey Davis was also deemed suspicious, no widespread investigation was carried out, allowing Falling to attack a new victim. Within three days after Jeffrey’s death, Falling was asked to baby-sit Jeffrey’s two year-old cousin, Joseph Spring, while the bereaved family attended Jeffrey’s funeral. Joseph’s death was attributed to a viral infection, and thus Falling once again escaped capture. After the double murder, Falling moved to Perry, Florida where she found a job as a housekeeper in the home of seventy-seven year-old, William Swindle. On the first day of her job, Swindle suddenly died in his kitchen. Due to his old age and his deteriorating health, there was no suspicion of foul play, and Falling continued her killings. Her next victim was her eighteen-month-old niece who allegedly stopped breathing while under Falling’s care. Once again, the vicious serial killer was able to escape apprehension. A year later, in 1982, Travis Coleman, only ten weeks old, also stopped breathing while Falling was attending to him. An autopsy was requested, and it was discovered that the infant had died from suffocation. The authorities immediately questioned Falling and she confessed to having killed Travis and three other babies as well by what she described as ‘smotheration.’ According to her testimony, she’d heard voices that had ordered her to kill the babies by placing a blanket over their faces.

Falling was found guilty of these murders and sentenced to life imprisonment. Even though her motives have not been acceptably explained, and she was known to have suffered from mental illnesses, Falling was not classified as legally insane.

Chapter 33: The Unsolved Killings

Unfortunately, not all cases of serial killings are solved. It has already been shown that Black Widows and Angels of Death are able to evade apprehension for significant periods. Other times their identities remain unknown forever; their crimes are suddenly brought to a halt, either because the perpetrator died, or because the perpetrator was imprisoned for other felonies, or, for other unknown psychological factors. At any rate, the serial murders remain unsolved.

William Hodges Bingham and his family worked in Lancaster castle in England. After thirty years as a caretaker in a supervisory position, in 1911 Bingham died suddenly. Within a few weeks William Bingham’s daughter, Margaret, was also found dead. Despite being in very good health, Margaret's brother also died shortly afterwards. An autopsy report was requested, and it was found that he had died from arsenic poisoning.

Because of the arsenic poisoning, a post-mortem examination was done on Bingham and his daughter. The report showed that they too had died from poisoning. The only surviving relative of the family, Edith Bingham, was accused of the three murders, but was soon acquitted as insufficient evidence could be found against her. As Edith would inherit the estate from her deceased relatives, it was commonly accepted that she was the killer; however, the case remained officially unsolved.

Females, the loving and caring protectors of our species and the ones that are more susceptible to danger, are in fact the most dangerous as they are the least suspected of the serial killers. Like their male counterparts, they show no remorse and have no mercy for their victims. Should we still call them the weaker sex? I think not.