Jeffrey Lionel Dahmer grew up in Bath, Ohio, which is near Akron. His parents were termed as "middle class." As a boy he was intelligent, but did not live up to his potential. Instead, he would disrupt class in a clownish way rather than pay attention to his schoolwork. When he was 16, he had already become an alcoholic and showing signs of what his future would hold. He had an intense interest in chemistry and in torturing and dismembering animals. When Dahmer was 18 years old, he committed his first murder. He picked up a hitchhiker and killed him rather spontaneously in June of 1979. Relevant or not, the year before his parents divorced.

For the next 9 years, his fantasies built up, until in 1981, fantasies became reality. Like other serial killers, Dahmer's victims grew in number as he got more "comfortable" with killing--1 in '87, 2 in '88, 1 in '89, 4 in '90, and 8 in '91--until he was caught. In fact, the last few killings were only days apart. Dahmer was a cannibal--he consumed human flesh and blood. He kept body parts (including skeleton and skulls). He preferred sexual acts with dead and dismembered bodies. *Some people do not consider Dahmer a cannibal because he only"tasted"flesh a time or 2.