Abstract
The purpose of this annual report is to provide the most accurate statistics possible about serial killers and their victims. The source of this information is the Radford/FGCU Serial Killer Database which is described in detail in the next section of the report. For many years, the report consisted of a series of tables with little commentary. Beginning with this version (2020) of the report, we have included a description of the Database as well as commentary for most of the tables. In each subsequent year, we will continue to add commentary to selected topics until the report contains results and commentary for all topics. In subsequent years we also plan on including infographics that will help “spice up” the information in the tables as well as including tests of statistical significance for all relevant comparisons. It is not the purpose of this report to delve into the mind of the serial killer. There are already excellent text books (e.g., Fox, Levin, & Fridel, 2019; Hickey, 2016) and other books that do a thorough job of doing this. One of our goals is to increase collaboration among serial homicide researchers. Toward that end, if any researchers are interested in “adopting” a current topic or proposing a new topic to provide annual updates and commentary, we would love to partner with you. Although information has been collected on such topics as the presence of triad behaviors and head injuries, we will not publish summaries of fields such as these until we have collected enough information that will lead to reliable interpretations.