20th-century American murderers

Robert Eugene Brashers was an American serial killer who committed at least eight murders in Kentucky, Missouri, South Carolina and Texas between 1990 and 1998. During his lifetime, Brashers was convicted of attempted murder for shooting a woman in 1985, as well as for various other offenses stemming from a 1992 case in which he stole a vehicle, but was not identified as a suspect in any of his murders and remained in relative obscurity. He died by a self-inflicted gunshot wound in 1999 to avoid arrest for an unrelated crime after a standoff with police.

Theodore Robert Bundy was an American serial killer who kidnapped, raped and murdered dozens of young women and girls between 1974 and 1978. His modus operandi typically consisted of convincing his target that he was in need of assistance or duping them into believing he was an authority figure. He would then lure his victim to his vehicle, at which point he would bludgeon them unconscious, then restrain them with handcuffs before driving them to a remote location to be sexually assaulted and killed.

American novelist, short story writer, essayist, painter, and spoken word performer (1914–1997)

Lee Harvey Oswald was a U.S. Marine veteran who assassinated John F. Kennedy, the 35th president of the United States, on November 22, 1963.

Jeffrey Lionel Dahmer, also known as the Milwaukee Cannibal or the Milwaukee Monster, was an American serial killer and sex offender who killed and dismembered seventeen men and boys between 1978 and 1991.

serial killer in California

John Lennon's killer

American bank robbers

American cult leader (1931–1978)

Hamilton Howard "Albert" Fish was an American serial killer, rapist, child molester and cannibal who committed at least three child murders between July 1924 and June 1928. He was also known as the Gray Man, the Werewolf of Wysteria, the Brooklyn Vampire, the Moon Maniac, and the Boogey Man. Fish was a suspect in at least ten murders during his lifetime, although he only confessed to three murders that police were able to trace to a known homicide. He also confessed to stabbing at least two other people.

American domestic anti-government terrorist (1968–2001)

Edward Theodore Gein, also known as the Butcher of Plainfield and the Plainfield Ghoul, was an American murderer and body snatcher. His crimes, committed around his hometown of Plainfield, Wisconsin, gathered widespread notoriety in 1957 after authorities discovered that he stole corpses from local graveyards and fashioned keepsakes from their bones and skin. He also confessed to killing two women: tavern owner Mary Hogan in 1954 and hardware store owner Bernice Worden in 1957.

John Wayne Gacy was an American serial killer and sex offender who raped, tortured and murdered at least thirty-three young men and boys between 1972 and 1978 in Norwood Park Township, a suburb of Chicago, Illinois. He became known as the "Killer Clown" due to his public performances as a clown prior to the discovery of his crimes.

Aileen Carol Wuornos was an American serial killer. Between 1989 and 1990, while engaging in street prostitution along highways in Florida, Wuornos shot, killed, and robbed seven of her male clients. She initially claimed that her victims had either raped or attempted to rape her, and that the homicides were committed in self-defense, but later abandoned this defense. Wuornos was sentenced to death for six of the murders and was executed in 2002 after spending more than ten years on Florida's death row.

American actor (1913–1978)

assassin of U.S. Senator Robert F. Kennedy (born 1944)

American serial killer (1960–2013)

American criminal, convicted for the murder of civil rights activist and Nobel peace prize laureate Martin Luther King Jr. in 1968

American laborer and assassin (1873–1901)

American gangster

American mobster y brujo de hechicería oscura

American-Israeli doctor, perpetrator of the Cave of the Patriarchs massacre (1956-1994)

American spree killer (1969–1997)

American serial killer

American science fiction writer (1915–1987)

Irish-American gangster and crime boss (1929-2018)

Native American activist

attempted assassin of Ronald Reagan (born 1955)

American serial killer, rapist, burglar and former police officer

American convicted murderer from California (1948-2009)

American serial killer, cannibal and necrophiliac (1950–1980)

Italian-American Costa Nostra mobster

US Army officer convicted for massacre at My Lai, Vietnam (1943–2024)

American mass murderers (1981–1999)

American mass murderer and spree killer; perpetrator of the University of Texas Tower shooting (1941–1966)

American serial killer (1939–1973)

American white supremacist, convicted felon

American kidnapper-murderer duo, committed "the crime of the century"

Jerome Henry "Jerry" Brudos was an American serial killer and necrophile known as the Lust Killer and the Shoe Fetish Slayer who committed the kidnap, rape, and murder of four young women between 1968 and 1969 in Salem, Oregon. He is also known to have attempted to abduct two other young women.

American mobster (1908–1975)

Joseph Lyle Menendez and Erik Galen Menendez, commonly referred to as the Menendez brothers, are American brothers convicted of killing their parents, José and Mary Louise "Kitty" Menendez, in their Beverly Hills home in 1989.

Norwegian-American serial killer

American convicted murderer of Jesse Anderson and Jeffrey Dahmer (as well as a previous murder conviction)

American murderer (1940-1977)

American serial killer (1947–1996)

American spree killer (1938–1959)

American mobster

American serial killer (1949–1992)

American bank robber (1910-1934)

American murderer; member of Charles Manson's "Family"

American serial killer (1854–1938)

American politician, assassin of Moscone and Milk (1946-1985)

American mass murderer (1925–2008)

American actor (1928–1990)

American convicted murderer

unidentified serial killer who was active in Cleveland, Ohio

American bank robber (1908–1934)

American serial killer (1927-1959)

American domestic terrorist incarcerated in a US federal prison

American executed homeopath (1862–1910)