A serial killer is typically defined as an individual who has killed 3 or more people over a period of more than a month, with down time (a "cooling off period") between the murders, and whose motivation for killing is usually based on psychological gratification. Some sources disregard the "three or more" criteria, and define the term as "a series of two or more murders, committed as separate events, usually, but not always, by one offender acting alone" or, including the vital characteristics, a minimum of at least two murders. Often, a sexual element is involved in the killings, but the FBI states that motives for serial murder include "anger, thrill, financial gain, and attention seeking".The murders may have been attempted or completed in a similar fashion and the victims may have had something in common, for example, occupation, race, appearance, sex, or age group.
Serial killers are not the same as mass murderers, nor are they spree killers, who commit murders in two or more locations with virtually no break in between.

Development

Many serial killers have faced similar problems in their childhood development. Hickey's Trauma Control Model explains how early childhood trauma can set the child up for deviant behavior in adulthood. The child's environment (either their parents or society) is the dominant factor in whether or not the child's behavior escalates into homicidal activity.
Family, or lack thereof, is the most prominent part of a child's development because it is what the child can identify with on a regular basis.The serial killer is no different than any other individual who is instigated to seek approval from parents, sexual partners, or others."This need for approval is what influences children to attempt to develop social relationships with their family and peers, but if they are rejected or neglected, they are unable to do so. This results in the lowering of their self-esteem and helps develop their fantasy world in which they are in control. Hickey's Trauma Control Model clearly shows that the development of a serial killer is based on an early trauma followed by facilitators (porn, drugs, and alcohol) and disposition (the inability to attach).
Family interaction also plays an important role in a child's growth and development. "The quality of their attachments to parents and other members of the family is critical to how these children relate to and value other members of society."
Wilson and Seaman (1990) conducted a study on incarcerated serial killers and what they felt was the most influential factor that contributed to their homicidal activity. Almost all of the serial killers in the study had experienced some sort of environmental problems during their childhood, such as a broken home, or a lack of discipline in the home. It was common for the serial killers to come from a family that had experienced divorce, separation, or the lack of a parent. Furthermore, nearly half of the serial killers had experienced some type of physical and sexual abuse and even more had experienced emotional neglect. When a parent has a drug or alcohol problem, the attention in the household is on the parents rather than the child. This neglect of the child leads to the lowering of their self-esteem and helps develop a fantasy world in which they are in control. Hickey's Trauma Control Model supports how the neglect from parents can facilitate deviant behavior especially if the child sees substance abuse in action. This then leads to disposition (the inability to attach), which can further lead to homicidal behavior unless the child finds a way to develop substantial relationships and fight the label they receive. If a child receives no support from those around him or her, then he or she is unlikely to recover from the traumatic event in a positive way. As stated by E. E. Maccoby, "the family has continued to be seen as a major—perhaps the major—arena for socialization".

Power/control

The main objective for this type of serial killer is to gain and exert power over their victim. Such killers are sometimes abused as children, leaving them with feelings of powerlessness and inadequacy as adults. Many power- or control-motivated killers sexually abuse their victims, but they differ from hedonistic killers in that rape is not motivated by lust but as simply another form of dominating the victim.Ted Bundy traveled around the United States seeking women to control.

Memorabilia

Notorious and infamous serial killers number in the hundreds, and a subculture revolves around their legacies. "Murderabilia", or memorabilia centered around famous serial killers, includes the paintings, writings, and poems of these killers. Recently, marketing has capitalized even more upon interest in serial killers with the rise of various merchandise such as trading cards, action figures, and encyclopedias like The Serial Killer Files "The Encyclepedia of Serial Killer" by Harold Schecter. Some serial killers literally attain the status of "celebrity" in the way they acquire 'fans'. Some killers even have previous personal possessions auctioned off on websites like eBay. A few examples of this are Ed Gein's 150 pound stolen gravestone, and Bobby Joe Long's sunglasses.

Ted Bundy:

The most frightening of serial killers: a handsome, educated psychopathic law student who stalked and murdered dozens of young college women who looked very much like a young woman who broke off her relationship with him.

Bundy was a very adept and glib con artist who faked a broken arm in a sling to convince young women to help him carry his textbooks to his car. Once there, he battered them with a baseball bat and carried them off for ghoulish rituals.

The Zodiac Killer:

The notorious and very bizarre serial killer who called himself The Zodiac remains one of the world's great unsolved cases. In Oct., 1966, a girl was viciously murdered in Riverside, California when she permitted a man to help start the car that he had intentionally disabled when she was in her school library.

This homicide began a ghoulish series of murders that panicked the people of the San Francisco area. For years the Zodiac taunted the police with weird ciphers, phone calls, insulting and cryptic messages.

Even though police investigated over 2,500 potential suspects, the case was never solved. There were a few suspects that stood out, but the forensic technology of the times was not advanced enough to nail any one of them conclusively.

The Rostov Ripper:

After they linked three murders, Major Fetisov organized a task force of 10 men to start an aggressive full-time investigation. He intended to get to the heart of this and stop this maniac from preying on any more female citizens. Among those he recruited was Viktor Burakov, 37. He was the best man they had for the analysis of physical evidence like fingerprints, footprints, and other manifestations at a crime scene, and he was an expert in both police science and the martial arts. Known for his diligence, he was invited aboard the Division of Especially Serious crimes in January 1983. Little did anyone realize then just how diligent he would prove to be and would have to be.


Burakov then embarked on a cat-and-mouse game with Russia's worst serial killer. Once he suspected Andrei Chikatilo, a former teacher, he placed him in a cell with a gifted informant, hoping that Chikatilo would slip up. By law, he could only hold him for 10 days. On the 9th day, he tried something daring: he brought in a brilliant psychiatrist.

Eddie Gein:

Considered to be a mild-mannered bachelor whose emotional development had been stunted by his domineering mother, he shocked the world when police found his vest of human skin and a cache of body parts. Gein is the model for The Silence of the Lambs' Buffalo Bill and Psycho's Norman Bates.

#~THE RED LEGEND~# 

The four red handkerchiefs

A non-popular serial murderer; Nicholas Adams Sowell, a handsome, educated psychopathic law student who stalked and murderer  
4 CHILDREN near our east black forest and for each one he drown them with a RED HANDKERCHIEFS that her, actually death mother sewed before her knowing mortal disease. After discussions and bad childhood, he get crazy and killed her and shot her head with an automatic rifle Thompson used in WWII by USA. Problems said to start as he was six years old when his father hit her mother and he too and later commit suicide and the succesive alcoholic boyfriends of her mother. Also drugs play an important role in his bad influence, her mother consume and sell m-cat, marijuana, hashish and other less common type of drugs. 
He had envy of the rest of the children because they had father, so at age of fourthteen he kill four parnets in the Red forest and later he hold the red handkerchief he used to drown them up the trees. Now, some people talk about him such as the devil boy who dessapears and was not found and others said he comitted suicide as his father done and his soul still walks in this forest killing children when they get lost at 00:00 PM Some pictures of the evidences there were found near the place the bodies were found: