The topic of female serial killers often evokes images of notorious figures like Aileen Wuornos or Belle Gunness. However, the narratives of African American female serial killers are frequently overlooked, overshadowed by the focus on their white counterparts. This article delves into the stories of some of these women, examining the societal factors that contribute to their relative obscurity.
Aileen Wuornos, one of the most well-known female serial killers.
The Complexities of Female Serial Killers
Female serial murderers are often described as more deadly, determined, and difficult to apprehend than their male counterparts. Their motivations are complex, and their crimes defy easy profiling.
Female serial murderers can be divided into several categories:
- The Black Widow: Careful and methodical, killing those with whom she has a close, personal relationship.
- The Angel of Death: Often murders in a hospital or nursing home setting.
- The Sexual Predator: Works alone and is the rarest type of female serial killer.
- The Revenge Killer: Commits crimes of passion, usually against family members.
- The Profit/Crime Motivated Killer: Driven by financial gain or involvement in criminal activities.
- The Team Killer: Works with other women or men to commit brutal and often sexual murders.
- The Killer with Questionable Sanity: Sanity is in question.
Roberta Elder: Atlanta's Forgotten Serial Killer
Roberta Elder, dubbed "Atlanta's Mrs. Bluebeard," stands as a stark example of a Black female serial killer whose crimes were largely ignored by mainstream media. Her story, unfolding between 1938 and 1952, involves a series of suspicious deaths within her household, primarily family members. The killings may have started as early as 1938, but no one suspected murder until Reverend William M. Elder died after eating “bananas and cheese” in 1952.
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Reverend Elder, a respected Baptist preacher in Atlanta, Georgia, lost his daughter Fannie Mae to pneumonia one year before his own death, and another daughter, Annie Pearl, died of pneumonia two years prior.
Suspicion arose when Reverend Elder's death presented puzzling symptoms. The same coroner that examined his daughters was bewildered when Reverend Elder’s skin looked ruddy and his body was emaciated. Concerned about the multiple Elder family deaths, the coroner decided to test whether Reverend Elder could have died of arsenic poisoning, the symptoms of which present much like pneumonia.
Police attention immediately turned to the Reverend Elder’s wife Roberta. Roberta and William were only married for a little over two years when he died.
The two set up a household with William’s five children from a previous marriage. But only one year into their marriage William’s daughter Annie Pearl became ill and died, followed by Fannie Mae. William, a construction worker by day, became violently ill at work, telling his co-workers he had just eaten “bananas and cheese.” Roberta called in a doctor who gave him medicine and instructed the family to call if the Reverend did not improve. The doctor was not called again until William was dying.
Reverend Elder’s children observed that Roberta gave him Milk of Magnesia, as she did for their sisters, to help ease their symptoms. But they later suspected this was how she administered the poison.
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The surviving family members were all treated for exposure to arsenic after showing symptoms themselves. Each of the deceased Elder family members had a life insurance policy taken out in their names by Roberta. She collected on the policies after their deaths.
As the police continued the investigations, they found that Roberta Elder left a trail of bodies in her wake starting in 1938 with the death of her common-law husband John Woodward. Ten more potential victims were identified that died mysteriously while living with Roberta. The victims included an adult son, two of Roberta’s infant children, one only one week old, the other two weeks old, a grandchild, and her mother.
Roberta took out life insurance policies on several of the deceased in amounts ranging from $50 to $225, with the largest policies on Reverend Elder for $500 and $550 on Fannie Mae. She collected on the policies after their deaths.
The police, however, could never prove that she ever purchased arsenic, though William’s surviving children believed she got it from her brother’s farm.
Roberta was convicted to a life sentence based on circumstantial evidence and remanded to prison. The prosecutor lamented that Roberta could not be executed because the law prevented it under circumstantial prosecutions.
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While Roberta’s killing spree did not draw attention from the mainstream white press, the Black press, including the Pittsburgh Courierand Chicago Defender, reported on the case and on Elder’s victims.
Roberta Elder was sent to prison, having never confessed, and her killing and victims went on unremembered. A female serial killer, a novelty to reporters and scholars alike, seemed to arouse no interest.
The same year as Roberta’s prosecution, a white woman named Nannie Doss, was accused of killing four out of her five husbands. Called Lady Bluebeard or the Giggling Grannie because she giggled every time she was asked about the killings, the police later suspected that Doss may have killed eleven family members.
Doss’ notoriety and popular culture capital, nearly seventy years after her crimes, reveal the disturbing trend in American history that Black victims do not draw the kind of media scrutiny and interest that white victims do.
Studies have shown that Black perpetrators are disproportionately overrepresented in the media, while Black victims are underrepresented. Meanwhile white victims are overrepresented out of proportion to the rate at which whites are crime victims.
Psychologist Scott Bonn argues that myths about serial killers and their victims have led to the assumption that Black serial killers do not exist in significant numbers. He argues that this occurs because 90 percent of serial murderers kill people of the same race.
The media perpetrates this myth by giving air time to the kinds of killers that target sympathetic victims, particularly white women. Bonn describes this phenomenon as “missing white girl syndrome.”
Zach Sommers argues that race and gender disparities in news coverage of Black versus white victims are supported by the evidence, and that the race and gender of a victim effects not only whether the victim receives any attention, but also how much attention.
Sarah Stillman argues that these images and messages offer “a subtle instruction manual” on which victims to empathize with and which ones to overlook. This kind of sensational news coverage of “white women and girls in peril” not only obscures a portion of violent crime victims, it reifies the value of whiteness over non-whites who are often at greater risk of violent crime.
Though Roberta Elder’s victims died decades ago, the phenomenon of consistently devaluing Black violent crime victims remains to this day, evidenced by the persistent public fascination with Nannie Doss and her white victims, while Roberta Elder and the victims she is accused of killing remain forgotten.
Between 1952 and 1954, the Black press followed Elder’s case through the criminal justice system, while law enforcement found more potential victims to blame on Elder and the white press took little interest.
Meanwhile, mainstream media became distracted by the “Giggling Granny” who continues to attract infamy as a notorious female serial killer.
Roberta Elder: Atlanta’s Forgotten Serial Killer
Lyda Southard: The Idaho "Lady Bluebeard"
Another example is Lyda Southard (October 16, 1892 - February 5, 1958), also known as Lyda Anna Mae Trueblood, was an American female suspected serial killer.
Trueblood married Robert Dooley on March 17, 1912. The couple settled with his brother Ed Dooley on a ranch in Twin Falls, Idaho,[4][5] and had a daughter, Lorraine, in 1913. Lorraine died unexpectedly in 1915, Trueblood claimed, as a result of drinking water from a dirty well.
Edward Dooley died soon afterward in August 1915; the cause of death was ruled ptomaine poisoning. Robert Dooley subsequently fell ill and died of typhoid fever on October 12, 1915, leaving Trueblood as the sole survivor in the family.
Two years after Robert Dooley's death, Trueblood married William G. McHaffle.[7] Shortly afterward, Trueblood's three-year-old daughter fell ill and died, prompting the McHaffles to move to Montana.[8] A year later, McHaffle suddenly fell ill of what was thought to be influenza and died in Montana on October 1, 1918.
In March 1919, she married Harlen C. Trueblood married for a fourth time in Pocatello, Idaho, to Edward F. Meyer, a ranch foreman, in August 1920. William G. Harlen C. Edward F. Paul V.
Twin Falls chemist Earl Dooley, a relative of Trueblood's first husband, began to study the deaths surrounding her. Along with a physician and another chemist, he soon discovered that Ed and Robert Dooley were murdered by arsenic poisoning.
Stephan discovered that some of the bodies contained traces of arsenic, while others were suspected of arsenic poisoning by how well the bodies were preserved, and found her motive in the records of the Idaho State Life Insurance company of Boise.
All four of Trueblood's husbands had held a life insurance policy where they listed her as the beneficiary. She was found by law enforcement in Honolulu, married for the fifth time to Navy petty officer Paul Southard. Lyda [now] Southard was returned to Idaho to face murder charges on Meyer.
She pleaded not guilty in court, but was convicted of using arsenic to murder her husbands and taking the money from their life insurance policies.
Following a six-week trial, Southard was convicted of second degree murder and sentenced to ten years to life in the Old Idaho State Penitentiary.
She escaped from prison on May 4, 1931 and took up residence in Denver, Colorado, as a housekeeper for Harry Whitlock, whom she married in March 1932, but who ultimately assisted in her arrest in Topeka, Kansas, on July 31, 1932.
Southard returned to the penitentiary in August 1932.
Other Infamous Female Serial Killers
While Roberta Elder's case highlights the historical neglect of Black victims, other African American female serial killers have also left a chilling mark on history:
- Aileen Wuornos: A prostitute who murdered seven men in Florida.
- Christine Falling: Dubbed the "Killer Babysitter," responsible for the deaths of several children in her care.
- Judy Buenoano: Known as "The Black Widow," she poisoned her husband, son, and attempted to kill her fiancé for insurance money.
The Role of Media and Society
The underrepresentation of Black victims in media coverage of violent crimes contributes to the erasure of these stories. Sensationalized coverage of white victims, often referred to as "missing white girl syndrome," reinforces the devaluation of non-white lives.
This disparity in media attention has significant consequences. It shapes public perception, influences law enforcement priorities, and perpetuates a system where some victims are deemed more worthy of justice than others.
Statistical Overview of Female Serial Killers
The following table summarizes some key statistics about female serial killers:
| Characteristic | Description |
|---|---|
| Percentage of Serial Killers Who Are Female | Approximately 15% |
| Common Motives | Financial gain, power, revenge |
| Typical Methods | Poisoning, suffocation, neglect |
| Victim Selection | Often family members, spouses, or individuals in their care |
Serial Killers
