Serial Killers & Murderous Minds

Today, we are sharing an episode from the award-winning true crime podcast RedHanded, hosted by Suruthi Bala and Hannah Maguire. RedHanded is the UK's #1 True Crime podcast, covering everything from high-profile murders and cults to con artists and cultural catastrophes, always asking not just what happened, but why. In this episode, Suruthi and Hannah investigate the hunt for Mexico City's "Matav...

By 1929, Peter Kürten had murdered at least eleven people across Düsseldorf, Germany, targeting women and children to satisfy a compulsion to see, hear, and taste blood. His reign of terror only ended when a surviving victim led police to his door, and his own wife delivered him to justice. This episode concludes the story of one of history's most disturbing serial killers, from his arrest and con...

In 1920s Germany, Peter Kürten terrorized Düsseldorf in a killing spree that would earn him the name the Vampire of Düsseldorf. But his path to murder began decades earlier, rooted in a childhood of relentless abuse and cruelty. From his first alleged killings at age nine to a string of escalating attacks on women and children, this episode traces how Kürten's compulsion evolved into something uns...

Between 1918 and 1919, a killer slipped into homes across Greater New Orleans under cover of night, attacking families with an axe and leaving investigators with few clues and no clear suspect. In a letter published by a local newspaper, the Axeman taunted police and promised to spare any home where jazz music played... turning an entire city into a single, terrified audience. As arrests were made...

In 1918, a killer began slipping into New Orleans homes under cover of darkness, attacking sleeping victims with an axe and vanishing without a trace. The attacks targeted the city's Italian immigrant grocers, leaving a terrorized community wondering who would be next... and investigators scrambling to find a suspect they couldn't identify. As the body count rose, false arrests and coerced stateme...

Fun fact: Did you know Jaws almost never existed because the shark kept sinking while filming? That is Connor Tomlinson just getting started. If that sounds fascinating, you are going to love Rewind Studios’ new podcast out now called WHAT THE FACT hosted by Connor Tomlinson and Carter Roy. It’s produced by the same team that brings you Serial Killers & Murderous Minds. Connor and co-host Cart...

On the night of February 29, 2000, Katherine Knight murdered her partner John Price at his home in Aberdeen, New South Wales... then committed acts so disturbing they had no precedent in Australian criminal history. Despite a lifetime of escalating violence and repeated threats against John's life, almost no one believed she would follow through. If you’re new here, don’t forget to follow Serial K...

In February 2000, Katherine Knight committed one of the most disturbing murders in Australian history... but the path to that night began decades earlier in a rural New South Wales household defined by violence, neglect, and sexual abuse. As Katherine moved through a series of volatile relationships, her fear of abandonment grew into a pattern of escalating intimidation and brutality that left a t...

In January 1993, Jean-Claude Romand murdered his wife Florence, his children Caroline and Antoine, and his parents Aime and Anne-Marie to prevent them from learning he had never graduated medical school and had spent nearly two decades impersonating a WHO research scientist. As investigators unraveled the crimes, they discovered he had also stolen hundreds of thousands of francs from family and fr...

For nearly two decades, Jean-Claude Romand convinced his family, friends, and colleagues that he was a respected World Health Organization researcher...while spending his days in cafes and rest stops, swindling loved ones out of their savings. And in January 1993, as the walls of his fabricated life finally closed in, Romand turned to violence rather than face exposure. This episode traces the chi...

In August 1995, Mark Winger beat his wife Donnah to death in their Springfield, Illinois home and shot an innocent man, Roger Harrington, to frame him for the crime... then walked free for six years. When his affair partner finally went to police in 1999, investigators uncovered a chilling web of premeditation that had been hiding in plain sight. If you’re new here, don’t forget to follow Serial K...

In 1995, Mark Winger appeared to have it all: a stable career, an adoring wife named Donnah, and a newly adopted daughter in Springfield, Illinois. But beneath the surface, Mark was carrying on a secret affair and harboring a chilling plan to rid himself of his marriage without losing everything he'd built. When an unsettling encounter with a shuttle driver gave Mark the opening he needed, he set...

In the 2010s, Omaha man Dave Kroupa was terrorized by thousands of harassing messages, acts of vandalism, and arson, all seemingly from a woman named Cari Farver, who had vanished without a trace. What Dave didn't know was that Cari was dead, and the real perpetrator was someone far closer to him. If you’re new here, don’t forget to follow Serial Killers & Murderous Minds to never miss a case!...

In 2012, Omaha mechanic Dave Kroupa met Liz Golyar on a dating app... a connection that would spiral into years of relentless stalking, arson, and murder. And when Dave began seeing Cari Farver, she vanished overnight, and a torrent of threatening messages began arriving in her name. As the harassment escalated from digital terror to a house fire, investigators slowly realized the truth was far da...

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, Ivan Milat lured at least seven young backpackers into Belanglo State Forest in Australia, where he stabbed, shot, and buried them in isolation he believed would protect him forever. A survivor's testimony, victim belongings kept as trophies, and forensic link analysis ultimately led investigators to his door...and a jury delivered seven unanimous guilty verdicts...

Ivan Milat grew up in a volatile Sydney household surrounded by weapons, abuse, and fourteen siblings. By his teens, he was already hurting animals, and allegedly... people. After a series of robberies, a sexual assault, and a faked suicide, Milat walked free from every charge and used steady road work to move unseen through Australia's most isolated stretches of highway. This episode traces how y...

The fourth and final episode of Campus Crimes examines the 2003 murder of Baylor basketball player Patrick Dennehy, who was shot and killed by his own teammate... but the crime that followed may have been even colder. Head coach Dave Bliss, facing exposure for recruiting violations, launched a calculated scheme to brand Dennehy a drug dealer after his death, recorded in his own words on a hidden t...

In November 2005, Morgantown, West Virginia, pediatric nurse practitioner Shelly Michael injected her sleeping husband Jimmy with a surgical paralytic, then set their home ablaze to conceal the crime. What investigators found —a body without soot in its lungs, a secret affair, and a controlled medication only she could access — built an airtight case against a woman her community trusted completel...

In Morgantown, West Virginia, pediatric nurse practitioner Shelly Michael appeared to have built the perfect life: a successful career, a beautiful home, and a blended family. But beneath that polished surface, she was carrying on a secret affair and quietly laying the groundwork for her husband Jimmy's murder. If you’re new here, don’t forget to follow Serial Killers & Murderous Minds to neve...

The third episode of Campus Crimes follows the events of the Friday after Thanksgiving 1969, when 22-year-old graduate student Betsy Aardsma was stabbed through the heart in the basement stacks of Penn State's Pattee Library, surrounded by people, in broad daylight, and dead within minutes. A man walked calmly out of the stacks, said five words, and vanished; no one was ever charged. Decades of in...

For this episode, Vanessa and Dr. Engels are joined again by Alexis Linkletter, co-hose of Crime House's newest show Crimes of Reddit. Between 1968 and 1985, a killer known as the Monster of Florence murdered eight couples on remote roads outside Florence, Italy, leaving behind chilling physical evidence and no clear culprit. Despite decades of investigation, multiple arrests, and shocking courtro...

For this episode, Vanessa and Dr. Engels are joined by Alexis Linkletter, co-hose of Crime House's newest show Crimes of Reddit. In 1968, a young couple was shot dead in the Italian countryside while their six-year-old son slept in the back seat: a crime that quietly launched one of Italy's most haunting serial killing sprees. For over a decade, a gunman stalked couples parked in remote areas outs...

On February 12, 2010, biology professor Amy Bishop opened fire on her colleagues at the University of Alabama in Huntsville, killing three and wounding three more after being denied tenure. But investigators quickly discovered the shooting wasn't her first act of violence: a quarter century of buried history, closed files, and institutional failures had put a gun in that room long before tenure ev...

In July 2000, 21-year-old British hostess Lucie Blackman vanished after a date with a man she knew only as Mr. Kowa. In reality, he Joji Obara, a serial predator who had drugged and assaulted over 200 women across three decades in Japan. It was Lucie's own phone calls the night she disappeared, and the courage of his past victims who came forward, that finally brought Obara to justice. If you’re n...

Vanessa and Dr. Engels get into the case of Japanese serial rapist Joji Obara, who for thirty years, drugged and assaulted hundreds of women across Japan, documenting his crimes in chilling detail. Hiding behind false names and a surgically altered face, he evaded justice while his attacks escalated. If you’re new here, don’t forget to follow Serial Killers & Murderous Minds to never miss a ca...