Case Study of Jeffrey Dahmer | The Biography of The Milwaukee Monster

In this blog, we will write about Jeffrey Dahmer, his early life history, experiences, crimes, arrest and conviction. He was one of the most notorious serial killers in the crime history of the USA.

The American criminal justice system has witnessed the emergence of many notorious serial killers from the period of 1960s to 1990s. Jeffrey Dahmer was a convicted sex offender and serial murderer. He killed and sexually violated 17 young males between 1978 and 1991. He was known as The Milwaukee Cannibal or The Milwaukee Monster.

Life History Of Jeffrey Dahmer

Jeffrey Lionel Dahmer aka Jeffrey Dahmer was born on 21^st May 1960. His birthplace was Milwaukee, Wisconsin. His parents were Lionel and Joyce Dahmer. He had a dysphoric family where his mother was suffering from depression and even attempted suicide. His father was a Chemist and he hardly gave him any time. At the age of four, he was suffering from a double hernia. He underwent surgeries to cure it. This brought a change in his life. He was a happy, curious, and energetic child. After this surgery, he became a loner.

Jeffrey Dahmer enjoyed collecting dead animals from the roadsides and dissecting them during his childhood. After dissecting those animals, he destroyed their body with chemicals. He had a hut in the backyard of their house where he used to dissect animals and collect their bones. He had access to chemicals from his father’s chemistry lab.

Jeffrey’s parents got divorced when he graduated from high school. His parents had an acrimonious relationship. He has seen parental negligence from a very young age. This has affected his personality development.

Jeffrey Dahmer was an alcoholic. His alcohol consumption was out of his control. He dropped out from Ohio State University due to his alcohol addiction. Later he joined the army in 1978 and he was posted in Germany. He was discharged from the army in 1981 due to his drinking issues. He then returned to Ohio. Meanwhile, his father remarried and sent him to live with his grandmother. His father tried to send him to rehabilitation centers. But nothing could reduce his alcohol addiction.

There is a movie about his life story called My friend Dahmer. Here’s the trailer.

Crimes

In the year of 1978, Jeffrey Dahmer started to spread his reign of terror in the Ohio state of the USA. The Milwaukee Cannibal or Monster killed 17 young males in a short span of time. Jeffrey Dahmer brutally murdered his victims by strangling them. After killing them he raped the corpses.

His first victim was a hitchhiker, Steven Mark Hicks. In 1978 he killed him by strangulation then he masturbated on his corpse. In September 1987 he killed his second victim, Steven Tuomi. They were staying in a hotel together and Jeffrey made him unconscious by using drugs. Later, he dismembered his body after masturbating on the corpse at his grandmother’s basement. When he was living with his grandmother, he had a male mannequin in his room. His grandmother was very disturbed about his behaviors. In 1988, his grandmother forced him to leave her house. He targeted Anthony Sears in 1989. He was an aspiring model. He sodomized, strangled, and dismembered his body.

He used to lure men from gay bars, clubs, shopping malls, etc. He mostly targeted African-American young men. He used to drug young men in order to have sex with their unconscious bodies. He had brutally dissected and dismembered his victims’ bodies. He was a cannibal and he collected the skulls and bones of his victims. He even kept some organs or parts of victims’ bodies as a souvenir. When police raided his apartment, they got a refrigerator full of human organs, limbs, and parts. The degree of brutality he showed through his crime commission knows no bound. He even gave some of his victims’ lobotomies.

You can watch his interview here.

Arrest and Conviction

Jeffrey Dahmer faced sexual assault charges in September 1989. He pleaded guilty and was convicted with second-degree sexual assault. He argued before the court in his own defense at his trial. He was given five years probationary sentence and judges ordered that he needed treatment. He was permitted to work during the day. His reign of terror finally ended when Tracy Edward, his last victim, escaped alive in 1991. He was finally arrested by the cops. He was sentenced to 16 life imprisonment. He was murdered by a fellow inmate (Christopher Scarver) at Wisconsin State Prison in 1994.

The experts who studied him defined him as a sadistic sociopath. He was diagnosed with the anti-personality disorder. From a very young age, he became a heavy drinker. He was a necrophiliac and a pathological loner. He had a compulsive obsession with control and dominance over his victims. He always wanted a submissive company. He used to get sexually stimulated by torturing and killing his victims.

Conclusion

Dahmer’s mental illness, dysfunctional family, and lonesome have shaped his human personality. On the other hand, drinking addiction has caused damage to his mental death. Due to his sexual preferences, he was often neglected in society. Although nothing can justify his brutal crimes. Perhaps, if he would have been sent to mental health treatment at his earlier age, he could not become a serial killer.

Read other serial killers biography in the Criminology playlist.

Read Ted Bundy’s here.

Read David Berkowitz here.