A small New England town is gripped by terror following the death of a 13th individual in a string of apparent murders, with police concluding that there were no obvious signs of a struggle and that the cause of death is currently under investigation, but the sequence of mysterious cases has residents fearing the worst.
For context, on Sunday, June 1, the body of 21-year-old Boston resident Adriana Suazo was found in the woods in Milton, Massachusetts. According to press accounts, at least 13 bodies have been discovered in remote areas across Massachusetts and surrounding states, including Connecticut, Rhode Island, and Maine, leading some to believe that a serial killer is at large in New England.
Furthermore, according to coverage from Boston 25 News, the Groton, Connecticut Police Department issued a statement dismissing the suspicions of a serial killer being behind the deaths, saying, “Regarding references circulating on social media about incidents in the State of Rhode Island, we currently have no information connecting those events to any of the incidents in Groton.”
In addition, Boston 25 News also reported that author Maureen Boyle, who wrote a noteworthy nonfiction account of a similar case, expressed skepticism about the serial killer theory as well, saying, “Just because you have bodies found in a variety of places in New England, that does not mean that there is a serial killer on the loose in the area.”
Building on her previous point, Boyle expressed concerns about the serial killer rumor, arguing that such speculations can be harmful and create mass hysteria or confusion, saying, “This is not a game. These involve real people, these involve real families, this is serious business.”
Likewise, Northeastern University criminologist James Alan Fox reportedly said that he doubts that a serial killer is behind the deaths, arguing that “most serial killers have some commonality in their victims.” Fox added, “But in these cases, there are so many dissimilarities. There’s no pattern to the dump sites.”
Moreover, Fox contended that “most serial killers have a particular dump site where they dispose of their bodies,” adding, “So when police do find evidence from a serial killer, they tend to find multiple bodies because the killer feels comfortable about disposing of bodies in that location. More than 70% of serial killers kill in one locale, typically around their home or workplace or somewhere where they know the roads and the escape patterns.”
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Concluding his thoughts on the strange situation, Fox said that from the perspective of a would-be serial killer, “It’s much safer for them to kill in a place where they know the terrain.” He added, “Plus, they tend to have jobs and families, which means they kill part-time — literally, they have some free time to kill. And in general, they can’t spend weeks and months traveling around finding victims.”
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