Apartment 213 & Jeffrey Dahmer Mugshot |
Early Life
Jeffrey Dahmer was born in West Allis, Wisconsin
to Joyce Annette and Lionel Herbert Dahmer.
Lionel, Jeffrey’s father was an analytical chemist.
Jeffrey was reported to be a normal young boy, who had no
real tendencies toward violence until he’s brother was born when Jeffrey was
seven years old.
At the age of eight Jeffrey moved with his parents to Bath, Ohio.
Between the ages of eight and fifteen years old Jeffery
became more and more withdrawn from society and showed little interest in things
that a normal boy his age would seem interested in.
Jeffrey would ride around his neighborhood looking for dead
animals to dissect.
Jeffrey began drinking alcohol in his early teens and was an
alcoholic by the time he graduated high school.
Jeffrey attended The Ohio state university, but dropped out
after missing the majority of his classes.
After dropping out of university Jeffrey’s father forced
Jeffrey to enlist in the army.
After 2 years in the army Jeffrey was discharged due to
alcoholism, Jeffrey then moved to Miami
Beach, Florida.
Early suspicious behavior
In 1982, Jeffrey moved in with his grand mother in West Allis, Wisconsin.
Jeffrey’s grandmother noticed very strange behavior from
Jeffrey which included, dressing up a mannequin he stole from a clothing store,
hiding a .356 Magnum under his pillow and spending allot of time in the
basement.
In 1988 Jeffrey’s grandmother asked him to move out due to
the terrible stench that always seem to come from the basement whenever Jeffrey
spent time in there.
Jeffrey then moved to Milwaukee’s
Westside where he also worked at the Ambrosia Chocolate Factory.
The Ambrosia Chocolate Factory Site |
Earlier Crimes
While in Miami
Beach, Florida in
1981, Jeffrey was arrested for drunk and disorderly conduct.
While living with his Grandmother in West Allis, Wisconsin
he was arrested twice for indecent exposure, once in 1982 and again in 1986.
He’s second indecent exposure arrest was for masturbating in
front of two teenage boys.
First Murder
Jeffrey Dahmer committed his first murder in the summer of 1978,
at the age of 18. His father was away on business and his mother had moved out,
taking his brother with her. In middle June Jeffrey picked up a hitchhiker
named Stephen Hicks and proposed a social at his father's house, Jeffrey
actually wanted to get Stephen drunk and have sex with him. When Stephen
started to get uncomfortable and tried to leave, Jeffrey Struck Stephen in the
back of the head with a 10 lb. exercise weight (dumbbell). Jeffrey then buried
the body in the backyard. Jeffrey said he killed Stephen because he did not
want him to leave.
Murder Spree
Only 9Years after Jeffrey killed Stephen Hicks, did Jeffrey
commit another murder.
Late 1987 around September, Jeffrey met Steven Tuomi at a
gay bar and murdered him but Jeffrey later claimed that he could not remember
killing Steven.
After the murder of Steven, Jeffrey committed 2 more murders
in the year of 1988 and another late in 1989.
Jeffrey would go to gay bars and take his victims home have
sex with them and then murder them.
Early in May 1990 Jeffrey moved to the now infamous Apartment
213, 924 North 25th Street, Milwaukee.
This was the privacy that Jeffrey needed and started to
commit murders more frequently.
Jeffrey committed 4 more murders before the end of 1990, 3
more in 1991 spanning over 4 months.
By the summer of 1991, Jeffrey was murdering approximately
one person each week. He killed Matt Turner on June 30, Jeremiah Weinberger on
July 5, Oliver Lacy on July 12, and finally Joseph Brandehoft on July 19.
Inside Apartment 213 |
Zombie Lovers
Jeffrey got the idea that he could turn his victims into
"zombies" completely submissive, eternally youthful sexual partners, and
attempted to do so by drilling holes into their skulls and injecting hydrochloric
acid or boiling water into the frontal lobe area of their brains with a large
syringe, usually while the victim was still alive. Other residents of the
Oxford Apartments complex noticed terrible smells coming from Apartment 213, as
well as the thumps of falling objects and the occasional buzzing of a power saw.
Konerak Sinthasomphone
In the early morning hours of May 27, 1991, 14-year-old
Konerak Sinthasomphone was discovered on the street, wandering naked, heavily
under the influence of drugs and bleeding from his rectum. Two young women from
the neighborhood found the dazed boy and called 911. Jeffrey chased his victim
down and tried to take him away, but the women stopped him. Jeffrey told John Balcerzak and
Joseph Gabrish, police officers dispatched to the scene, that Konerak was his
19-year-old boyfriend, and that they had an argument while drinking. Against
the protests of the two women who had called 911, who recognized him from the
neighborhood and insisted that he was a child and couldn't speak English, the
officers turned him over to Jeffrey. They later reported smelling a strange
scent while inside Jeffrey's apartment, but did not investigate it. The smell
was the body of Tony Hughes, Jeffrey's previous victim, decomposing in the
bedroom. The officers did not make any attempt to verify Konerak's age or
identity, nor locate someone who could communicate with him, and failed to run
a background check that would have revealed Jeffrey being a convicted child
molester still under probation. Later
that night, Jeffrey killed and dismembered Konerak, keeping his skull as a
souvenir.
Konerak Sinthasomphone |
Arrest and Trail
On July 22, 1991, Jeffrey lured another man, Tracy, into
his home. According to the would-be victim, Jeffrey struggled with Tracy in
order to handcuff him, but ultimately failed to cuff his wrists together.
Wielding a large butcher knife, Jeffrey forced Tracy into the bedroom, where Tracy
saw pictures of mangled bodies on the wall and noticed the terrible smell
coming from a large blue barrel. Tracy punched Jeffrey in the face, kicked him
in the stomach, ran for the door and escaped. Running through the streets with
handcuffs still hanging from one hand, Tracy waved for help to a police car
driven by Robert Rauth and Rolf Mueller of the Milwaukee police department.
Tracy led police back to Jeffrey's apartment, where Jeffrey at first acted
friendly to the officers. However, Tracy remembered that the knife Jeffrey had
threatened him with was in the bedroom. When one of the officers checked the
bedroom, he saw the photographs of mangled bodies and called for his partner to
arrest Jeffrey. As one officer subdued Jeffrey, the other opened the
refrigerator and found a human head. Further investigation of the apartment
revealed three more severed heads, multiple photographs of murdered victims and
human remains, severed hands and penises, and photographs of dismembered
victims and human remains in his refrigerator.
Jeffrey was indicted on 17 murder charges, later reduced
to 15. Jeffrey was not charged in the attempted murder of Edwards. His trial
began on January 30, 1992.With evidence overwhelmingly against him, Jeffrey
pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity. The trial lasted two weeks. The court
found Jeffrey sane and guilty on 15 counts of murder and sentenced him to 15 life
terms, totaling 957 years in prison, which was the
maximum penalty available as Wisconsin does not have capital punishment. At his sentencing hearing, Jeffrey
expressed remorse for his actions, and said that he wished for his own death.
In May of that year, Jeffrey was extradited to Ohio, where he entered a plea of
guilty for the murder of his first victim, Stephen Hicks.
Jeffrey was sent to Columbia Correctional Institution in Portage,
Wisconsin.
Tracy Edwards |
Born Again Christian
After his imprisonment, Jeffrey became a born again Christian
after reading religious documentation that his father sent him.
On a TV interview with Jeffrey he had the following to say.
“If you don't ... if a person doesn't think that there
is a God to be accountable to, then ... then what's ... what's the
point of ... of trying to modify your behavior to keep it within
acceptable ranges? That's how I thought anyway. I always believed the theory of
evolution as truth that we all just came from the slime. When we ... when
we died, you know, that was it, there is nothing, and I've since come to
believe that the Lord Jesus Christ is truly God, and I believe that I, as well
as everyone else, will be accountable to him.”
Jeffrey Dahmer while in a Interview Session |
Death
Jeffrey was attacked twice in prison, the first time in July
1994. An inmate attempted to slash Jeffrey's throat with a razor blade while Jeffrey
was returning to his cell from a church service in the prison chapel. Jeffrey
escaped the incident with superficial wounds. While doing janitorial work in
the prison gym, Jeffrey and another inmate, Jesse Anderson, were severely
beaten by fellow inmate Christopher Scarver with a broomstick handle on
November 28, 1994. Jeffrey died of severe head trauma while on his way to the
hospital in an ambulance. Anderson died two days later from his wounds.
List of Known Victims (Name, Age, Date of Death)
List of Known Victims (Name, Age, Date of Death)
Stephen Hicks | 19 | Jun 6, 1978 | |||||||||||
Steven Tuomi | 26 | Sep 15, 1987 | |||||||||||
James "Jamie" Doxtator | 14 | Jan 1988 | |||||||||||
Richard Guerrero | 25 | Mar 24, 1988 | |||||||||||
Anthony Sears | 26 | Mar 25, 1989 | |||||||||||
Eddie Smith | 36 | Jun 1990 | |||||||||||
Ricky Beeks | 27 | Jul 1990 | |||||||||||
Ernest Miller | 22 | Sep 1990 | |||||||||||
David Thomas | 23 | Sep 1990 | |||||||||||
Curtis Straughter | 19 | Feb 1991 | |||||||||||
Errol Lindsey | 19 | Apr 1991 | |||||||||||
Tony Hughes | 31 | May 24, 1991 | |||||||||||
Konerak Sinthasomphone | 14 | May 27, 1991 | |||||||||||
Matt Turner | 20 | Jun 30, 1991 | |||||||||||
Jeremiah Weinberger | 23 | Jul 5, 1991 | |||||||||||
Oliver Lacy | 23 | Jul 12, 1991 | |||||||||||
Joseph Bradehoft | 25 | Jul 19, 1991 |