about serial killer statistics....

The actual proportion of the unidentified dead who are the victims of serial murder is unknown (Hickey 1997; Egger 1990a; Jenkins1994; Kiger 1990). In the United States, it is not mandatory for coroners to report the discovery of unidentified bodies to a centralized data bank. Also, coroners need no formal training for the position. Their reports to the FBI may contain unreliable information about the cause and time of death (Kiger 1990). Furthermore, cause of death cannot be determined from badly decomposed bodies, which are then unlikely to be counted as homicides. Sometimes, bodies may be found where cause of death can be classed as homicide, but the victims were killed in previous years.These victims are not likely to be submitted as additions to a revised homicide count for that year (Kiger 1990).

Many victims of a serial killer may not be classed as homicides at all. They may be assumed to have died of natural causes (eg. nursing home and hospital patients). As a result, homicide rates are underestimated and the consequent analyses are inaccurate (Jenkins 1994; Kiger 1990; Williams and Flewelling 1987). UCR/SHR data reflect only the number of deaths labeled as homicide by the police.They do not necessarily reflect the actual number of deaths in a given year.

At this point, numerical estimates of serial killers and victims based on this data are questionable. Thus, it is unwarranted to assume that serial killing is on the rise as has sometimes been claimed. It is also inaccurate to attribute most stranger or unknown homicides to serial murder. This limits our ability to understand the nature and extent of the problem, and or course, inflated estimates provoke fear of a serial killer epidemic.

References

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