OTTIS TOOLE

BY: KYLIE RUHL

Serial Killer, Cannibal Necrophile, and Arsonist

CHILDHOOD

Q: What was their childhood like?

A: Toole was born in Jacksonville, Florida on March 5, 1947. He was the youngest of nine children. He had suffered several head injuries, which led to seizures. He was sexually molested by his sister and a neighbor. His alcoholic father left when he was young, his mother was a religious fanatic, and his grandmother was a Satanist who exposed him to various practices. His mother would even dress him up in girls clothes and would call him Susan.

CHILDHOOD

Q: Were there any precursors?

A: There were precursors in Toole’s childhood because he had a very troubled childhood. He tended to keep to himself. When he was 14 he got sexually abused to a traveling salesman. Ottis then proceeded to run over the man over with his own truck and killed him. That was his first murder.

CHILDHOOD

Q: Did childhood behavior reflect problems?

A: Yes, when he was a fairly young child he had started a life of petty crimes and the crimes seemed to escalate more and more when he finally had reached adulthood. Ottis ran away from home on several occasions and started fires in abandoned houses at a young age.

ADULT LIFE

Q: What was their adult life like?

A: Ottis Toole’s adult life was a very bloody one. First he started out with petty crimes like stealing and then he joined a partnership with fellow serial killer Henry Lee Lucas. Their relationship soon turned into a sexual one shortly after. Together they committed numerous murders . Toole and Lucas were suspected to over 200 murders.

Ottis Toole and Henry Lee Lucas

ADULT LIFE

Q: Did they finish high school/college?

A: No, Toole never finished high school. He dropped out in the eighth grade and had an extremely low IQ.

ADULT LIFE

Q: Did they marry? Have children? Were they loners?

A: Ottis Toole did marry a woman 25 years older than him in 1976. However it was short lived after only three days when his wife found out of him being a homosexual. He had no children and was known as a drifter before and after he met Lucas.

NUMBER OF KILLINGS

Q: Is there an exact number of victims they have murdered?

A: Ottis Toole’s murders he have been traced to and confessed to have over exceeded two hundred. Police are still to this day are not entirely

MOTIVES

Q: What motives did the killer have for the killings?

A: Toole really never had any motives for killing any of his victims. Ottis Toole and Henry Lee Lucas were drifters on the abandoned roads of America and preyed on anyone anywhere. Both did disturbing thing to the bodies, and Toole was even a cannibal and a necrophile. He had confessed to over hundreds murders with Lucas and his motives were never revealed.

CHARACTERISTICS OF VICTIMS

Q: What was the profile and characteristics of their victims?

A: As said before that there never really was a set characteristic that Ottis would prey upon to commit all of his murders. Ottis killed almost every type of person. He killed from old to young and from male to female. There was nothing that would stop him from killing.

MOST FAMOUS MURDER

Q: What was their most famous murder?

A: Ottis Toole’s most famous murder was the murder of Adam Walsh. He lured Adam away from the Sears store his mother was in and offered Adam toys and candy. Toole then knocked Adam out then pulled out into an abandoned road and decapitated him. Although Toole confessed to the murder he was never formally charged. Adam’s father John Walsh is now an advocate to victim’s rights and inspired the show “America’s Most Wanted”.

Adam Walsh

FACTORS TO CAPTURE

Q:What factors led to them getting caught?

A:Lucas had been arrested for another crime aside from Toole, Lucas had pointed police to Toole for mass murder. Ottis was already serving time in prison for a arson charge. He then admitted to the confessions on his own.

Toole in prison

SENTENCING

Q: What were they charged with and sentenced to?

A: Both were murders that occurred in Florida. In 1984, Toole was convicted of murder for a 1982 arson incident that resulted in the death of an elderly man. He was sentenced to death, and received a second conviction and death sentence later that year for the murder of a 19-year-old girl. Both death sentences were reduced to life in prison on appeal. In 1991, Toole pleaded guilty to four more murders and received four more life sentences.

DEATH

Q: Did they live and are surviving to this very day, or did they die?

A: Ottis Toole died on September 15, 1996 in prison for natural causes. Toole had cirrhosis of the liver and AIDS. He was 49 years old.

REFERENCES

http://www.biography.com/people/ottis-toole-11930488

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0867491/bio

http://www.allserialkillers.com/ottis_toole.htm

http://www.amw.com/fugitives/case.cfm?id=39789