Whenever I need to remind myself of the absolute nadir of human morality and the apex of human depravity, I think of Fred and Rosemary West. They weren’t the model for Billy and Janice Dent, but they could have been. They were an English husband/wife murdering-and-torturing duo who turn even my considerably reinforced stomach.
Today we’re going to talk about Rose.
As most of you know, there aren’t a lot of women serial killers, and most of the ones we know about didn’t behave similarly to their male counterparts. Men tend to lean into brutality, domination, and cruelty, whereas female serial killers are often subtle, usually choosing poison as their weapon of choice. They are “quiet killers,” who aren’t interested in harming or debasing their victims, just eliminating them.
Rose West was different. I won’t subject you to specifics here — they are readily available online, of course — but suffice it to say, Mrs. West was just as fond of violence, rape, and general assault as her male equivalents. She enjoyed torturing her victims in a variety of ways, many of which we typically associate with men.
She murdered her stepdaughter while Fred was in prison for theft. He must not have minded because when he got out, the two of them embarked on a truly grotesque, decades-long series of assaults and murders that only ended when they were arrested in the early nineties. Fred committed suicide while in prison. Rose is still alive in an English prison.
For some reason, this bit from Rose’s Wikipedia page really gets to me:
Rose grew up into a moody teenager, prone to daydreaming….
I mean….that could describe a lot of us, right? And yet most of us don’t go on years-long torture-and-murder sprees.
If you want more information on Rosemary West, I suggest you start with her Wikipedia page and go from there if you truly need more.
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