John Douglas: The man who inspired Mindhunter and Silence of the Lambs

Douglas spends his life among the most dangerous, predatory offenders - rapists, murderers, serial killers. Men who live behind masks - masks of sanity, masks of Mr Nice Guy until it’s too late, real masks put over their faces at night before they kill.

The suit and tie that Douglas wears, it’s a mask too - it gives him authority when he sits across the prison visiting table from criminals constantly searching for signs of weakness to exploit, one eye ever hunting for a victim.

Douglas developed the science - some would say art - of criminal profiling. A profiler takes every shred of evidence from a crime scene and uses it to develop a picture of who the killer is - at times the results can be astounding, pegging with chilling accuracy the age, race, profession, marital status, personality and location of the offender. Douglas looked at the crimes of Jack the Ripper and said with certainty that the murderer - who to this day remains unknown - lived slap-bang in the middle of his killing grounds in the east end of London. Most serial murders start killing close to home - their ‘comfort zone’. As Douglas says: "If you want to understand the artist, look at his art."

The method of killing is often revelatory about the killer’s personality. If a victim is found strangled from behind, then most likely the killer knew them - few people, even the most psychopathic, would look into the eyes of someone they knew as they died. Multiple wounds to a victim’s face and upper body? Then there’s probably a personal motive. Revenge, perhaps - jealousy.

The key to Douglas unlocking the secrets of the criminal mind was a series of interviews he conducted with notorious offenders beginning in the 1970s - some call it the Golden Age of Serial Killing - and continuing to this day. He interviewed the likes of David Berkowitz - the Son of Sam - Charles Manson, Ed Kemper, John Wayne Gacy, Gary Heidnik, Ted Bundy and Richard Speck. Between them, these men alone are responsible for the deaths of nearly 100 people. Douglas’ new book ‘The Killer Across the Table’ explains how these interviews taught him what makes a killer tick - why killers kill. Little wonder, then, that he was the inspiration for the character of FBI chief Jack Crawford in Silence of the Lambs, and had his career immortalised in the Netflix crime series Mindhunter, about to return for a second season.

At the heart of understanding the worst offenders - serial killers, sex murderers, repeat rapists - lie three simple words, says Douglas: ‘Manipulation. Domination. Control’. These are the prime motivators. But why do those three simple words drive such men? The answer lies somewhere in their childhood for it’s there that empathy seems to have been drained from them, and empathy is the one thing which makes us human. Nearly all suffered abuse of one kind or another as children. "They are all predators,?" says Douglas, "and all grew up without forming trusting bonds with other human beings during their formative years".

Douglas’ work has led him inevitably to ask big questions about life, specifically ‘are some people born evil?’. When it comes to the nature versus nurture debate, Douglas says: "I would argue that, while no-one who does not have certain inborn tendencies toward impulsivity, anger, and/or sadistic perversions is going to evolve into a predator because of bad upbringing, there is no doubt in my mind that those possessing such inborn tendencies can be pushed along the path to predation by negative influences as they grow up and mature."

As an example, he points to one of the most notorious serial killers in history - Ed Kemper, the so-called Co-ed Killer who murdered his grandparents when he was 15, then went on to kill a series of young hitchhikers, and his mother. He stands six foot nine, weighs 300 pound, and has an IQ of 145.

In order to understand the very essence of Kemper’s crimes, Douglas tried to unravel the killer’s fantasy life, his ‘emotional reasons’ for murder. Like many such men, Kemper had a difficult relationship with an emotionally cold mother. None of Kemper’s victims were treated sadistically. Unlike many other killers, it wasn’t torture or humiliation that motivated him. Kemper told Douglas that he was ‘evicting them from their bodies’ so he could be with them after death. He was lonely - and like all violent and sexual offenders he was also a narcissist. The same psychopathology crops up again and again in Douglas’ work: humiliation or abuse in childhood leaves a young man, with a high sense of his own importance, unfit for the world - incapable of functioning in work or a relationship - and this piles on more humiliation to their already fragile sense of self; they are raw with anger and sensitive to any slight; empathy has been expunged from them. Killing becomes an act which gives them power, control, domination.

Serial offenders - paedophiles, rapists, killers - are also serial manipulators of the authorities. Lying isn’t just second nature - it’s fun. "On one of his court-mandated visits to a state psychiatrist Ed Kemper had the head of his latest victim, a 15-year-old girl, in the trunk of his car," says Douglas. "During that particular interview, the psychiatrist concluded he was no longer a threat to himself or others and recommended his juvenile record be sealed." Suffice to say, Douglas does not hold to the idea that such offenders can be rehabilitated.

However, the deep-seated narcissism and inadequacy of serial offenders also makes them easy to manipulate. In his interviews with criminals, Douglas tries to maintain control of the situation as a figure of authority - hence the FBI suit and tie - while still allowing the killer to feel a sense of power and control. In his first interview with David Berkowitz, Douglas told him that another multiple murder had written to police saying ‘he wants to be powerful like you’. Berkowitz immediately relaxed and said to Douglas: "What do you want to know?"

When Douglas interviews assassins - like James Earl Ray who shot Martin Luther King - he sits them ‘facing the window or door because they tend to be paranoid and will be distracted if they can’t psychologically escape when stressed by the interview’. During an interview with Charles Manson, all of five foot two, "he climbed up onto the back of a chair at the head of the table so he could lord it over us from a superior position, just as he used to sit on top of boulder to preach to his ‘family’ of followers".

Douglas says his goal in all these interviews is ‘to turn on the DVD’ inside the minds of these men. All serial offenders have rich, though dark, fantasy lives - they vividly replay their crimes in their minds. Douglas takes hours leading offenders through humdrum small talk and life history until they begin speaking freely about the crimes they committed. That’s when Douglas gets closest to honesty and can really pick apart why a killer killed.

That moment can be ‘almost like a metamorphoses’, he says. He describes one child killer, Joseph McGowan, transforming before his eyes as he began to talk openly of his crimes. "His physical appearance seemed to change before my eyes," he said. "His eyes were unfocused as he looked beyond me. I could tell he was looking completely inward - back a quarter of a century. I could sense he was clicking back to the one story that had never left his mind."

Most ‘ordinary’ people who commit murder don’t take pleasure in the act itself - even if they hate the person they’ve killed. However, the sexual or serial murderer does. McGowan took extreme pleasure in killing. "The gratification and emotional fulfilment of the act went through to the brutal murder itself and his ability to destroy something." When Douglas asked McGowan to show the expression that was on his face at the time of the killing, ‘his face contorted into what I would characterise as an intense, malevolently satisfied grimace’.

With such killers ‘the fixation was with the act itself, not the personality or specificity of the victim’. In other words, a killer like McGowan - who was also a social inadequate with a domineering mother - would have killed anyone to satisfy his urge to murder, a child was just an easier victim than an adult woman, or even a man.

"The only real fantasy here was a fantasy of power," Douglas added. "For a person with criminal tendencies who perceives he has little power or control over his own life, murder embodies the ultimate power."

There’s one consistent trait among all serial predators, says Douglas, and that’s ‘two emotional concepts constantly warring within them. One is a feeling of grandiosity and entitlement. The other is a deep-seated and pervasive sense of inferiority.’

Even though their actions may appear insane, serial offenders are not mad. Douglas cites the case of Dennis Rader, the BTK killer - BTK standing for bind, torture, kill - who murdered entire families. When it seemed like his wife suspected him of aberrant behaviour, Rader was able to stop killing for years before starting again. "This layoff proved to me Rader’s sanity and rationality," says Douglas.

Most serial offenders display ‘the homicidal triad’ when young - bed-wetting, fire starting and cruelty to animals. The psychology of the crime scene also points to the psychology of the criminal. Is it organised? In other words, was the crime well planned, is there little evidence left behind, was the getaway effective? Or was it disorganised - meaning the killer might be young, less experienced, maybe under the influence of drink or drugs.

Serial offenders are also born to compartmentalise - in a way that no normal person could. John Wayne Gacy had 33 boys buried under his house, yet he went about his life as a happily married man, active in local politics and successful in his business life. "Predators like these exist on two distinct psychic planes," says Douglas.

"Serial killers are constantly on the hunt, some of them almost nightly," Douglas adds. "The hunt is a key component of the fantasy and often just as fulfilling as the crime itself."

Nearly all such offenders see themselves as wronged by the world, and often blame their acts on some catalyst which set them off - being jilted, losing a job, friends shunning them, a terrible childhood, exposure to pornography, or a even dog barking next door according to the Son of Sam. Often they blame the victim too - their skirt was too short, their door was unlocked, they shouldn’t have been out at night. "Nearly all serial killers believe their crimes are justified, or at least explainable," Douglas says. "They perceive themselves as the true victims - yet another manifestation of their extreme narcissism".

The truth is, says Douglas, these men made a choice to kill. Whether they had a dreadful childhood or not - and many did suffer appalling physical, emotional and sexual abuse - they knew the difference between right and wrong. They were not pre-programmed to kill. The acted of their own freewill. They want to ‘play God’, as Douglas puts it. "The reality is that a bad background is not an excuse for murder."

Self-evidently, confronting such horror has its cost. "As an investigator of violent crime, you try to be as emotionally detached as possible, not only to maintain your objectivity and critical judgement, but also to preserve your sanity," he says. "In fact, having to put myself, as a behavioural profiler, into the head of every victim whose case I work has definitely taken its psychic toll on me throughout my career."

* The Killer Across the Table: Unlocking the Secrets of Serial Killers and Predators with the FBI’s Original Mindhunter by John E Douglas and Mark Olshaker is published by William Collins on May 16 priced £20 in hardback.

THE KILLERS ACROSS THE TABLE

JOHN Douglas has spent time in the company of some of the most infamous offenders in criminal history. They include:

David Berkowitz aka the Son of Sam. Berkowitz went on a murder spree in the New York during the summer of 1976 killing six people. He sent letters to the police signed Mr Monster and when caught claimed a demon inside a dog belonging to his neighbour ‘Sam’ instructed him to kill. He remains behind bars.

Ted Bundy. The seemingly charming, highly intelligent and attractive Bundy brought terror to America in the 1970s. He was finally caught after two escapes from custody and confessed to 30 murders. He died in the electric chair in 1989 with crowds outside chanting ‘Burn, Bundy, Burn’.

Richard Speck. He tortured, raped and murdered eight student nurses in 1966. He was condemned to die but the death sentence was overturned. He died in prison after serving 25 years.

Gary Ridgway aka the Green River Killer. Convicted of 49 murders, he’s the most prolific serial killer in America. His victims were mostly sex workers and runaways. He was spared the death penalty but will die in prison.

JOHN DOUGLAS ON FILM AND TV

SCOTT Glen famously portrayed a version of John Douglas in The Silence of the Lambs, but it’s the Netflix series Mindhunter which has really brought the detail of his work to life for millions.

In Mindhunter, the lead character Holden Ford is based on Douglas’ early career with the FBI’s Behavioural Science Unit. Douglas along with his colleague Robert Ressler - the man who coined the term serial killer - began travelling the country interviewing serial offenders in prison to gain insight into how they think in the hope of using the information to catch offenders still at large.

Their work would have been impossible without Dr Ann Burgess who was studying ways to help women who had been raped. Her work looking at crime from the victim’s perspective helped develop a 360 degree view of serial crime. The three eventually published the Crime Classification Manual, which remains a handbook for detectives today.

Douglas has also been played by Hugh Dancy as special investigator Will Graham in the series Hannibal, which charts the life of the fictional serial killer Hannibal Lecter.

Douglas is now retired from the FBI but continues to consult on major crime. He worked on the Amanda Knox case, and supported her claim of innocence, and also helped free a number of men wrongfully convicted of three child murders spuriously connected to Satanism.