Number 10: Christopher Scarver

Here's a brief one, but important one. Again, like many of the others on this list, Christopher Scarver isn't known for the typical serial killer tropes: He didn't use a weird weapon, he didn't wear anyone as a hat, he didn't get away with it, and he didn't kill two dozen people. What makes him significant is who he killed.

Scarver is a certified crazy person though, and believed that God personally talks to him, so he's got that going for him. Unfortunately it seems that God told him to kill people, which makes me think that is probably wasn't God talking to him. The reason he's on this list is because he killed one of the worst serial killers of all time while they were both in prison. He murdered Jeffery Dahmer. He serial killed a serial killer. After killing Dahmer, he then beat another fellow inmate (and murderer) to death with the same instrument he used on Dahmer: A bar from a weight lifting machine.

His reason, "God told me to do it." A real class act. Now, let's also keep in mind that Scarver was in prison in the first place because he shot someone in cold blood and robbed them. Then again, nobodies perfect. Let he who is without murder cast the first. . . weight machine bar? I don't know. That metaphor fell apart. I am not a fan of that metaphor. 

Besides wasting Dahmer, Scarver's most significant deed is that he gave insane, blood-thirsty prisoners the possibility of someday becoming folk heroes. And hope is a hard thing for a murderer to create.

James Kislingbury for Citadel Interactive © 2009 

Photo courtesy of Halfdark

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