“The Bind, Torture, Kill guy?”
“Yes. Rader, for example, was married to Paula Dietz for over thirty years, and they had two children. Paula, by all appearances, was a conventional small-town wife and mom, and apparently unaware of what her husband was doing. Her husband hid his heinous crimes for decades by presenting himself as a family man, a church leader, a Boy Scout volunteer. He used Paula and his kids as a front, a mask. They enabled him to compartmentalize his crimes, and to keep on killing. Without them he might not have been able to do so. Rader described his murders as being like a hobby that existed in a different ‘mental box.’ It was a similar story with Ed Kemper and his girlfriend. People who knew the couple described her as ‘sweet’ and their relationship as ‘normal.’ She, too, claimed to have no idea what her partner was doing. Kemper backed this up. He maintained that he kept his ‘dark side’ hidden from her.”
“They didn’t even suspect?”
“If they did, they never acted on it.”
“What about denial? Can women like them harbor suspicions, but then compartmentalize their doubts in the same way their men compartmentalize their murders?”
Gideon nods. “This is where the spectrum gets layered and interesting. You go from the Paula Dietzes on one end—where it appears the spouse or partner really was innocent and unaware—to a more middle ground with the partners of killers like Gary Ridgway, the Green River Killer; John Wayne Gacy; Robert Yates; Russell Williams; Israel Keys; Robert Hansen; Harvey Louis Carignan; and others. They all had partners who did in fact grow suspicious, or who noted their men’s erratic behaviors, but never said or did anything.”
“So they were enablers but not active participants?”
“No participation in the ritual of the killings, correct. Then you get the far end of the spectrum—women who grow suspicious, perhaps even express doubts or resistance, or try to get away, but they are instead gradually co-opted by their partners. They become actively complicit in their men’s crimes. Either partially or fully.”
“By ‘partially’ you mean knowing what they do, but turning a blind eye?”
He nods. “Yes. It can range from knowingly providing a cover, to actually helping lure victims for him, to actively assisting in the torturing and killing them. Like Karla Homolka with Paul Bernardo.”
“So my question is, Would these women have become criminals—sadistic killers, even—had their paths not crossed with a killer?”
“Many of them started life as ‘good girls.’ Good students. Kind, friendly, sociable. Decent families. In my opinion a lot of them would never have crossed legal lines—let alone become killers—had fate not crossed their paths with a true devil. Karla Homolka, for example. She went from an apparently well-adjusted, likable young woman who loved and worked with animals, to Bernardo’s lover, then accomplice. She even helped kill her own sister. In the end she presented herself as a victim of coercion.”
“The battered wife syndrome?”
Poppy shifts uncomfortably in her seat. She sneaks a glance at Lillith. But Lillith is transfixed by the pair onstage. Poppy reaches for her wine and quickly empties her glass. She needs to blunt the emotions being triggered in her.
Sophia leads Gideon into a deep dive on the psychology of several of the female partners of killers he has written about in his book—many of whom he has interviewed himself—painting a picture of women who genuinely seemed destined for normal lives, until they met a devil.
While Sophia asks another probing question, Poppy gestures to a server moving discreetly through the aisles. She points to her emptywineglass, and within moments she has another full one in hand. She settles back into her chair, feeling a bit better now.
“So these women who did cross from victim to villain, and who did actively lure victims or participate in the serial murders—they are not your Aileen Wuornos, Dorothea Puente, Jane Toppan, or Belle Gunness types?”
“On the contrary. A different class entirely.”
“What about Aline-Claire Lavoie, the partner of Vincent Kapoor? You mention her in your book as well—is she a victim or a villain? Would you put her on the Karla Homolka end of the spectrum—someone who might claim coercive control or psychological entrapment, as Karla claimed with Paul Bernardo?”
“Aline-Claire’s case is murkier than Karla’s, in my opinion. Her complicity remains hotly debated. She was a demure medical secretary from Quebec—the middle child of a large and devout Catholic family. Plain. Mild mannered. Responsible. Devoted to looking after her parents and siblings. She worked hard—often at more than one job at a time—to help with family finances. She eventually got engaged to a nice local guy in Quebec, but the romance wasn’t really there. It fizzled, and they eventually called marriage plans off. She still had big dreams. She still wanted adventure and travel in her life, but deep down she seemed to have accepted she was doomed to a gray life in a small town across the Saint Lawrence River from Montreal.”
“So howdidher path intersect with Vincent Kapoor’s in the heat and vibrance of Kashmir?”
“This is where fate dealt her a hand. She was out shopping in Quebec, entered a store, and the glass door slammed behind her and shattered. A million shards of glass showered down on Aline-Claire, slicing her arms and hands, and the backs of her legs. A big piece of glass cut through an ankle tendon. Doctors thought she’d never walk properly again. But she was very determined. She worked diligently at rehab, and insurance from the accident brought her a small windfall. She was thirty at the time. She still dreamed of traveling to India, andfelt it was a sign—a last chance. A last dance, so to speak, before settling back into the rest of her gray life. When she was healed enough, she persuaded her ex-fiancé to go with her. They’d remained friends. She needed a companion—she was not brave enough to go on her own. In Kashmir, just after they landed, while the couple was trying to rent a boathouse, they encountered Vincent Kapoor. He immediately saw the naivete, insecurity, vulnerability in Aline-Claire.”
“He targeted her?”
“Instantly. He’d just fled from Greece after his prison van escape at Piraeus. He’d made it to Kashmir but had zero funds—nothing but the clothes on his back. He approached them, posing as a disheveled, ‘artsy’Paris Matchphotographer on vacation, and he organized for Aline-Claire and her man to jointly rent a luxury houseboat with him, plus two flight attendants he’d already started to con on his flight over from France. While on the houseboat he set to work ‘love bombing’ her, drawing her slowly and fully into his world. He told her she was beautiful, and that she should see herself how others saw her. He took photos of her. He wooed her.”
“What about the ex-fiancé?”
“Well, they returned to Quebec together at the end of their vacation. But Vincent was a true master of the long con. He never gave up on things, and he had patience. He wrote her letters of love and adoration, daily, pleading with her to return so they could try a life together.”
“She eventually did.”
“He wore her down. He allowed her to believe in her dreams. He fanned them. He allowed her to believe she could be beautiful. That she could be someone else. He sucked her deep into a world of luxury travel, gorgeous clothes, petty theft, gem dealing, fraud, passport theft, identity fraud, and ultimately murders. He needed a malleable woman, you see—particularly a Western-looking woman—to help him build legitimacy and trust among his foreign backpacker targets. His victims were mostly young travelers who flocked in the seventies to India, Thailand, Kathmandu—part of the Southeast Asia ‘Hippie Trail.’”
“And what made him target them?”
“He was primarily after their passports—which he’d use for identity fraud—and the ‘hippies’ almost always came with wads of traveler’s checks, which he’d later cash—after he’d disposed of them—by using their doctored passports. Both the cash and passports would facilitate various other cons he always had on the go. Above anything, Vincent was a predatory opportunist. And they were easy victims. Plus he saw himself as smarter and superior to them. He felt that if they so easily succumbed to his false charm and wiles, they somehow deserved their own downfall.”
