Top 10 Serial Killers that Look the Least Like Serial Killers

Some serial killers look exactly like the nightmare your brain would cast. Others look like the guy who would help you carry groceries, smile at your dog, and ask you how your week's going. That disconnect is what gives this list its bite. You are not looking at monsters with neon warning signs over their heads. You are looking at faces that seem ordinary, soft, polished, harmless, or even oddly wholesome. And that is the part that really gets under your skin.

This list is not about innocence, sympathy, or rewriting what these people did. Not even close. It is about how unsettling it is when evil shows up wearing an everyday face. The whole thing messes with your instincts. You expect menace and get normal. You expect chaos and get calm. So cast your vote for the entries that make you do the biggest double take, the ones that make you think, "No way. Him?" That jarring mismatch is exactly what puts someone near the top.

1. Ted Bundy

   

   Theodore Robert Bundy (born November 24, 1946) was an American serial killer, kidnapper, rapist, and necrophiliac. He assaulted and murdered numerous young women and girls during the 1970s and possibly earlier. Bundy was executed via electric chair on January 24, 1989. His exact number of victims remains... read more

   In the picture by his name, he does look like he could be a serial killer. But in other pictures and shows, he looks like a nice guy. He looks like a super nice guy. I'll probably die from him also because I'll probably get fooled.

   He looks very charming and charismatic. He definitely does not look like a serial killer. He looks like a normal person.

   He looks like a normal guy. I would've never expected someone who looks like him to be a rapist or a murderer.

2. The Boston Strangler

   

   Albert DeSalvo, also known as the "Boston Strangler," was an American serial killer who is believed to have killed at least 13 women in the early 1960s. He was known for gaining entry to his victims' homes by posing as a maintenance man or repairman. DeSalvo was eventually apprehended, confessed to the... read more

   Though his name certainly suggests he is a killer.

3. Cleophus Prince Jr.

   

   Cleophus Prince Jr. is an American serial killer who was convicted in 1993 for the rape and murder of six women in San Diego County, California, between January and September 1990. Prior to these crimes, he was court-martialed in 1989 for larceny while serving in the U.S. Navy. After serving his sentence... read more

   I don't know. He just doesn't look like one to me.

4. Paul Bernardo

   

   Paul Kenneth Bernardo, also known as Paul Jason Teale, is a Canadian serial killer and serial rapist. He was arrested on February 17, 1993, and during a 71-day search, police discovered videotapes of his crimes hidden in an upstairs bathroom.... read more

   Serial killers rarely ever look like "serial killers." This list shows that they can come in any shape and size.

5. Lee Roy Martin

   

   Lee Roy Martin, also known as the "Gaffney Strangler," was an American serial killer from Gaffney, South Carolina. He murdered four women between 1967 and 1968. Martin was captured after he called a newspaper reporter and led authorities to the victims' bodies.

6. John George Haigh

   

7. Gordon Northcott

   

8. Derrick Todd Lee

   

   Derrick Todd Lee (November 5, 1968 - January 21, 2016), also known as the Baton Rouge Serial Killer, was an American serial killer. From 1998 to 2003, he terrorized the areas surrounding Baton Rouge and Lafayette, Louisiana, by committing the murders of at least seven women. He was convicted of murder... read more

   Looks like a non-killer.

9. George Joseph Smith

10. Beverley Allitt

    
The Newcomers
11. ?

    Albert Fish

    

    Hamilton Howard "Albert" Fish was an American serial killer, child rapist, and cannibal. He was also known as the Gray Man, the Werewolf of Wysteria, the Brooklyn Vampire, the Moon Maniac, and The Boogey Man.

    In March 1935, he was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to death by electrocution... read more

12. ?

    Kermit Gosnell

    
The Contenders

13. Karla Homolka

    

14. Richard Ramirez

    

    Ricardo Leyva Muñoz Ramírez, known as Richard Ramirez and widely referred to as the Night Stalker, was an American serial killer, rapist, and burglar. He was born on February 29, 1960, in El Paso, Texas, as the youngest of five children to Julian and Mercedes Ramirez. His father was a Mexican national... read more

    He looks more like a detective who spies on serial killers or suspects of being serial killers.

15. Donald Harvey

    

16. Robert Maudsley

    

17. William Heirens

    

    William George Heirens was a convicted American serial killer who confessed to three murders in 1946. He was dubbed the Lipstick Killer after a message scrawled in lipstick at one of the crime scenes. Heirens was sentenced to life in prison and remained incarcerated until his death in 2012.

    He doesn't look dangerous at all, but looks can be very deceiving. Anyone could be a serial killer, no matter how innocent they look.

18. Jane Toppan

    

    No one suspected her of being a serial killer until she was brought to justice. She was a nurse, and for the longest time she was believed to be an angel of mercy.

19. Dennis Rader

    

    Dennis Lynn Rader is an American serial killer who murdered ten people in Sedgwick County, Kansas, between 1974 and 1991. He was known as the BTK killer, which stands for Bind, Torture, Kill. Rader was arrested in 2005 and is currently serving ten consecutive life sentences without the possibility of... read more

    He looks like my dad. No wonder my parents divorced.

    He looks like an angry science teacher.

20. Kate Bender

    

    Kate Bender was part of the infamous Bloody Benders family, who murdered at least 11 people in Kansas from 1871 to 1873. The Benders lured victims to their home, where they killed and robbed them.

    Known for her beauty and purported psychic abilities, Kate was in her early twenties.... read more

21. Bruce McArthur

22. Velma Barfield

    

    Margie Velma Barfield, born October 29, 1932, was an American serial killer. She was convicted of one murder but eventually confessed to six additional poisonings. Barfield became the first woman in the United States to be executed by lethal injection after capital punishment was reinstated in 1976.

23. David Parker Ray

    

    David Parker Ray (November 6, 1939 to May 28, 2002), also known as the "Toy-Box Killer," was an American kidnapper, torturer, serial rapist, and suspected serial killer. Although no bodies were recovered, accomplices accused him of multiple murders, and police believed he may have killed up to 60 women... read more

24. Rose West

    

25. Edmund Kemper

    

    Edmund Emil Kemper III (born December 18, 1948) is an American serial killer, rapist, necrophile, and admitted cannibal who murdered ten people, including family members and young women, between 1964 and 1973. Known as the Co-Ed Killer or Co-Ed Butcher, he stood around 6 feet 9 inches tall and had... read more

26. Robert Hansen

    

    Robert Christian Hansen (February 15, 1939 - August 21, 2014), known in the media as the "Butcher Baker," was an American serial killer. Between 1971 and 1983, Hansen abducted, raped, and murdered at least seventeen women in and around Anchorage, Alaska. He hunted many of them in the wilderness using... read more

27. Dennis Nilsen

    

    Dennis Andrew Nilsen (November 23, 1945 - May 12, 2018) was a British serial killer and necrophiliac. He was also known as the Muswell Hill Murderer and the Kindly Killer. Nilsen murdered at least 12 young men in a series of killings committed between 1978 and 1983 in London, England.