Also known as: The Lust Killer; The Shoe Fetish Slayer
Born: January 31, 1939 Webster, South Dakota
Died: March 29, 2006 (aged 67)
Cause of death: Liver cancer
Convicted: Murder - 3 counts
County: Marion
Sentence: Life
Age at time of death: 67
Sex: Male
Race: White
Height: 6 ft.
Hair: Blond
Weight: 220lbs
Eyes: Blue
Many career employees of the Oregon State Penitentiary knew Jerry Brudos up close.
Although this writer (webmaster) never met him in person, I was fascinated by a conversation with an inmate who had been a long time cellmate of Brudos. That cellmate was very moved by Brudos' passing; he had lost a good friend.
How could a heinous serial killer who inspired terror in the hearts and minds of Northwesterners, inspire compassion in another person, albeit an inmate.
The answer reminds us that the human psyche is complicated, technical, not easily stereotyped. That makes our work as corrections professionals a dangerous line of work. We really don't understand what makes people like Jerry Brudos tick, even as psychologists continue to make progress in analyzing the criminal mind.
This video series is presented on our AOCE web site in the hope that continuing education and enlightenment in the area of forensic psychology will help us understand our clients a little better.
Viewing this documentary may also remind you of how dangerous that inmate you had a casual conversation with on the Control Floor yesterday may really be -- a sober reminder that, while we need to treat every inmate with an appropriate level of dignity, we should never let down our guard.
(Note: You might not be able to access these videos from your work station computer due to the system filtering for inappropriate content. You should be able to view them at home.)
Jerry Brudos
Jerome Henry "Jerry" Brudos (January 31, 1939 – March 29, 2006) was an American serial killer and necrophiliac, also known as "The Lust Killer" and "The Shoe Fetish Slayer".
Early Life
Brudos was born in Webster, South Dakota, and was the youngest of four sons. His mother had wanted a girl and would dress Brudos in girl's clothing. She would also constantly belittle him and treat him with disdain, as well as abuse him. As a child, Brudos and his family would move into different homes in the Pacific Northwest, before settling in Salem, Oregon.
He had a fetish for women's shoes from the age of five, after playing with spike-heeled shoes at a local junkyard. He also reportedly attempted to steal the shoes of his first grade teacher. He also had a fetish for women's underwear, and had claimed that he would steal underwear from female neighbors as a child. He spent his teen years in and out of psychotherapy and mental hospitals. He began to stalk local women as a teenager, knocking down or choking them unconscious, and fleeing with their shoes.[1]
At age 17, he abducted and beat a young woman, threatening to stab her if she did not follow his sexual demands. Shortly after being arrested, he was taken to a psychiatric ward of Oregon State Hospital for nine months. There it was found his sexual fantasies revolved around his hatred and revenge against his mother and women in general. He also underwent a psychiatric evaluation, and was diagnosed with schizophrenia. Despite being institutionalized, he still graduated from high school with his class in 1957. Shortly after graduation, Brudos became an electronics technician.
In 1961, he married a 17-year-old girl, with whom he would father two children, and settled in a Salem, Oregon suburb. He asked his new bride to do housework naked except for a pair of high heels while he took pictures. It was at about this time, however, that he began complaining of migraine headaches and "blackouts", relieving his symptoms with night-prowling raids to steal shoes and lace undergarments. He kept the shoes, underwear, and (for a time) the bodies of his victims in a garage that he would not allow his wife to enter without first announcing her arrival on an intercom that Brudos had set up.
Crime scene: Brudos' house on Center St. in Salem near the Oregon State Hospital.
Criminal Career
Between 1968 and 1969, Brudos bludgeoned and strangled four young women. The only initial evidence was witness sightings of a large man dressed in women's clothing. In the garage of his Salem, Oregon home, Brudos kept trophies from his victims, expressly two pairs of amputated breasts that were used as paperweights and the left foot of a 19-year-old girl named Linda Slawson (his first murder victim) which he used to model the shoes he collected. After committing a murder, he would dress up in high heels and masturbate. Police investigation and interviews of local coeds led them to Brudos, who described the murders in detail. He had confessed to murdering Linda Slawson, Jan Whitney, Karen Sprinker and Linda Salee, and was sentenced to life in prison.
Nightgown Brudos would make his victims wear.
While incarcerated, Brudos had piles of women's shoe catalogues in his cell — he wrote to major companies asking for them — and claimed they were his substitute for pornography. He lodged countless appeals, including one in which he alleged that a photograph taken of him with one of his victim's corpses cannot prove his guilt, as it is not the body of a person he was convicted of killing.
Brudos died in prison on March 28, 2006 from liver cancer.
Crime scene: Brudos' house on Center St. in Salem near the Oregon State Hospital.
Nightgown Brudos would make his victims wear.
Jan. 1968:
April 1969: