Case Files 013

Chapter 129: Thrill Killing

I immediately turned to the village head, "Sir, if Er Xiao is right, then the killer should still be in or around the village. Then the chance of the killer being a villager here is very high, has anyone gone missing recently?"

The village head had his hands roasting on the stove and he said slowly, "Our village is only so big. If someone has gone missing, their family or neighbour would have come to report it to me. But until now no one has come to me with that issue." Then he added, "How about this, the day is already getting late. Tomorrow morning, I'll have Ol' Xia gather all the villagers and we'll see if anyone's missing. That will work right? If that doesn't work, we'll search through the house one by one. If the killer is really a villager here, we'll find a dead body in their home."

I shook my finger. "That's not a good idea and it won't work. It's snowing too heavily. The killer could have easily left the dead body in the yard and the snow will do the rest for them. We can't possibly go and shovel up the snow at every house, right? We might as well wait for spring to come and melt the snow, that might be faster." I continued, "Furthermore, it's not wise going around to throw suspicion, that is not what the law enforcement should do. It will reflect badly on the police. After all, if we're being suspected of being a killer for no reason, we wouldn't feel too at ease either."

"Then what should we do?" The village head nodded before he asked.

I asked, "The killer has just buried the arm in the snow this afternoon, they must still be around the village. What we need to do now is to guard the village's two exits, if anyone wishes to leave, we have to be informed. After all, the snow has blocked off all the roads, there's no reason for anyone to leave the village at the moment." The village head took a sip of the warm water and yawned with satisfaction. "That should work. Then Er Xiao, I will leave you with the guard duty of the eastern entrance of the village. If someone tries to escape from the highway, contact me. Try to stop them if you can, but if you can't, remember their faces. We'll eventually capture them if they're a villager here."

Er Xiao didn't understand what we were talking about until now. He said hurriedly, "Does this mean I'm the informant like the ones on those crime dramas? This is exciting! Leave this to me, I'm the perfect candidate, I have nothing else better to do anyway." I was not sure that was a good quality in a watchman but seeing how confident Er Xiao was, I didn't say anything. If an outsider was hiding inside the village, we would have known about it now considering everyone at First Drain Village knew each other, so the killer most likely would be a villager here. A village who had a butchery background, could it really be Ol' Xia? Something told me that was not the case, something was still missing.

However, we had essentially narrowed the suspect down to 300 plus people. It was only a matter of time until the killer was apprehended. With that in mind, I calmed down a lot. Perhaps when everyone was gathered together, we could identify the killer immediately with my criminal profile. Gu Chen placed 50 RMB on the counter despite Er Xiao's multiple rejection. We put on the new gloves and at least our fingers could work normally again. Then we hurried back to the village.

As we walked back, Chief Zhou said, "Based on our clues so far, it does seem like the killer is one of the villagers but no one here matches the killer's profile. No one I know looks like the kind of person who would kill and dismember an actual human."

I shook my head. "Humans are always deceiving with their appearance, you can never understand the heart of a person from their looks. There was this case where a teacher stabbed a child on his way home. No one expected him to be capable of such mindless violence, his colleagues refused to believe it. The reason he killed was funny too." I shrugged. "He said he was under too much pressure from school, and the child's laughter rubbed him the wrong way."

Chief Zhou thought about it and said, "Wu Meng, you have studied psychology. What's the reason behind someone dismembering a body and even feeding the carcass to a dog? Why would someone go to such lengths of cruelty?"

I pulled on my hair and told Chief Zhou. "Based on the known situation, I've come up with the criminal profile of a murderous butcher. They murder because of internal torture, so they have to torment other living humans to satisfy their own twisted needs, they enjoy the thrill of the kill." Seeing the confusion on Chief Zhou's face, I added, "In criminology, there is a term called thrill killing. A thrill kill is premeditated or random murder that is motivated by the sheer excitement of the act."

Chief Zhou scratched his head, and looked at me with eyes begging for knowledge. "This is the first time I've heard of that term. Why don't you explain it further for us, since we have nothing else to do anyway?" The others turned to me, they too agreed with Chief Zhou's suggestion. I cleared my throat and obliged. "Then we will have to start with Maslow's Hierarchy of needs. Maslow's hierarchy of needs is often portrayed in the shape of a pyramid with the largest, most fundamental needs at the bottom and the need for self-actualization and transcendence at the top. In other words, the idea is that individuals' most basic needs must be met before they become motivated to achieve higher-level needs."

The group nodded.

I continued, "At the most basic level, we humans have psychological needs and the 3 most important ones are health, rest, and sex. When these are not satisfied, one would do anything, including killing, to correct that. Crime of passion is committed when the perpetrator committed murder compelled by sudden impulses due to lack of rest and thus inability to think clearly, they often regret their actions after the fact; Health here refers to physical, societal and mental well-being, an example of murder committed to fulfil this need is the perpetrator killing and robbing someone to buy a new iPhone; Lust killing a homicide in which the offender searches for erotic satisfaction by killing someone."

"Okay, I think I understand." Chief Zhou nodded.

I extended 3 fingers as I listed them out, "Rest, sex, health," Then I pulled back my fingers, "When they are all satisfied, it doesn't mean that the world won't have anymore murderers. Take for example, thrill killing, that doesn't fulfil any of these baser needs.

"In the case of thrill killing, the killer kills for the sake of killing, they kill to satisfy the emptiness in their soul. In such cases, the choice of victims is often mostly random." After a pause, I continued, "That is why the main clue to solve such cases is often not the killer's motive or the connection between the victim and the killer. Therefore, there is a conflict, we do not wish for the killer to strike again but the greater the number of victims, the greater the chance we have of catching them."

Chief Zhou nodded. "That is sick. Indeed, in the past, I have come across cases where the killer doesn't even know the victim at all. We didn't even know why the culprit had committed the crime."

I nodded. "This kind of killer is extremely dangerous, dismemberment is merely for them to extend the high of murder. For example, the serial killer case that has been recently solved at Silver City. The killer, Mr. Gao, is a typical thrill killer. He has a high IQ, comes from a good background, there is no reason for him to kill. All of his victims were raped and dismembered." I concluded, "He enjoyed the thrill of killing, the rape and dismemberment are just an extension of that."

Gu Chen scoffed, "No matter what, a killer is a killer and the police will eventually catch them. This Mr. Gao might be highly intelligent but he was caught in the end, right?"

I nodded, "The killer is now 60 plus. His killing spree started in 1988. Hopefully, the souls of his victims will be able to rest in peace with his arrest."

"I can't believe such people exist." Chief Zhou lamented. I sighed, "This world is too big and it is home to all sorts of people. Criminal profiling came into being in America to handle these kinds of cases. A criminal profiler has to take on the mindset of the perpetrator to come up with the image of the killer based on available information."

"Then, will the profiles always be correct?" Chief Zhou looked at me seriously. I looked at him and noticed the furrow between his brows.

I nodded. "Of course there is nothing that is 100 percent correct. If criminal profiles are always correct, we won't need detectives anymore. To be honest, criminal profiling is more like data analysis, drawing conclusions from known data like which kind of person would be more prone to murders and crimes." I continued, "But criminal profiling has a big flaw in stereotyping. Humans are more varied than a formed profile and we always have to be mindful of that prejudice. A criminal profile can only bring us into the perspective of the killer as close as possible, it is not 100 percent correct. Matter of fact, I already have a feeling that I might be wrong."

"What do you mean?" They asked. I pulled on my hair and admitted, "I worry that my earlier profile might not be correct, because when all the conditions of a criminal profile appear on the same person, it is too unusual. A criminal profile is just the concept of an ideal killer for a specific case but actual humans are more varied than that." I told the group, "Just like there is no ideal man or woman for a specific mate, there is no ideal criminal either. No human should be able to fit into the categories of a criminal profile so well."

"So you're saying the killer is not a butcher?" Chief Zhou questioned.

I nodded and then shook my head. "It's hard to say. I believe I need to wait until we have more clues first."