Criminoloogist Robin Odell has compiled this gruesome gallery of cases from all over the world, revealing the growth in serial slayings, contract killings and middle-class murders and investigating what motivates people to commit the ultimate crime. As well as gangsters and ordinary felons, the book includes doctors, millionaries, housewives, children, lawyers, accountants, officers and gentlemen who have succumbed to the killing instinct. Behind the sensational names concocted by the tabloid press - 'Boston Strangler', 'Dracula Killer', 'Night Stalker', 'Granny Killer' - lurk real murderers committing acts of violence in circumstances often more bizarre than fiction. Arranged in an easy-to-use A-Z format, the book contains over 500 cases from serial killers such as Dennis Nilsen and Ted Bundy, to those such as Jeremy Bamber and Steven Benson who dispatched their parents for money; from murderous New Zealand teenagers whose story made a successful film, to the many doctors and...

犯罪学家罗宾-奥德尔（Robin Odell）编撰了这本来自世界各地的令人毛骨悚然的案件集，揭示了连环杀手、合同杀手和中产阶级谋杀案的增长，并调查了促使人们实施终极犯罪的原因。除了黑帮分子和普通重刑犯之外，本书还包括医生、百万富翁、家庭主妇、儿童、律师、会计师、官员和屈服于杀人本能的绅士。在小报编造的耸人听闻的名字背后--"波士顿绞刑犯"、"德古拉杀手"、"夜行者"、"祖母杀手"--潜伏着真正的杀人犯，他们的暴力行为往往比小说中的情节更离奇。本书以易于使用的A-Z格式编排，包含了500多个案例，从丹尼斯-尼尔森和泰德-邦迪等连环杀手，到杰里米-班博和史蒂文-本森等为钱打发父母的人；从故事被成功拍成电影的新西兰杀人少年，到许多医生和医生之间的关系。