Killer Highways and Cold Confessions: The Evolution of the American Serial Murderer

They don’t make serial killers like they used to.

The era of roaming madmen slipping undetected between state lines is fading—replaced by a world of DNA databases, surveillance cameras, and cell phones in every pocket. But what does that mean for those rare few who still kill—and the ones trying to catch them?

This excerpt, taken from Dead End, explores the chilling patterns of interstate murderers, the changing face of criminal investigation, and one inmate’s decades-late confession from a maximum-security prison in Missouri.

Come face to face with the darker corners of justice, memory, and motive. You may never look at an empty stretch of highway the same way again.

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They don’t make serial killers like they used to. To be sure, there will always be serial killers stalking the streets, or in the case of the I-70 madman, stalking the interstate. FBI data says interstate killers fall into three distinct categories.

• Itinerant individuals who move from place to place.
• Homeless individuals who are transients.
• Individuals whose employment lends itself to interstate or transnational travel, such as truck drivers or those in military service.

And FBI agents say with advancements in technology, the days of the serial killer may be numbered.

“It is certainly a much more dangerous game for them today than it was during the time of the I-70 killer,” said FBI profiler Larry Ankrom. “When you consider the advancements of forensics and DNA, their chances of being caught are going to be much greater in the years ahead.”

What has also changed are people’s habits. We are all less vulnerable now with a cell phone in one pocket and perhaps pepper spray in the other. There are cameras everywhere waiting to snag a criminal in action. And when was the last time you saw a hitchhiker with his thumb up on the street?

“Bad guys used to have easy targets,” says Ankrom. “Those days are long gone.”

Today, lethal injection is the most common form used by states for the killers who do receive the death penalty. Utah still has a firing squad on the books. They can still hang people in New Hampshire. And in the south, the electric chair is still in play. But with many convicted murderers on death row for more than 20 years, it is much more likely the fear of being caught by modern technology is far greater than the fear of imminent punishment.

In 1991, Emory Futo woke up in his California home, hopped on an airplane, flew to St. Louis, and one by one went on a manhunt and killed his parents and two brothers, then got back on a plane and flew home.

Futo was sentenced to life in prison without parole. He had maintained his innocence for more than 30 years until he contacted me and said he wanted to tell his story. He confessed from his prison cell in Potosi, Missouri.

“I know now that what I did was wrong,” Futo told me. “I hope and pray I will be forgiven. I’m sorry for all the pain I caused. I am so sorry. I know I am going to die in prison.”

Futo said he killed his parents because of years of physical and emotional abuse. He killed his brothers when they would not go along with his plan. As we talked, I asked Futo about whether the death penalty gave him pause, or acted as a deterrent.

“Never,” he told me. “Never. I had gone through so much, that once I decided I could not take it anymore, I knew what I had to do. I was so filled with rage and anger, nothing or nobody was going to stop me.”

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