Whoever Fights Monsters

My Twenty Years Tracking Serial Killers for the FBI

Face-to-face with some of America's most terrifying killers, FBI veteran and ex-Army CID colonel Robert Ressler learned from them how to identify the unknown monsters who walk among us - and put them behind bars. Now the man who coined the phrase "serial killer" and advised Thomas Harris on The Silence of the Lambs shows how he has tracked down some of the nation's most brutal murderers.

Just as it happened in The Silence of the Lambs, Ressler uses the evidence at a crime scene to put together a psychological profile of the killers. From the victims they choose, to the way they kill, to the often grotesque souvenirs they take with them, Ressler unlocks the identities of these vicious killers for the police to capture.

Join Ressler as he takes you on the hunt for America's most dangerous psychopaths. It is a terrifying journey you will not forget.

©1992 Robert K. Ressler and Tom Shachtman (P)2016 Tantor

Excellent book !

Many, many insights ! Not a dull moment. new respect for the behavioral unit at the FBI.

Saddening and Fascinating

In this book you will hear a lot of disturbing things and a lot of sad cases. But the story is wealth old with lots of fascinating facts and information that transcend this dismal subject. If you have the stomach for it it’s an excellent use of a dozen hours.

give me more!

Great book, disappointed when finished. Will be looking for more that is informational but also gripping!

Great Information

A lot of great information. As a clinician this was a information that most do not want to speak of.

Monsters Among Us

An intriguing history of the study of serial killers by the man who is ultimately the godfather of this line of work. The author is he now retired army and FBI member who became interested in investigative and psychological profiling before it was a “thing“.

I thought the reader of the book did a good job in relating information and had a fairly straightforward delivery including capturing what I assume to be the deadpan humor of a person who works on some very gruesome cases. But the humor more often has to do with FBI bureaucracy and how law-enforcement as well as the military do their jobs or can’t do their jobs based on hierarchy and the general pettiness that seems to plague all areas of human existence. It would be interesting to know how many cases could’ve been solved sooner or are unsolved because law-enforcement agencies or military branches refuse to cooperate with one another or more worried about somebody else getting credit for solving the case then getting the case solved and helping somebody.

The book does go into some very gruesome detail about the crimes committed by the various people in question. So the descriptions are not for the squeamish particularly for me. But I believe it’s a necessary part of the book to get a better understanding of what the author is dealing with and why it’s so important to study all aspects of these killers not just investigating a crime to investigate the crime.

The author doesn’t several occasions lobby for the Life in prison over the death penalty. Mainly because he believes that the people who work killing in such ways are more valuable to study on a long-term ongoing basis and he also makes an economic argument as to why this is important. I have not thought that life in prison would be less expensive than an execution. But he makes the case that that is not correct. So that has me interested in learning more about the “economics“ of the situation.

Another thing I’m interested in knowing what his take is on the Michigan State pedophile cases as the author is a Michigan State grad and apparently has done work with the University teaching classes and things like that. Assuming that the author is still alive I’m wondering what his involvement was to catch these people and keep them from harming others since both people currently embroiled in this case were involved with the University for 20 years or more.

All in all an interesting book and a good reminder that not everything is always as it seems. And for adults and children alike to let people know where they’re going and when they expect to be back so in case they don’t return it’s easier to begin pinpointing why they were gone what may have happened etc. etc. Many of the people who were abducted or attacked were often in hitchhiking or out by themselves in places that were unfamiliar and away from others who could potential he help them out of a dangerous situation. It does seem like there’s a lot of credence to knowing your surroundings and if something were to happen how you would react.