David McGowan - Programmed to Kill; The Politics of Serial Murder

P rogrammed to K ill

The Politics of Serial Murder

David McGowan iUniverse, Inc.

New York Lincoln Shanghai

Programmed to Kill

The Politics of Serial Murder

All Rights Reserved 2004 by David McGowan

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping, or by any information storage retrieval system, without the written permission of the publisher.

iUniverse, Inc.

For information address: iUniverse, Inc.

2021 Pine Lake Road, Suite 100 Lincoln, NE 68512 www.iuniverse.com

ISBN: 0-595-77446-6

Printed in the United States of America

This book is for all the survivors.

This man, from the moment of conception, was programmed for murder.

Attorney Ellis Rubin, speaking on behalf of serial killer Bobby Joe Long

[T]he experimenters will be particularly interested in dissociative states, from the abaissement de niveau mental to multiple personality in so-called mediums, and an attempt will be made to induce a number of states of this kind, using hypnosis.

From a declassified MK-ULTRA document

It is probably safe to say that this is not your typical true crime book. It is, instead, a journey into an even darker, more disturbing worldone that exists in the shadows of the world depicted in the hundreds of formulaic serial killer biographies that line the shelves of Americas bookstores. For many readers, much of the information contained within these pages will be unfamiliar, and some of the theories and ideas that are discussed may seem rather bizarre.

Perhaps the most controversial theory that readers will find themselves confronted with concerns a phenomenon commonly referred to as mind control. Although the concept of mind control has long been a staple of that polluted well-spring of information known as the conspiracy theory literature (where it often mingles freely with outlandish tales of reptilian aliens and paranormal activity), it has never been a polite topic of discussion in mainstream culture. The only exposure that most people have had to the idea of mind control is through the often metaphorical, and frequently absurd, images that Hollywood has provided in a decades-long string of filmsfrom The Manchurian Candidate and The Stepford Wives in the 1960s and 1970s, to such recent offerings as Conspiracy Theory and Zoolander (along with the remakes of both The Manchurian Candidate and The Stepford Wives).

Most people are naturally quite skeptical of the notion that someones thoughts and actions can be controlled by unseen actors. Particularly in Western culture, where the idea of free will is firmly indoctrinated, theories of mind control are inimical to the omnipresent mantra that we are all responsible for our own actions. It is quite likely then that scenarios involving mind-controlled killerswhether assassins like Lee Harvey Oswald or Sirhan Sirhan, or serial killers like Henry Lee Lucas or Charles Mansonwill be summarily dismissed by many readers. Skeptics though should bear in mind that, contrary to perceptions, mind control is not a fictional creation of novelists and Hollywood screenwriters; to the contrary, there exists a substantial paper trail establishing that the U.S. intelligence community has devoted a vast amount of both human and financial resources, over a period of several decades, to the study of mind control. Along the way, luminaries of numerous social sciences have been recruited and co-opted.

Detailing all the techniques and procedures that have received attention from the Central Intelligence Agency and its brethren is, unfortunately, well beyond the scope of this book. It is possible, however, to provide a rough sketch of what mind control really isa sketch that will, it is hoped, help to demystify a phenomenon that is not, as it turns out, nearly so esoteric as it may at first appear to be.

The basic methodology of mind control was revealed many decades ago by George Estabrooks, a prominent psychologist/hypnotist who worked under contract to American intelligence agencies. In his book Hypnotism, first published in 1943, Estabrooks teased his audience by noting that the intelligent reader...will sense that much more is withheld than has been told. While that was undoubtedly an accurate assessment, Estabrooks nevertheless did reveal enough to allow an informed reader to construct a reasonably accurate picture of the fundamentals of mind control.

The degree to which any given person is susceptible to being mind controlled is a direct function of that persons susceptibility to what are known as dissociative states. According to the psychiatric community, dissociative states (or dissociative disorders) include Amnesia, Fugue State, and what used to be called Multiple Personality Disorder (MPD) but is now generally referred to as Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID). All of these terms describe the same basic phenomenon: a person who is seemingly in control of his or her actions over a given time period is unable, at a later date, to recall or account for those actions.

As with any category of mental illness, there is no dividing line that separates those who are diagnosed with dissociative disorders from those who are normal. Virtually everyone possesses the ability to experience dissociative states. Many people, for example, are familiar with the phenomenon sometimes referred to as driving on autopilot. The scenario generally plays out as follows: you suddenly snap out of it just as you are pulling into your parking space at work, and you realize, to your horror, that you cant remember anything since leaving your house! If this has happened to you, then you have experienced being in a dissociative state. In essence, you drove to work while in a fugue state, and you later had amnesia. In a similar vein, it could be said that an alter personality, which you have no conscious awareness of, drove you to work. In any event, it is clear that someone piloted your car to work in a safe and reasonable manner, and it was someone other than you.

Many people are also familiar with another common example of a dissociative state: you are deep in thought, oblivious to everything around you, possibly working on the solution to one of the worlds great mysteries, when suddenly your silent meditation is interruptedperhaps by an unexpected noise, or by someone calling your name or tapping your shoulder. As you snap out of it, you suddenly realize, much to your dismay, that you cannot remember what it was that you were so deep in thought about just moments before. If you have ever had a similar experience, or if you are familiar with the dreamlike state that some people attain just before falling asleep, or while engrossed in a book or television program, then you have experienced being in a dissociative state of consciousness.

While the ability to dissociate is likely universal, or nearly so, some people are clearly more susceptible to dissociative states than are others. There is little question that someones innate ability to dissociate can be greatly enhanced although not necessarily by ethical means. The most severe of the dissociative disorders, MPD/DID, is in almost all cases created by psychological trauma so severe that the traumatic episode (s) cannot be integrated into the experiences of the core personality. By far the most common cause of MPD is early childhood traumausually, but not always, resulting from horrific abuse by a parent or other adult guardian. Dr. Frank Putnam noted in 1989 that he was struck by the quality of extreme sadism that is reported by most MPD victims. Many multiples have told me of being sexually abused by groups of people, of being forced into prostitution by family members, or of being offered as sexual enticement to their mothers boyfriends. After one has worked with a number of MPD patients, it becomes obvious that severe, sustained, and repetitive child abuse is a major element in the creation of MPD. Dr. Deirdre Barrett, writing in 2001 for Psychology Today, offered a similar observation: dissociaters...have the following traits in common: Many such subjects reported a history of child abuse. Although some remembered this directly, some had been told by others that they had been battered...Other dissociaters who had not been abused had suffered childhood traumas such as prolonged, painful medical conditions and before the age of 10 experienced the deaths of their parents.