John Walsh Wrong on Serial Killers and Missing Children
In "Serial Killers: The Method and Madness of Monsters" a new Penguin books history of serial homicide, author Peter Vronsky argues that John Walsh the host of America’s Most Wanted TV show, used exaggerated statistics in his statement to Congress on the issue of missing and murdered children. Children are most frequently killed not by serial killers and strangers, as Walsh claimed, but by their own parents and relatives, according to Vronsky’s just published book. "Serial Killers: The Method and Madness of Monsters."
(PRWEB) December 5, 2004 -- In "Serial Killers: The Method and Madness of
Monsters" a new history of serial murder by Peter Vronsky, the story behind the
“serial killer epidemic” of the 1980s is explored. According to the book, John
Walsh, the current host of the TV program America’s Most Wanted, used inaccurate
statistics when testifying before Congress in the 1980s. Relying on information,
perhaps traced to the then Rhode Island Senator Claiborne Pell's claims, Walsh
stated that 205 children go missing every hour: a total of 1.8 million children
a year. (See: www.petervronsky.com)
While most of the reported
missing children are later found, Walsh said, “The unbelievable and unaccounted
for figure of fifty thousand children disappear annually and are abducted for
reasons of foul play… this country is littered with mutilated, decapitated,
raped, and strangled children.” Walsh suggested that serial killers are
responsible for these abduction-murders. Walsh’s own son, Adam had just been
abducted and murdered in Florida by a stranger, who might have been notorious
serial killer Ottis Toole, Henry Lee Lucas’s partner.
But where were the
actual reports of 50,000 unsolved disappearances: nearly a thousand children a
week? According to Vronsky’s book, several studies were initiated in the wake of
Walsh’s claims. A study of 1,498 child murders in California between 1981 and
1990 determined that the predominant killers of children were not strangers and
serial killers, but the children’s own parents! Strangers murdered only 14.6
percent of children between the ages of five and nine, while relatives and
parents murdered 44.8 percent of those child victims. Another 30.2 percent were
murdered by acquaintances. Women comprised 36.4 percent of all killers of
children between the ages of five and nine.
A later study by the National
Incidence Studies of Missing, Abducted, Runaway, and Throwaway Children
(NISMART) determined that between 1976 and 1988, an average of 43 to 147
children a year were actually abducted by strangers—and not all murdered. A far
cry from the claimed 50,000 figure.
Despite this rare occurrence of
stranger abduction, the national fear triggered by the exaggerated reports of
the 1980s persists today. While stranger abductions like the tragic case of
Polly Klaas and the resolved case of Elizabeth Smart are extremely rare, Vronsky
writes, “Of course, this fact is of no consolation to the parents of the 43 to
147 children who on average every year are abducted by
strangers.”
"Serial Killers: The Method and Madness of Monsters" is a
430-page book covering the historical, cultural, psychological and investigative
aspects of serial homicide from ancient times of the Roman Empire to the most
recent cases today and includes many never before seen
illustrations.
Peter Vronsky is currently completing his doctorate in
history at the University of Toronto and is a former international investigative
documentary producer.
For more information or to contact the author: www.petervronsky.com
Serial Killers: The Method and
Madness of Monsters
Peter Vronsky
New York: Berkley Publishing Group,
2004.
432 Pages, Illustrated
ISBN: 0425196402
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Source : http://www.prweb.com/releases/2004/12/prweb185803.htm