Jeffrey Dahmer
Serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer murdered 17 boys and men from 1978 to 1991, all but one of them in Milwaukee, Wis. Dietz was hired by the prosecution to evaluate Dahmer’s claim that he was “guilty but insane.” Dietz interviewed him for 18 hours, with the psychiatrist describing Dahmer as, “articulate, rational and motivated to speak the truth.” During his two days of testimony, Dietz explained to the jury that Dahmer was not insane or driven to commit murder but, instead, had sexual disorders and exhibited sexually deviant behavior with his victims, but purposely drank himself to the point of intoxication when he killed. Dahmer, he said, also kept the skulls of 11 of his victims: far from being insane, Dietz said Dahmer, calmly and rationally, knew that keeping, "some of his favorite items, these keepsakes (meant taking a very big risk of being detected for all these serious crimes."
Dietz was impressed at how Dahmer remembered intricate details of each murder. The two men watched some of Dahmer’s cinematic favorites including Star Wars: Return of the Jedi, Exorcist III plus gay pornography.
Dahmer also gave Dietz plans for a temple he wanted to build for most of the 11 victims’ skulls that he kept, with plans to paint them. “Mr. Dahmer drew for me a diagram of what he had in mind—planned for the temple,” Dietz told the jury. “And that diagram of the temple shows 10 skulls on a table, with incense burning on both ends, and two whole skeletons on either end of the black table…and a special globe lamp to impart an eerie sense of lighting. And he wanted a black leather chair so that he could sit in the leather chair and admire his collection. If he did this, and had it set up this way, he…could somehow get touch with some spiritual force or power.”
Both the Star Wars and Exorcist films had evil characters that inspired the temple, specifically the emperor in Return of the Jedi and the devil in Exorcist III. “He identified with the characters,” Dietz told the jury, “because he felt that he was thoroughly evil and corrupt.”
At the conclusion of his 1992 trial, Dahmer was convicted of the 15 Wisconsin murders to which he had confessed, and received 15 life sentences.
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