Mind of a Serial Killer - SERIAL KILLER: Ed Kemper Pt. 2 with Andrea Gunning of Betrayal Weekly

Episode Date: July 23, 2026

Once again, Vanessa and Dr. Engels are joined by Andrea Gunning of "Betrayal Weekly" to discuss the crimes of Ed Kemper. In early 1973, Kemper murdered UC Santa Cruz students Rosalind Thorpe and Alice Liu following a violent argument with his mother, Clarnell... then turned his rage on her. After killing Clarnell and her friend Sara Hallett, Kemper fled California before voluntarily calling police to confess to eight murders. His subsequent cooperation with investigators helped shape the FBI's behavioral profiling of serial killers.If you’re new here, don’t forget to follow Serial Killers & Murderous Minds to never miss a case! Want all 2 parts of every case all at once? Join Crime House+ and get both parts of each case dropped together on Monday ad-free. Join at crimehouseplus.com or if you’re listening on Apple Podcasts, tap “Try Free” at the top of this show’s page. Serial Killers & Murderous Minds is a Crime House Original Podcast, powered by PAVE Studios.🎧 Need More to Binge? Listen to other Crime House Originals Clues, Crimes Of…, Murder True Crime Stories, Crime House 24/7, and more wherever you get your podcasts!Follow me on SocialInstagram: @CrimehouseTikTok: @CrimehouseFacebook: @crimehousestudiosYouTube: @crimehousestudios

Hi listeners, it's Vanessa. Before today's episode, I want to tell you about another show I think you'll love. Crime House and A&E are teaming up on the podcast version of the famous true crime series, The First 48. Each week, Carter Roy takes you inside a landmark homicide case, the interrogations, the dead ends, and the breakthroughs in the critical first 48 hours. Listen to and follow the First 48 every Thursday on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or wherever you listen to podcasts. This is Crime House.

Our parents are supposed to be our safe harbor. The people we look to for love, protection, and approval. They guide us and help shape our understanding of the world so that we can thrive on our own someday. Unfortunately, not everyone gets that kind of support from their parents. Some people have to figure out life for themselves. For others, parents can create so much negativity. They can't wait to leave home and get away.

Growing up, Ed Kemper wanted nothing more than to escape his mother's dark cloud. Her emotional and physical abuse made him feel weak. As he got older, the resentment festered. And Ed fantasized about one day making his mom feel the same way. But he didn't just want to punish her.

He wanted to punish all women. So he hunted them down one by one until it was time to make his ultimate kill. The human mind is powerful. It shapes how we think, feel, love, and hate. But sometimes it drives people to commit the unthinkable. This is serial killers and murderous minds, a crimehouse original. I'm Vanessa Richardson.

And I'm forensic psychologist, Dr. Tristan Engels. And once again, we're thrilled to welcome our special guest, Andrea Gunning, host of The Betrayal Weekly podcast. Thanks so much. I'm happy to be back. We are so excited. You're back, Andrea, and you're here to help us wrap up our series on Ed Kemper. Just like last time, Andrea will introduce the episode, then be sure to stick around at the end for an extended conversation between her and Dr. Engels about the case. Can't wait. Before I hand it off, Crimehouse exists because of listeners like you. Want even more? Join Crimehouse Plus and get both parts of every story dropped on the same Monday completely ad-free. No way to waiting three days for part two, plus crimehouse bonus episodes every month.

To join, go to crimehouseplus.com, or if you listen on Apple Podcasts, tap try free at the top of the serial killers and murderous minds page. Andrea, it's all yours. As we get started, be advised that this episode contains discussion of rape, murder, and necrophilia. So please listen with care. This is the conclusion of a deep dive into the mind of Ed Kemper, one of the most notorious serial killers in American history. In 1970s, California, Ed murdered at least six young female hitchhikers until finally turning his rage on the person who tormented him most, his own mother. And as Vanessa goes through the story, Dr. Engels will be talking about things like,

why some killers raise the stakes with each murder, how fear of vulnerability can drive a need for absolute dominance, and why some murderers seem to lose their drive as they get older. And as always, they'll be asking the question, what makes a killer? Before Ed Kemper turned 25, he was already responsible for at least six murders. First were his grandparents, Maude and Edmund, who he shot and killed on their farm in 1964 when he was just 15.

Then, after serving a five-year sentence at a mental health facility, Ed moved to Santa Cruz to live with his mother before getting his own apartment. When Ed killed his grandparents, he'd told the authorities he'd just wanted to see what it was like to take someone's life. While he was in the mental health facility, he learned what doctors needed to hear to deem him fit to return to society, and when his killings resumed,

they were far more gruesome than before. Between 1972 and 1973, he killed roommates Mary Ann Pesci and Anita Lucchessa, who were both 18 years old, followed by 15-year-old Aiko-ku, and finally, 19-year-old Cynthia Scholl. Ed brought his victims' remains home, where he dismembered and decapitated them. Then he sexually assaulted them.

Sometimes he took Polaroid photos as he carried out his gory post-mortem ritual, and he always disposed of remains in the Santa Cruz Mountains or in Big Sur. However, even though some of Marianne's remains had been found, and each of the victims had been reported missing, the authorities had no leads. so by January of 1973, after killing Cynthia, Ed felt invincible. He disposed of her remains in Big Sur, tossing a bag containing her dismembered body parts out of his car window as he drove down the highway in broad daylight. It was almost like he wanted to get caught.

And pretty soon, someone discovered what had become of Cynthia. The very next day, a highway patrol worker found a plastic bag with two human arms inside. They searched the surrounding area and quickly found remnants of human skin and portions of two legs. Over the next several weeks, Cynthia's torso, hand, and pelvis were discovered either washed up on shore or in a lagoon near Santa Cruz. Police determined that she'd been cut up with power tools. However, her head and right hand were still missing. That's because Ed had kept them. He buried them in the backyard of his mother's duplex, and, oh, and, oh, and, oh, and, you know, he was not.

only planned to get rid of them if the smell of decay became too hard to conceal. Ed had originally kept remains as a souvenir, a way to relive what he'd done, but now he gained a sense of satisfaction, knowing he had intel the police didn't. He'd once tried to become a police officer, and even though his application was rejected, he still idolized them, and now watching them struggle to solve the crimes made him feel powerful over them. Ed keeping Cynthia's remains at his mother's home rather than his own, could have been for a few reasons. It could have been practical or convenient due to a need for space or concealment and decay concerns, but it could also be symbolic, given how central his mother has been to him psychologically. And if that's the case, that means

she's still a central part of his offending behavior too. Many of the themes that we've discussed that are connected to their relationship include rejection, humiliation, anger, empowerlessness. So, burying remains at her home could be viewed as his way of reclaiming power in her territory. It could also just be proximity, as in wanting them close to the person that affected him the most. But another thing that I find interesting is his changing relationship to the remains themselves. They started as trophies, a way for him to relive the experience and maintain a connection to his victims. But now they seem to be giving him a vicarious role in the investigation, and maybe even if feeling of superiority over law enforcement. Now remember being a police officer, like you said,

was his dream job, and they rejected him. But now he has information that they want. The person they rejected is now the person they need. And because of this, I think his motives are expanding. His crimes seem to be rewarding him in multiple ways now, and he's enjoying the sense of mastery he's gaining from that. Do you think it's possible that he just wants to get caught? I don't think so, at least not yet anyway, because he's enjoying that secrecy and the psychological insertion he has in the investigation. It's a new sense of power, and I think he isn't wanting to jeopardize that just yet. Well, if Ed did want to get caught, he certainly wasn't in a rush. Now that the news of his murders had become widespread, his mother, Clarenell, was one of

many people who were obsessively tracking the news, and Ed took pleasure in her fear. When the media dubbed him the co-ed killer, since most of the victims were college-aged women, he reveled in the fact that Clernel had no idea the killer was her own son. And he especially loved that she was oblivious to the location of Cynthia's remains right in her own backyard. It's possible Ed knew his mother's alcoholism prevented her from seeing the truth about him. Clarenell had always struggled with alcohol abuse, and it had become even worse over time. Knowing she wasn't at her sharpest, Ed took advantage of her. Clarenell worked at UC Santa Cruz, and one day Ed got his mother to obtain a UCSC staff parking sticker for his car.

Despite the mounting fear, many local college students continued hitchhiking, and Ed thought having that bumper sticker would make it easier to gain people's trust. It seemed to work. Ed continued picking people up on a regular basis, sometimes even brought up the murders in conversation. He found it both thrilling and terrifying that everyone was talking about him and that he could be caught at any moment. However, those feelings also put him on edge. So when he and his mother got into an argument on the night of February 5, 1973,

24-year-old Ed was especially reactive. It's not clear exactly what their argument was about, but Ed was in a fury. He considered calling the police right in front of Clarenell and confessing to the crimes just to see her. reaction. But he thought twice and stormed out of the house instead. I think it's significant that the one person Ed seems most tempted to reveal himself too is his mother, but only when he's angry with her, and especially now after what we just discussed

regarding his desire for secrecy. Throughout his life, she's been described as the person whose opinions, criticisms, and judgments have mattered most to him, which is why I don't think that this is a true desire to confess, not in the sense that you. he wants to offload the burden of what he's done in answer for his crimes, but instead I think it's retaliatory or about reclaiming power. It could be his way of forcing her to confront the fact that the son she feared had become exactly what she warned others that he could become again. And not because he wants to admit that she was right all along, but maybe he wants her to experience the realization of what that would mean, because the fear that she would tap into when she would have that,

that realization would be very gratifying to Ed. You said it yourself. He's enjoying watching her obsessively follow these investigations. He's enjoying the fear of that alone. So this would very much allow him to reclaim his power over her if he did confess to her in that way. Do you think this gives you any new insight into Ed as a killer? So far, he's come across as extremely methodical.

He's obviously highly intelligent. He studied hitchhiker's behavior to learn how to attack them without getting caught. and among other things, but is he perhaps more impulsive than he initially seemed? Is it possible only his mother brings out this level of impulsivity in him? I don't know that this tells us he's becoming more impulsive. He's still very organized and very deliberate. What I think this reveals is that his mother remains to be one of the few people, if not the only person, capable of disrupting that control he has. She's the person who can provoke an emotional response strong enough to temporarily override his usual restraint. He's been quite emotionally contained in nearly every encounter, which is what I

feel, makes Ed so unsettling. He's calculated. He's patient, methodical, and he's emotionally contained, and not to be confused with emotionally healthy, but remarkably controlled in ways that many other offenders with similar backgrounds often or not. Ed had removed himself from the situation before doing something he'd regret, but he still needed a way to blow off steam. For him, well, that meant finding his next victim. So after that argument on the night of February 5th, 1973, he drove to the UC Santa Cruz campus. Around 9 p.m., he spotted 23-year-old Rosalind Thorpe sitting at the bus stop. Rosalind was a psychology student, and she'd just spent the evening at the library. She was exhausted from studying. Plus, it was pouring rain, so when Ed pulled up in

his yellow ford with the staff bumper sticker and offered her a ride, Rosalind accepted. Ed only drove a short distance with Rosalind in the car when he noticed 21-year-old Alice Liu walking in the rain. Just like Rosalind, Alice had been at the library all night, and so she also accepted Ed's offer of a ride. Once both women were in his car, he felt a surge of excitement rushed through him. He tried to keep as cool as he discreetly reached for the gun under his seat. This time, he didn't want to make his victims suffer before they died. So once he grabbed the gun, he turned and shot Rosalind once in the head. Alice screamed and Ed turned and shot her next.

Both women were dead. And here's the emotional dysregulation I was expecting to see throughout this. Only rather than showing in the moment with his mother, it appears to be spillover from that argument. We just talked about how one of the few people capable of disrupting Ed's otherwise controlled demeanor is his mother. And shortly after that argument with her, he commits a double homicide, but in a way that differs from his previous MO. How he did this suggests that he may have been seeking to release whatever anger, intention, or emotions this has brought up. Now, to be clear, his mother didn't cause him to do this. He was going to kill whether he gotten an argument with his mother or not.

But this argument may have impacted this moment more than Ed would even like to admit or acknowledge. In the past, Ed brought his victims to remote areas to kill them. So why do you think he chose such a public place this time? Was he driven to continually raise the stakes to satisfy that void of his own desire? And if so, was this his way of proving to his mom what he was capable of? Well, this is definitely an escalation. He's continued to murder, engage in post-mortem acts and get away with it. He's even successfully concealing evidence and hiding in plain sight.

That's how confidence grows. But also over time, the same acts stop producing the level of thrills that they are seeking. So serial offenders often require increased risk-taking or other sources of psychological reward to get the same effect. But the timing is also significant, which I think speaks to what we just touched on with regard to her affecting his offending behavior. Ed felt exhilarated after killing Rosalind and Alice. But then he realized he was still on campus and he was approaching a guarded, gate. He slowed down as he got closer and the two men glanced his way. Ed knew they could see the young women in the car, so he rolled down his window and said they were drunk and that he was

taking them home. The guards laughed and let him pass. As he sped off campus, Ed couldn't help but feel invincible and soon he'd unleash his fury on the person who'd tormented him all his life. On February 5, 1973, 24-year-old Ed Kemper murdered 23-year-old Rosalind Thorpe and 21-year-old Alice Liu on the UC Santa Cruz campus, following an explosive fight with his mother, Clarenell. It seemed like Ed had been triggered by his mother, and with the two victims' bodies in his trunk, he returned to Clarenell's apartment. He usually brought his victims' bodies inside, where he had privacy, but that night, he felt larger than life. Ed pulled into the driveway, got out of his car, and dragged both bodies out of the trunk. Then, right there in his mother's neighborhood, with streetlights shining down on him, Ed dismembered them.

There were no witnesses. Afterward, he brought the remains inside. Clarenell was in the living room watching TV, but she somehow didn't notice a thing, maybe because she was too drunk at the time. Ed went into his own room where he sexually assaulted the remains. There is a psychological phenomenon known to criminal profilers as flaunting invisibility. It's where an offender tries to remain invisible while taunting people, brazenly, with the fact that they can't be caught, at least according to them. There are two conflicting drives that motivate this. It's the drive to be invisible and the drive for notoriety.

That's exactly what Ed is doing here with his mother. He wants this to remain hidden and a secret, and he's gone to great to maintain that. But at the same time, he's gone undetected for so long, getting more confident by that, learning what he can about himself to be successful, and so he also wants validation. With most offenders, this phenomenon happens with law enforcement, but with Ed, it's occurring with his mother. He wants his mother to see what he feels he's actually good at, even though that's something extremely depraved. It's also his way of taunting her authority and reclaiming power on her domain, in her territory, much like burying bodies there was. Whatever drove Ed's deranged impulses, he kept his composure the next morning, when the town

awoke in a frenzy. The news of Rosalind and Alice's disappearances was everywhere. The Santa Cruz police issued an all points bulletin to all stations in the region, and students formed search parties combing through the 2,000-acre campus. Meanwhile, Ed drove 50 miles to Alameda County and tossed both women's remains into the ocean and around the hills. Ten days later, a road crew discovered some of them, but the authorities still had no evidence into who had committed the atrocity. One evening, Ed even dropped into a local cop bar to listen in on their conversations. It was his way of keeping tabs on the investigation, and to his relief, they were nowhere close to identifying the co-ed killer. Ed felt calm and untouchable.

That is, until the police showed up at his doorstep. They were there because he'd bought a 44-caliber magnum and lied that he'd never been institutionalized before. Ed started to panic, but it turned out they were just there to confiscate the gun. He knew better than to make a scene, so he complied. But he felt like the police were closing in on him, and that it was only a matter of time before they found something tying him to the Co-Ed murders. So in April of 1973, he did something on your own.

unusual. One evening, Ed bought his mother flowers. She'd gone out drinking with friends and he put the bouquet in a vase to surprise her. It's possible he wanted to do something nice for her before his life came crashing down. But hours passed and Clarenell still didn't return home. Easter was approaching and holidays had always been tough for Ed, since growing up his family life was so fractured. Now he resented his mother for having a good time and leaving him all alone. He opened a six-past. of beer and sat down on the couch, waiting. Finally, around 4 a.m., Claire Nell walked in. She went into her bedroom and Ed followed her to talk.

Immediately she told him to leave her alone. Ed did as he was told. He calmly exited the room and sat alone for an hour. Anger swelled in his chest until finally Ed stood and went into the kitchen where he grabbed a hammer and a knife. He marched back into Clarenell's bedroom and saw that she'd fallen asleep. Without hesitation, Ed violently attacked her. Once he knew she was dead, Ed decapitated his mother.

He then placed her head on a shelf in the living room and proceeded to scream at it for an hour. He even threw darts at it. Eventually, he removed the tongue and larynx and put them in the garbage disposal. As Ed stared down into the drain, he thought, thought it was fitting because all she'd ever done was yell at him. Finally, Ed returned to the bedroom and sexually assaulted her remains in various ways. All right, this is one of those moments where I do a brief check-in with everyone, because this is a deeply disturbing scene and I'm about to analyze it,

so it's perfectly okay if you need a break or you want to skip this part. But to understand what many experts have struggled to unpack about this very moment in Ed's life, we need to start from a particular place. Prior to buying her flowers, Ed had been strategically placing himself inside his own investigation. He'd been inserting himself by going to cop bars and ear hustling. He'd been picking up hitchhikers and talking about the missing women with them to understand what they knew, and overall had been following the investigation very closely. I think it's likely that he felt he had control over this. But then suddenly, unexpectedly, the police showed up at his door.

And by all accounts, he had a moment of panic, as you described. But he wasn't panicked because he was fearful or regretful. He was likely panicked because it was a threat to his control. That was a moment he did not see coming. And it certainly wasn't a moment rehearsed in his fantasies. after this he turned to his mother. Now, of all times, he decided he was going to bring her flowers. I think that's significant.

It's as if he was attempting to repair the relationship because he realized, like he had after killing his grandparents, that he was going to need her. This actually seems to fit a pattern we've repeatedly seen throughout his life, when something significant happens, whether it's a crisis, a failure, or a moment of distress, he often gravitates back to her. Despite their incredibly dysfunctional relationship, she appears to have remained his primary attachment figure. That doesn't mean he had a healthy relationship with her or even that he liked

her because he clearly did not. People can simultaneously resent, depend on, and remain emotionally attached to someone. But then he brings her flowers and she's not physically and later emotional. present to receive them. So he once again encountered rejection instead of connection. She doesn't know that police were just at his house or that he needs her in some materially important way or maternally important way. Ed hasn't developed the tools to express his emotions or ask for what he needs. So she let him down in this moment, which was another cumulative rejection in his eyes. And when we conceptualize it, we can begin to understand why this particular moment may have been so psychologically significant for him and stood out from all the rest. And I also think

it's important to remember that his mother was the one person capable of emotionally destabilizing him. He's encountered strangers, victims, and even police officers that don't seem to provoke the same degree of emotional reactivity that she does. So now, why did he engage in sexual acts with her body. And I think the answer to that is really a mix of retaliation and reclaiming total and utter control over her, dehumanizing her, throwing darts at her head in this state, in this moment. She's the humiliated one who has to fully submit to him. As you mentioned, and as we've heard, part of Ed's sexual gratification came from killing women and then sexually assaulting their corpses. Is it possible? Do you think they were always just proxies for his mother? And

could that possibly suggest he was partially motivated by a desire for maternal love? I know that Ed later claimed that he was killing his mother through these girls, that they were proxies for him. And while I do think there's some truth to that, at least later on, I don't think that explanation paints the full picture. In fact, I don't think these women or everything he did to them were always proxies for his mother. He had been fixated on killing for a long time. He started with playing with the Barbies. We saw that fantasy rehearsal there.

Then it moved on to animal cruelty. And then he killed his grandparents. He was very easily willing to kill a police officer if he happened to notice blood splattered during the routine traffic stop. None of those are proxies. Many of his violent and sexually deviant behaviors emerged long before his resentment or anger toward his mother became as severe as it did. There is also no evidence that he was exclusively targeting women because they reminded him of his mother.

He wasn't specifically seeking out women with the same characteristics as her. He was an organized offender whose victims were largely selected based on opportunity. So in other words, they were those who would accept a ride from him. So there was some degree of chance there. And his necrophilia, as we discussed, appears to fit themes of control, possession, and eliminating rejection. Some experts argue that all of that is a proxy for his mother, but that's also the underlying core of the condition. I think these are all important to highlight amendment and grievances we see throughout a story, but she doesn't fully explain his violence, his sexual pathology, or his broader criminal behavior.

Ed's true motive remains especially unclear based on what he did next. He stashed Clarenell's remains in a closet, then got into his car and drove to a nearby police hangout. There, he had a few more beers and replayed what he'd just done in his head. Afterward, he returned to his mother's apartment. He hadn't cleaned up any of the bloodstains, but he called his mother's friend, a woman named Sarah Hallett, and invited her over for dinner and a movie. Sarah happily agreed. She arrived at around 7.30 p.m.

The very same day Ed killed his mother. Ed told Sarah that Clernel was running late, and that's when Sarah mentioned how tired she was. Ed assumed it was from drinking with Clarenell the night before. That comment immediately got under Ed's skin. He didn't need a reminder of his mother's flourishing social life when he had no one. Overcome with rage, he attacked Sarah.

He put an arm around her neck and lifted her off the ground. Due to Ed's 6'9 stature, The force killed her instantly. Ed put Sarah's body in the same closet where he'd stashed Clarenell's remains. Then he poured himself a drink and eventually fell asleep on Clarenell's blood-stained bed. When Ed awoke the next morning, his entire attitude had changed. He knew there was no way he'd get away with it this time. He left behind a mountain of evidence.

He racked his brain, and soon he decided all he could do was run. First, he wrote a note for his friends on the police force, apologizing for the mess he made. Then, knowing his yellow Ford was too identifiable, he stole Sarah's car keys from her purse. He grabbed as many guns and bullets as he could, then got into her car and started driving. His first stop was in Reno, Nevada, almost 300 miles northeast of Santa Cruz. There, he ditched Sarah's car and rented a different one. afterward, he drove for 18 hours straight, covering over a thousand miles. He only stopped to buy gas, drinks, and caffeine pills.

At one point, Ed got pulled over in Colorado for speeding, but the officer let him go. When he got too tired to drive any further, he stopped in Pueblo, Colorado. At that point, he was in a daze. He didn't know where he was going or what he would do next. So he made a bold decision to call the police. In the early morning hours, Ed stumbled into a phone booth and called the Santa Cruz County Sheriff's Department. He told the officer on duty that he was the co-ed killer and that he'd not only murdered all six college women, but he'd just murdered his mother and her friend, too.

Aside from the fact that he's right, this is a hard one to escape from because he's directly tied to it, Ed has talked about why he decided to turn himself in and he said there was no purpose left to. continue killing once his mother was dead. But I don't think we should ever blindly accept what someone like Ed tells us. It's valuable information to have, but we also have to look at other data, and as a forensic psychologist, I look at patterns. And if there was truly no purpose left to continue killing after murdering his mother, that implies killing her was the reason for his offending all along. But if that's the case, why kill his grandparents first? Why kill six coeds first? Why invite Sarah over after killing his mother, only to kill her too.

Why initially tried to flee afterward? So I personally don't fully buy that explanation. I think there's some truth to it. I think Ed believes it, but I don't think it's the entire story. Here's what I think may be more likely. Throughout his entire life, despite their incredibly dysfunctional relationship, like we highlighted, he repeatedly turned to his mother during periods of distress. He simultaneously resented her,

depended on her and remained emotionally attached to her, even if that's not what he wanted. When he killed his grandparents, he called her. When he experienced setbacks and rejection, he often turned to her. Even his offending behavior eventually became mixed with her environment because he increasingly incorporated her home into his crimes. And the home he used to store, bury, and dismember bodies is now no longer accessible too. Now he's on the run, and for the first time, she's truly gone. The dependency is gone. The conflict is gone, but so is the attachment. The person he repeatedly turned toward, regardless of how unhealthy that relationship was, no longer exists. I don't think he fully grasped what would happen or what would change in the aftermath of

killing her. The only other times that Ed had to function without his mother, he had another structure to lean on. First it was his grandparents. Then it was a Tascadero. He always seen. He always seem to have somewhere to go, someone to turn to, or some larger system organizing his life for him. So I think this is more likely the reason he chose to call the police in this moment. But I don't think someone like Ed would ever admit that because that would mean admitting feelings of defeat, shame, or humiliation. And we know how strongly he feels about those. Well, despite Ed's willingness to confess, finally, the officer on the line didn't believe him. He assumed it was a prank call. Ed tried to convince him, but it didn't work.

So instead, he'd have to show them the truth of his horrific crimes. In the spring of 1973, 24-year-old Ed Kemper went on the run after murdering his mother, Clarnel, and her friend Sarah Hallett. However, while on his journey, Ed ran out of steam. He eventually called the Santa Cruz police to turn himself in. At the time, the officer on the line didn't believe him. But Ed was adamant. He called back the next morning. This time he told police to go to his mother's apartment. Detective Mickey Aloufi decided to check it out. Aloufi was the same officer who'd confiscated Ed's 44 caliber magnum months earlier. He never considered Ed might be the co-ed killer, but when he entered the home, he realized

how wrong he'd been. As soon as Aloufi stepped inside, he was hit with the unmistakable smell of decay. Then he saw blood and hair on almost every surface, including on the Easter flowers that Ed had bought for Clarenell. Aloufi immediately called for backup, as well as the coroner. When the team arrived and searched the apartment, they found the mattress was completely soaked through with blood, and the bloodied hammer and knife were left sitting out in the open. The officers were extremely disturbed. Then they noticed a closet where the over the old was particularly strong. They cautiously opened the door and were met with Claire Nell's decapitated remains and Sarah's corpse. Police were utterly shocked and that feeling only

intensified when they entered the living room and found Claire Nell's head still with darts attached to it. Finally, they found pieces of her throat in the kitchen sink. Amidst all the violence, the officers also discovered the note Ed had left behind for them. All the wide Ed was still standing in a phone booth in Colorado waiting on the line. And soon, he spotted a local police officer approaching with his gun drawn. In that moment, Ed was overcome with relief. Ed's relief here is likely because he no longer has the burden of maintaining a double life. Even Ed later described feeling emotionally exhausted and near collapse by the end.

I also can't help but notice yet another pattern. here. I mentioned this before, but this is very similar to what happened after he killed his grandparents. He called his mother for help. She called the police and told him to wait for them and he did. Why? Because he had nowhere else to go and the one person he repeatedly turned to during periods of distress gave him that direction. So it's possible he was also defaulting to a familiar behavioral script from the past because the circumstances felt familiar. And perhaps just as importantly for someone as intelligent and image conscious as Ed, turning himself in also allowed him to regain control and the ability to tell his own story before someone else told it for him. Do you think it's possible that Ed knew

how evil he was and that he just needed to be stopped? And if so, how could he have gotten there from where he was as a psychiatric patient back in the days when he was manipulating his doctors? Yes, I think it's possible. My theory is that he wants to believe that the problem starts and ends with his mother, but the reality is he has pathology of his own that was independent of her, and that pathology remains even in her death. And I think even he recognizes that he is not able to control it. The irony is he wants to be someone who is in complete control of others and himself, but when you have urges, compulsions, or pathology that controls you, and you realize you're not even in control of yourself, a controlling person like Ed will want to

control that by framing it in a way they can live with. And blaming it all in his mother is an easy way to do that. But deep down, I think he's well aware and has been for quite a long time. He has more insight than most. He spent years observing himself and understanding himself through the eyes of everyone around him, even the psychiatric hospital. He knew what he was. He just didn't fully understand what made him that way. It seemed like Ed had just given up on his life of crime. He cooperated as the officer handcuffed him. Minutes later, backup arrived. They searched his car. Inside, they found a shotgun, a rifle with a sniper scope, and an automatic rifle, along with several knives, swords, and a mountain of ammunition. They also found a leather

jacket covered in blood. From there, Ed was transported back to Santa Cruz, where the evidence against him continued to mount. In addition to everything they found inside Claire Nell's home, authorities found even more damning clues inside Ed's yellow Ford, which was still parked in his mother's driveway. Officers carefully searched every inch of the car. Under the back seat, they found blood and several long hairs, clearly belonging to multiple women. Some of the bloodstains could be seen easily, while others only showed up when the police sprayed special chemicals and used ultraviolet lights. They also found a bullet clip and a single used bullet stuck inside one of the door panels. When they opened the trunk, they found even more evidence, including strands of hair caught in the trunk latch.

Apparently, Ed wasn't as thorough as he'd believed. They also found a shovel, water bottles, a raincoat, a dishpan, and a knife with dried blood on it. When it was time for Santa Cruz detectives to interrogate Ed, they had a plethora of questions to get through, and Ed answered each one truthfully. To him, there was power in conversation. causing them shock. Each time he described one of his horrendous crimes, their looks of utter disbelief made him feel accomplished. Ed's power trip continued when police surprisingly let him speak to the press shortly after his initial interview. During that press talk, Ed revealed something for the first

time. He said his obsession with decapitating victims stemmed from a belief that a person's head was the most important part of their body. Apparently when he was a child, someone told him that a person doesn't truly die unless their head is removed. Then, Ed cruelly joked that a woman's body still had uses even without her head. Once this press interview wrapped, Ed continued divulging information. He told investigators exactly where to find each victim's remains, including Cynthia Shoal's head buried in his mother's backyard. Ed explained that he'd only disposed of remains because the decay became too obvious. Otherwise, he would have kept all of them.

Ultimately, the authorities managed to uncover at least some of the remains of each victim, and Ed was charged with eight counts of first-degree murder. On April 30, 1973, he pleaded not guilty due to insanity. If you think about it, Ed has demonstrated a desire to be seen and understood for a long time, not just by others, but even by him. We've seen him gather feedback from hitchhikers, insert himself into police culture, and bring up the

murders and conversations before he was ever caught. I also think his relationship with secrecy changed because before his arrest, secrecy protected him. It allowed him to continue offending and avoid being detected. But once he was in custody, that didn't have the same benefits. Sharing details gave him attention. Intellectual stimulation and an opportunity to change the narrative surrounding who he was and why he did what he did. And this is why I think he's now wanting to speak and talk and be open about it. Many officers who knew Ed seemed shocked at what he was capable of, and his doctors felt the same. After the trial started in October 1973, some of Ed's doctors testified that he'd always seemed normal and well-adjusted. But for the prosecutor on the case,

that wasn't good enough. The prosecutor spoke out angrily against the psychiatrist who'd recently agreed to keep Ed's records sealed and blamed Ed's doctors from his first sentencing for releasing him back into the public. It seems like the heated debate about Ed's mental health started to get to him because even though he'd previously been willing to share details, he soon showed signs of severe depression. And then in November 1973, he attempted suicide in his jail cell. Prison guards stepped in and Ed lived. Let's talk about his depression and suicide attempts, especially because they seem to surprise his doctors as well. There are two likely scenarios here. Let's talk about the first. Up until this point, Ed had been

actually relatively emotionally contained. And again, to clarify that, I don't mean emotionally healthy. I mean he was able to regulate himself, walk away from triggers, remain patient, control his urges while he learned about himself. I mean, he took, what, a thousand hitchhikers without acting on those, and he was able to contain much of his anger toward his mother for years. And according to Ed, the person most central to his offending and the purpose for his killing was his mother, and now she's gone. So there is a loss of identity, and maybe the first time in his life he was forced to confront a lack of purpose. Everything that gave him meaning, purpose, or anchor was now gone, and his future had been decided for him. And that can be

psychologically disabling, especially for someone like Ed who needed control and predictability. Now for number two, because at the same time, the timing of this is something that forensic psychologists like myself pay attention to. With no prior history of depression or suicide attempts, and he's presently undergoing a trial regarding insanity that requires a very high burden of proof, it raises the question and the possibility of malingering. Ed knows what to say to doctors. to quote fake good, as we say, meaning he knows how to present as healthy and rehabilitated. So who's to say he doesn't know how to feign severe mental illness and distress? It would not be the first time that an incarcerated individual attempted suicide without true intent,

but rather for performative reasons or secondary gain. So if I was evaluating him, I would absolutely be evaluating malingering as well, though today's common malingering assessments in forensic practice were not developed until well after this time. In general, what do you make of the range of emotions that experienced from the time he committed his final co-ed killings to his time in prison pretrial? Is there any indication that his emotions might be influenced by altering perceptions of reality? Do you think he was struggling in that moment to cope with the reality of what he'd done? No, I actually don't see that at all. I was surprised by his diagnosis of schizophrenia when he went into Atascadero, and I know they

ended up also questioning that, but I was also able to understand why it was given to him at that age and at the era at the time. But Ed has always appeared remarkably grounded in reality throughout much of his offending. He knew what he was doing. He understood the consequences, and he spent years deliberately concealing his behavior. I think a lot of people assume that he had to have been psychotic because some of his crimes look very similar to Ed Gein's. Gein also had a strained relationship with his mother. He also engaged in dismemberment, decapitation, and necrophilia. But that's actually an important reminder that similar behaviors do not always reflect the same psychology. Gein was socially isolated, dependent, and exhibited severe mental

illness. He started living in a fantasy after his mother's death and struggled to distinguish that from reality. Ed Kemper is vastly different. He's not confused about what he's doing. He's organized, deliberate, and highly aware of the consequences of his actions. He wasn't delusional or trying to escape reality. He was concealing reality to avoid being detected. And then on top of that, he actively tested people to see how well it was working. That is someone who is rational and sophisticated. We may never fully understand Ed Kemper's view of reality, but later in November of 1973, a jury of his peers felt they'd come to understand the reality of his crimes. They deemed Ed was legally sane and guilty of all eight murders. In response, the judge said

he was relieved they'd come to this conclusion, and Ed seemed to agree with his guilty verdict. He told the judge he deserved to be tortured to death. just like so many of his victims had been. However, Ed wasn't even facing the death penalty because it had been suspended in California one year earlier. Instead, Ed received eight concurrent life sentences. However, despite the jury's opinion that Ed was legally sane, the judge ordered him to serve his time at a state prison

called the California mental facility in Vacaville. He remains there as of this recording. And over the decades, he's continued to participate in psychiatric, interviews with researchers who want to understand the mind of a killer. Notably, in 1978, Ed Kemper became the main interview subject for the FBI's newly formed prison interview project for the Behavioral Science Unit. Special agents John Douglas and Robert Ressler spent countless hours analyzing him for their criminal personality research project, which helped categorize killers. Despite being behind bars, Ed was still an open book.

shocking candor about his crimes helped them develop behavioral profiling of serial killers, and he became the blueprint for the organized killer classification. His interviews laid the groundwork for the FBI's Violent Criminal Apprehension Program in 1985, which allowed investigators to identify and capture serial killers much faster. Ed has spent over half of his life in prison. He was first eligible for parole in 1979, but was denied that year, and for several, years to follow, he also waived his right for a hearing for many years, claiming he deserved to stay behind bars. He was denied again in 2024 and won't be eligible until 2031. Now at age 77, he uses a wheelchair and suffers from coronary heart disease. And in his old age,

the notoriously depraved killer has been unable to hide his true nature. In April 24, or a psychiatrist found he was at a high risk of re-offending. He's been diagnosed with antisocial personality disorder, narcissistic personality disorder, and schizotypal personality disorder. Hopefully everything researchers have learned about Ed will prevent others from suffering the same fate his victims did. Thanks so much for listening.

Come back next time for a deep dive into the mind of another murderer. But first, check out this extended conversation between Dr. Angles and Andrea Gunning, host of the Betrayal Weekly podcast. Andrea, I'm so excited to talk about this case with you, especially since you worked on the documentary Kemper on Kemper. So can you talk to me about that experience? Yeah, so the idea of Kemper on Kemper was to unpack his crimes through using his own interviews, his own voice, right? There's a lot of documented archival of Ed Kemper sitting with him. law enforcement and really talking about what motivated him and what the crimes were like. And so

we wanted to explore that story through that archival and really get an understanding of what happened through his own perspective and his own motivations. And so that's what the documentary is about. And what law enforcement officials did you reference in your documentary with him? We interviewed John Douglas. Oh, wow. Get out. What was that experience like? Did you meet him personally? I didn't meet him personally. At the time I was executive in charge of production. So I was overseeing all of production management, all the boring things in TV, which is the money and the schedule and the budget and all. You know, this was right after Mine Hunter came out. Okay. And I remember watching that and we were developing this for oxygen and the idea of meeting with John Douglas, who I just

saw, by the way, at CrimeCon. And I just was so starstruck. Uh-huh. But, remembering it was such a huge get because he was so, him and Robert Ressler were really at the forefront of, they were just trailblazers for their time. And it was just a huge get. And I remember being really excited that we landed him for the show. Can you tell our listeners a little bit about John Douglas and what he did and why he was a trailblazer just for those listening who don't know or aren't familiar with him? Yes. And I could be having a moment. I believe, like I forget what his formal title is, but he's a criminal. psychologist. But they, Robert Ressler and John Douglas, and this is my understanding, they really created the behavioral science unit of the FBI. And they were like the beginning stages of really unpacking what motivated serial killers and really understanding, really spearheaded the behavioral science unit of the FBI and really trying to understand from a psychological perspective what motivates killers, specifically serial killers, in order to prevent and find, perpetrators that are currently offending. And so they really broke the mold of really understanding

the science. Yeah, he was a FBI criminal profiler and I believe that he became the chief of the behavioral science unit as well. Yeah. Which is amazing. You've covered a lot of firsthand accounts on your show from people who have experienced some very awful things in their life, much like we have. I would love to hear what it's like covering their cases and how it compares to covering a notorious true crime figure like Ed Kemper. When I talk about betrayal and deception, you know, oftentimes we hear from people, what about red flags? What, you know, did, you know, the storytellers that we work with? Didn't they see a red flag? Wasn't there something that they had to have known that something was going on?

And at betrayal, we don't really believe in red flags. I believe people are very good at wearing the mask that they want you to see. Yeah. And so until that mask falls, given like an inciting incident or something happens and you truly see someone for who they really are, I think people are very good and capable at lying and wearing a mask. Like the mask of sanity, we talk about a lot on our show. Right. And I think there's a lot of parallels. between that idea and Ed Kemper.

For example, he used the ability to appear as a college student to ingratiate himself in that community and disarm women and hitchhikers as a way of looking like anybody else. And, you know, as a bar patron, just your average guy grabbing a beer, just, you know, old Ed or I forget what they called him. Yeah. Being able to overhear what police officers were saying about the case and the killings, you know, they just saw him as this regular guy. Yeah, he went above and beyond, too.

He did a lot of research. Like, he did over a thousand hitchhike rides, just asking questions from women about his appearance and what they thought of him and if he was intimidating and what would make him less intimidating just to learn how to blend in better. We don't really cover a lot of homicide. We don't cover murder on our show. We do a lot of different types of crimes. But I would say that for our perpetrators, and similar to Ed Kemper, is that they're very good at putting on a mask and putting on appearances and blending in and allowing people to see what they want them to see. Dr. Engels, now, I have a question for you. Sure. I'm fascinated by your work in forensic psychology, especially as it relates to analyzing serial kids. like Ed Kemper. Can you talk about the process of working with violent offenders? Yeah, absolutely. I'll start with what it's not like, because I think that's probably the most

common questions, the most common questions I get tend to have me explaining what it's not like first. And we aren't as forensic psychologists generally profiling serial killers to help catch them, not the way TV and movies like to portray. And that's what the FBI typically does. And generally, to do that, you have to be an FBI agent working with the behavioral analysis unit, and that's a very competitive role. And thankfully, though, over the last several decades, the FBI's behavioral analysis unit has collaborated with outside experts, including researchers and forensic psychologists, to better understand violent offenders and advanced behavioral analysis. And that openness was due in part by people like John Douglas. And I appreciate that, because,

Speaking from my own experience, as a forensic psychologist who has worked alongside law enforcement in different capacities, that degree of openness is not always the norm. More often than not, there are roadblocks and there's differences in perspectives between our disciplines. But now as to what it's like working with violent offenders, including serial killers, because I have worked or had to evaluate them, I have worked in so many different settings. I've worked with juveniles and adults. I've worked in prisons, jails, probation and parole. I've worked with veterans on parole. I've done treatment and I've done forensic evaluations. I've been a provider and an evaluator, like I said, to serial killers as well. Each experience is different, but the one thing that I can say that is

uniform is that it's truly, it's never dull. You're always learning. You're always challenged. And if you were to picture what it would be like to sit in front of a serial killer or a violent offender, and do this work, I promise you, it's likely not at all what you pictured. There is rarely a single explanation for violent behavior and everything you think you knew, you really didn't. You are going to learn something from every single person you meet and every single person you evaluate. In every episode that I do here, I'm expanding that understanding as well. And that's something I love the most about this work. I also think that people overestimate the role of mental illness, and a lot of offending behavior

because the majority of people with mental illness are not violent. And many violent offenders do not have severe mental illness. And that severe mental illnesses don't explain their behavior. So sometimes what you're seeing is just longstanding personality pathology, entitlement, poor impulse control, antisocial traits, substance abuse, or even just a history of aggressive behavior that's been reinforced

because criminality can run in families. And professionally, the most important skill is being objective because you're going to be sitting in front of people who have done some really egregious crimes. You're going to be sitting in front of people that you may think were wrongly accused or unjustly sentenced even. And your job in that room is clear. Outside of that room, after you've submitted your work, you can be shocked during everything else. But you cannot let those two lean into one another. So compartmentalization for us is important but in healthy ways. I actually did have a question about just your opinion on the case of Kemper.

Of Kemper. Sure. And it's similar to Dahmer, right? We covered this when we did the Dommer on Dahmer and we used his interview actually with my boss, Nancy Glass. A lot of what he focused on was about his mother and his upbringing and how his mother was, you know, cold. and distant and never held him as a child. And then you have Ed Kemper who had an abusive mother. Ultimately, towards the end of Kemper's killing spree, he feels like, you know, these people are dying innocently. This is really about me and my mom. And in order for this to end, I need to kill her.

He makes that decision and he's very clear about that. Do you believe that the majority of everything that was involved in this case directly comes back to his relationship with his mother, or is it other comorbidities or however you call it in your field, like you were just speaking earlier? I believe, because that's a great question. We actually talked about, I don't know, we talked about that in episode two in great detail because you're right. He did later say that at the end, you know, all of this led to her. I killed her and then I'm done.

my purpose for killing is over is what he said. And so that's when he called the police and he turned himself in and that was the end. But I don't believe that all of the women were proxies for mom. I don't believe his killing was just because of his mother and his resentment towards her. I do believe there was a lot of resentment. I do believe there was a lot of abuse. I do believe all of that had been cumulative over the years. I do believe all of that existed.

But I do believe it was comorbid with a lot of psychopathic traits, a lot of preexisting tendencies that were really converging together. And the reason I believe that is I think he wanted to believe that all of this was externalized blame on his mom because it's easier for him to sit with. Right. And part of the reason I want to say that is because if it was really just I'm killing because of my mom, then why did you almost kill the police officer? when he almost caught you. Or why call your mom's best friend after killing her and then kill her too? Or why try to evade the police? And then when you realize, I can't escape, I'm going to call the police on myself.

Why kill your grandparents? All of those are all preexisting, violent tendencies, psychopathic traits that were already there, regardless of mom as well. I think all of these converge together. So I think there's a part of him that wants to externalize all of the blame on her. I think he's a very intelligent individual. We already know that. He was tested. We know he has a high IQ. We saw that he's a very analytical individual. He did a lot of research. He could fool Tascadero staff. He could he did research with hikers. He wanted to understand himself. And he

did understand himself. And I think he even knew that if he didn't turn himself and he was just going to continue doing this and then he couldn't just blame it on his mom. He had to accept that this is who. he is as well. I think he had some awareness of that. He just didn't want to accept that awareness. And maybe he has accepted it at this point. I'm not sure. But I don't think he has fully admitted that either or accepted that either. I don't know if he's said that or explained that or spoken about that since then. But no, I don't. I don't think this is all just mom. I think this is when it comes to things like this, it's usually a convergence of different variables and different factors. It's never just one singular causal thing. But I, yeah, I think his mom is

as an externalization of blame, honestly. It's so fascinating. Yeah. It really is. Well, Andrea, we could be here all day and I would love to have you again. But thank you so much for joining Vanessa and me. And for anyone who hasn't checked out Betrayal Weekly yet, make sure to search and follow on your favorite podcast platform. Thanks for having me. I really enjoyed covering this case with you guys. We'd love to have you on again, so come back anytime. And thanks to all of you for listening, serial killers and murderous minds is a crimehouse original powered by Pave Studios.

Here at Crime House, we want to thank each and every one of you for your support. If you like what you heard today, reach out on Instagram at Crimehouse. Don't forget to rate, review, and follow serial killers and murderous minds wherever you get your podcasts. your feedback truly makes a difference. And to enhance your listening experience, join Crimehouse Plus and get both parts of every story dropped on the same Monday completely ad-free. No waiting three days for part two

plus Crimehouse bonus episodes every month. To join, go to crimehouseplus.com or if you listen on Apple Podcasts, tap try free at the top of the Serial Killers and Murderous Minds page. Serial Killers and Murderous Minds is host by me Vanessa Richardson and forensic psychologist Dr. Tristan Engels and is a crimehouse original powered by Pave Studios. This episode was brought to life by the serial killers and murderous minds team. Max Cutler, Ron Shapiro, Alex Benadon, Lori Marinelli, Natalie Pritzowski, Alyssa Fox,

Sarah Batchelor, Sarah Tardiff, and Carrie Murphy. Thank you for listening. Hi listeners, it's Vanessa. Before today's episode, I want to tell you about about another show I think you'll love. Crime House and A&E are teaming up on the podcast version of the famous true crime series, The First 48. Each week, Carter Roy takes you inside a landmark homicide case,

the interrogations, the dead ends, and the breakthroughs in the critical first 48 hours. Listen to and follow the first 48 every Thursday on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or wherever you listen to podcasts.