Serial killers have occupied the urban mythology like wildfire. It hasn’t been very long to be precise, it was in the late 70s that this trend suddenly exploded and retains the pop culture glamour it has been accorded in the recent years, all thanks to the FBI, who led a study into the behaviour of men like these so that the maze of their mind could be illuminated. Yes, it has been mostly men( and Americans especially as far as statistics go) that entered the famous serial killer club, with the exception of Aileen Wuornos.
Maybe in our lawful, innocent minds, they perform acts conforming to the same derring-do, stupefying recklessness that was earlier linked to the fictional yet legendary outlaw Robin Hood. They become larger than life characters especially if the stature of crimes they committed is gory and they have seemingly managed to elude the penetrating glare of the official authorities. The first instance of this phenomenon was Ted Bundy. In a well tailored slim fitting suit, piercing eyed, the nasally voiced, prison escapee, good looking lawyer had the public going completely crazy over him, especially women which seems ironic considering the fact all of his victims were women. They never could believe that such a man, as the media had it at the time, was capable of such cold blooded murder. Of course, in 1989 his luck ran out on the electric chair, but a recent Netflix documentary proves the Ted Bundy star if anything still rises on the horizon, an increasing danger, to be candid. India had its own Ted Bundy in the form of Charles Sobhraj, the man who murdered tourists for perverted fun, taking full advantage of his polyglotism and charisma. The extent was such that he got books printed on him, movies made and the 21st century honour, a Netflix show again. Unlike Bundy, Sobhraj finally is a free man after serving most of his life in jail and now slides through France, in the same serpentine way he was labelled as in the press, The Serpent.
T Sappani, a notorious serial killer from the region of Tamil Nadu, has finally been apprehended and charged with a life term for the murder of 8 people. He would also steal from them to fund his liquor habit. On the tail of the law since 2016, he has finally been caught after a prolonged search. His modus operandi was of the common con man, luring people to buy gold at low prices and once they were ensnared in these times of wants and desires, he would murder them. Verdict is yet to be pronounced on three of his murders, but the imprisonment is final enough. He seems disappointingly ordinary compared to the Sobhrajesque killer, which reiterates the point made many years back, men like these walk amongst us, it is our good fortune we don’t cross paths with them.