Robert Kenneth Ressler (February 15, 1937 – May 5, 2013) was an American

FBI The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic Intelligence agency, intelligence and Security agency, security service of the United States and Federal law enforcement in the United States, its principal federal law enforcement ag ...

agent and author. He played a significant role in the

psychological profiling Offender profiling, also known as criminal profiling, is an investigative strategy used by law enforcement agencies to identify likely suspects and has been used by investigators to link cases that may have been committed by the same perpetrato ...

of violent offenders in the 1970s and is often credited with coining the term "

serial killer A serial killer (also called a serial murderer) is a person who murders three or more people,An offender can be anyone: * * * * * (This source only requires two people) with the killings taking place over a significant period of time in separat ...

", though the term is a direct translation of the German term ''Serienmörder'' coined in 1930 by Berlin investigator

Ernst Gennat Ernst August Ferdinand Gennat (1 January 1880 – 20 August 1939) was director of the Berlin criminal police. He worked under three political systems in his 30-year career as one of the most gifted and successful criminologists in the Germa ...

. After retiring from the FBI, he authored a number of books on serial murders, and often gave lectures on criminology.

Early life

Robert Ressler grew up on North Marmora Avenue in

Chicago, Illinois Chicago is the List of municipalities in Illinois, most populous city in the U.S. state of Illinois and in the Midwestern United States. With a population of 2,746,388, as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the List of Unite ...

and graduated from

Schurz High School Carl Schurz High School is a public four-year high school located in the Irving Park neighborhood on the northwest side of Chicago, Illinois, United States. The school is named after German–American Carl Schurz, a statesman, soldier, and advoc ...

, Class of 1955. He was the son of Joseph, who worked in security and maintenance at the ''

Chicago Tribune The ''Chicago Tribune'' is an American daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Founded in 1847, it was formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper", a slogan from which its once integrated WGN (AM), WGN radio and ...

'', and Gertrude Ressler. At an early age Robert became interested in killers, as he followed the ''Tribune''s articles on " The Lipstick Killer". Ressler claims that he was more fascinated than afraid of this notorious killer, as other killers fascinated him in his later years with the

. His fascination would be bolstered decades later by

John Wayne Gacy John Wayne Gacy (March 17, 1942 – May 10, 1994) was an American serial killer and sex offender who raped, tortured and murdered at least thirty-three young men and boys in Norwood Park Township, Cook County, Illinois, Norwood Park Tow ...

, who had grown up in the same neighborhood as Ressler, and was in the

Boy Scouts Boy Scouts or Boy Scout may refer to: * Members, sections or organisations in the Scouting Movement ** Scout (Scouting), a boy or a girl participating in the worldwide Scouting movement ** Scouting America, formerly known as Boy Scouts of America ...

with him. Ressler attended two years at a community college before joining the

U.S. Army The United States Army (USA) is the primary land service branch of the United States Department of Defense. It is designated as the Army of the United States in the United States Constitution.Article II, section 2, clause 1 of the United Stat ...

and was stationed in

Okinawa most commonly refers to: * Okinawa Prefecture, Japan's southernmost prefecture * Okinawa Island, the largest island of Okinawa Prefecture * Okinawa Islands, an island group including Okinawa itself * Okinawa (city), the second largest city in th ...

. After two years in the army Ressler decided to enroll in the School of Criminology and Police Administration at

Michigan State University Michigan State University (Michigan State or MSU) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in East Lansing, Michigan, United States. It was founded in 1855 as the Agricultural College of the State o ...

. He graduated with a bachelor's degree and started graduate work but only finished one semester before going back into the army as an officer, having also completed an ROTC program at Michigan State.

Military career

Ressler served in the

from 1957 to 1962 as a provost marshal of a platoon of MPs in Aschaffenburg, as he states in his autobiography ''Whoever Fights Monsters''. He was in charge of solving cases such as homicides, robberies, and arson. After four years in Germany, Ressler decided to leave the position and was reassigned as the Commander of a Criminal Investigation Division (CID) at Fort Sheridan. He then went back to Michigan State to finish his master's in police administration, paid for by the army, in exchange for two more years of service after graduation. After he received his degree, he served a year in

Thailand Thailand, officially the Kingdom of Thailand and historically known as Siam (the official name until 1939), is a country in Southeast Asia on the Mainland Southeast Asia, Indochinese Peninsula. With a population of almost 66 million, it spa ...

and a year in Fort Sheridan, where he ended his career with the army as a

major Major most commonly refers to: * Major (rank), a military rank * Academic major, an academic discipline to which an undergraduate student formally commits * People named Major, including given names, surnames, nicknames * Major and minor in musi ...

, and moved on to the

Federal Bureau of Investigation The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic Intelligence agency, intelligence and Security agency, security service of the United States and Federal law enforcement in the United States, its principal federal law enforcement ag ...

(FBI).

FBI career

Ressler joined the FBI in 1970 and was recruited into the

Behavioral Science Unit The Behavioral Science Unit (BSU) is the original name of a unit within the Federal Bureau of Investigation's (FBI) Training Division at Quantico, Virginia, formed in response to the rise of sexual assault and homicide in the 1970s. The unit was ...

, which deals with drawing up psychological profiles of violent offenders, such as rapists and serial killers, who select victims at random. Between 1976 and 1979, Ressler and criminal profiler coordinator of the Behavioral Science Unit John Douglas together organized the interviews of thirty-six incarcerated serial killers in order to find parallels between such criminals' backgrounds and motives. In addition, Ressler and retired Detective Pierce Brooks of the LAPD were instrumental in setting up

Vi-CAP The Violent Criminal Apprehension Program (ViCAP) is a unit of the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation responsible for the analysis of serial violent and sexual crimes, based in the Critical Incident Response Group's (CIRG) National Ce ...

(Violent Criminal Apprehension Program). This consists of a centralized

computer database In computing, a database is an organized collection of data or a type of data store based on the use of a database management system (DBMS), the software that interacts with end users, applications, and the database itself to capture and analy ...

of information on unsolved homicides. Information is gathered from local police forces and cross-referenced with other unsolved killings across the United States. Working on the basis that most serial killers claim similar victims with a standard method (''

modus operandi A (often shortened to M.O. or MO) is an individual's habits of working, particularly in the context of business or criminal investigations, but also generally. It is a Latin phrase, approximately translated as . Term The term is often used in ...

'') it hopes to spot early on when a killer is carrying out crimes in different jurisdictions. This was primarily a response to the appearance of nomadic killers who committed crimes in different areas. So long as the killer kept on the move, the police forces in each state would be unaware that there were multiple victims and would just be investigating a single homicide each, unaware that other police forces had similar crimes. Vi-CAP would help individual police forces determine if they were hunting for the same perpetrator so that they could share and correlate information with one another, increasing their chances of identifying a suspect. He worked on many cases of serial homicide such as

Jeffrey Dahmer Jeffrey Lionel Dahmer (; May 21, 1960 – November 28, 1994), also known as the Milwaukee Cannibal or the Milwaukee Monster, was an American serial killer and sex offender who killed and dismemberment, dismembered seventeen men and boys b ...

Ted Bundy Theodore Robert Bundy (; November 24, 1946 – January 24, 1989), known colloquially as Ted Bundy, was an American serial killer who kidnapping, abducted, raped and murdered dozens of young women and girls between 1974 and 1978. His ''modus ...

Richard Chase Richard Trenton Chase (May 23, 1950 – December 26, 1980) was an American serial killer, cannibal, and necrophile who killed six people in Sacramento, California, from December 1977 to January 1978. He was nicknamed The Vampire of Sacramen ...

and John Joubert, and

Montie Rissell Montie Ralph Rissell (born November 28, 1958), also known as Monte, is an American serial killer and rapist who raped and murdered five women between 1976 and 1977 in Alexandria, Virginia, where he lived. Early life Rissell lived the first seven ...

Later life and death

Ressler retired from the FBI in 1990 and authored a number of books about serial murder. He actively gave lectures to students and police forces on the subject of criminology and, in 1993, was brought in, in London, to assist in the investigation into the murders committed by

Colin Ireland Colin Ireland (16 March 1954 – 21 February 2012) was a British serial killer known as the Gay Slayer, because his victims were gay men. Criminologist David Wilson believes that Ireland was a psychopath. Ireland suffered a severely dysfu ...

. In 1995, Ressler met

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. Its Provinces of South Africa, nine provinces are bounded to the south by of coastline that stretches along the Atlantic O ...

n profiler

Micki Pistorius Micki Pistorius is a South African forensic or investigative psychologist and author. She was the first woman in her profession and the first profiler in South Africa, working on many high-profile cases involving serial killers for the South A ...

at a conference in Scotland and she invited him to review her investigation of the "ABC Murders", so-called because of their location in the

Johannesburg Johannesburg ( , , ; Zulu language, Zulu and Xhosa language, Xhosa: eGoli ) (colloquially known as Jozi, Joburg, Jo'burg or "The City of Gold") is the most populous city in South Africa. With 5,538,596 people in the City of Johannesburg alon ...

suburbs of

Atteridgeville Atteridgeville also recently known as “Pheli” is a township located to the west of Pretoria, South Africa. It is located to the east of Saulsville, to the west of West Park; to the north of Laudium and to the south of Lotus Gardens. The ...

Boksburg Boksburg is a city on the East Rand of Gauteng province of South Africa. Gold was discovered in Boksburg in 1887. Boksburg was named after the State Secretary of the South African Republic, Willem Eduard Bok, W. Eduard Bok. The R29 (South A ...

, and Cleveland. A man named David Selepe had died in police custody while being investigated as a suspect for the Cleveland murders, prior to the discovery of the Atteridgeville and Boksburg crimes, and the authorities feared that they had killed an innocent man while the real culprit was still at large. Ressler believed that Selepe was indeed responsible for the Cleveland murders, either alone or with an accomplice, and that the Atteridgeville and Boksburg murders had been committed by the same offender, but that this killer was not involved in the Cleveland murders. He also pointed out that the Atteridgeville-Boksburg murderer was gaining confidence with each killing and would contact the media. As predicted, serial killer

Moses Sithole Moses Sithole (born 17 November 1964) is a South African serial killer and rapist who committed the ABC Murders. It is believed that he is so named because they began in Atteridgeville, continued in Boksburg and finished in Cleveland, a suburb ...

called the South African newspaper '' The Star'' to claim responsibility for the Atteridgeville and Boksburg murders, some time after Ressler left the case. Ressler's visit to

Ciudad Juárez Ciudad Juárez ( , ; "Juárez City"), commonly referred to as just Juárez (Lipan language, Lipan: ''Tsé Táhú'ayá''), is the most populous city in the Administrative divisions of Mexico, Mexican state of Chihuahua (state), Chihuahua. It was k ...

in Mexico to investigate the still-active feminicides occurring there served as inspiration for the character Albert Kessler in

Roberto Bolaño Roberto is an Italian, Portuguese and Spanish variation of the male given name Robert. Notable people named Roberto include: * Roberto (footballer, born 1912) * Roberto (footballer, born 1977) * Roberto (footballer, born 1978) * Roberto (footb ...

's novel ''

2666 ''2666'' is the final novel by Roberto Bolaño. It was released posthumously in 2004, a year following his death. It is over 1100 pages long in the original Spanish. It is divided into five parts. An English-language translation by Natasha Wi ...

''. Ressler died at his home in Spotsylvania County, Virginia, on Sunday May 5, 2013, from

Parkinson's disease Parkinson's disease (PD), or simply Parkinson's, is a neurodegenerative disease primarily of the central nervous system, affecting both motor system, motor and non-motor systems. Symptoms typically develop gradually and non-motor issues become ...

, aged 76.

Model for fictional characters

A screenplay adapted from his colleague

John E. Douglas John Edward Douglas (born June 18, 1945): "...my parents almost chose that as my middle name instead of the more prosaic Edward." is an American retired special agent and unit chief in the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). He ...

' book '' Mindhunter: Inside the FBI's Elite Serial Crime Unit'' was picked up by

Netflix Netflix is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service. The service primarily distributes original and acquired films and television shows from various genres, and it is available internationally in multiple lang ...

. '' Mindhunter'' stars

Holt McCallany Holt McCallany (born Holt Quinn McAloney; September 3, 1963) is an American actor. He is known for portraying FBI Special Agent Bill Tench on the series '' Mindhunter'' (2017–19) and has had leading and supporting roles in various television se ...

, who plays the character Special Agent Bill Tench, a lead character based on Ressler. In 2021, Ressler was portrayed by Jake Hays in '' Ted Bundy: American Boogeyman''. In 2024, Ressler was portrayed by Sean Cameron Michael in the South African true-crime series '' Catch Me a Killer''.

Books

*''Sexual Homicide: Patterns and Motives'' (with

, Ann Wolbert Burgess) (1988) *''Whoever Fights Monsters: My Twenty Years Tracking Serial Killers for the FBI'' (with

Tom Shachtman Tom Shachtman (born February 15, 1942) is an American author, journalist, filmmaker, and educator. He has published more than 30 books across a variety of topics, including histories, biographies and books for children. He lives in Connecticut. A ...

) (1992) *''Justice Is Served'' (with Tom Shachtman) (1994) *''I Have Lived in the Monster'' (with Tom Shachtman) (1998)

References

External links

*
Robert K Ressler interview at www.sci-fi-online.comRobert Ressler obituary at Forensic Behavioral Science International

Obituary
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ressler, Robert 1937 births 2013 deaths Burials at Arlington National Cemetery Federal Bureau of Investigation agents Offender profiling Michigan State University alumni United States Army officers Deaths from Parkinson's disease in Virginia