It?s a country where everybody is allowed to have a gun. Would you say danger lurks at every corner in the US so that a gun becomes a necessity? Crime is rife across world, but only in the US does it seem magnified as an extension of socio cultural life.
Of course Americans are scared of crime too, but they seem to lap it up as entertainment. Like mythological stories that every child listens to, American crime stories about gangsters and the Mafia, bank robbers and serial killers, drug cartels and bootleggers, gun toting cowboys and any number of tales of criminals have become the subject of films, comic books, TV shows. They cover bad Great Depression and prohibition times to famous prisons like Alcatraz created to punish the most dangerous of criminals.
Literally millions of American tourists and other foreign tourists have visited Alcatraz Island prison museum. Here you learn that disobeying society?s law gets you to prison, but disobeying prison laws takes you to Alcatraz. This maximum security federal penitentiary, jail to 1576 crooks for 29 years upto 1963, overlooks San Francisco Bay where, in contrast, opulent American lifestyle is visible. I?ve never seen any museum so crowded that you don?t get a ticket on-the-spot. You have to do advance bookings. Even as you queue up to buy advance tickets or board the boat you can see crooks being hero worshipped. They are in large billboards with their quotes. ?It looks like Alcatraz got me licked,? inmate 85 Al Capone, among the most dreaded criminals, had said. George ?machine gun? Kelly, Alcatraz inmate no 117 recorded, ?These 5 words seem to be written in fire on the wall of my cell: Nothing can be worth this!?
Just imagine, Americans like Bill Gates or Steve Jobs who?ve contributed so much to changing thought processes across the globe and dictating how we do business, communicate or entertain ourselves, still don?t have a museum on their lives where the public can get inspired, but the famous crooks do. Alcatraz houses memoirs of these dangerous anti-socials. Banner stories abound of escape bids by 36 prisoners caught in the crossfire of bullets and strong undersea undercurrents. You can join an audio tour of former inmates, correctional officers and residents as they reminisce about life in Alcatraz. The thrill you experience is like visiting Disneyland or Universal Studios. But let me narrate that to you, blow by blow, next week so you enjoy the thundering storm of Alcatraz during the tenure it was open.
Can crime be a cultural phenomenon? American society has evolved from the killer instinct, from fights and battles that united 51 States. Of course their pioneering and inventive spirit that?s changed the world cannot be questioned. A multitude of crimes are committed here not for money or drugs, but because the criminal was psychologically or socially misbalanced, depressed or just plain bored, lonely, angry or wanted to kill. From real crime in high protection American prisons, writers write books that get translated into spectacular Hollywood block buster films, or programs that get spectacular TV TRPs. Let me portray 3 live examples where FBI professionals have displayed deep sensitivity and the art of making prisoners talk for TV reality shows with eye-to-eye emotional conversations.
Case 1: 34-year-old Joe Rifkin told the FBI he was a serial killer. He brutally strangled 17 prostitutes and dumped their body parts all over the New York metropolitan area. ?There were nights I?d be with two girls and then a third girl, and she would be the one I would kill,? he recalled. His bloody murders went unnoticed for 4 years until 1993 when he left the 17th girl?s corpse in his family garage for 3 summer days. The decomposed smell gave him away to the New York police when he went to dispose of the body. Rifkin very calmly recalled details of each of his murders. In his bedroom they discovered scores of items he collected from his victims. He said he would use these items to remind him of the crime and relive that sexual pleasure. Rifkin is serving 203 years in jail now.
Case 2: Ron Luff followed Jeff Lundgren?s fanatic religious cult without hesitation in Kritland, Ohio. Lundgren used guilt to manipulate his 20 followers to eternal damnation mandated by God if they did not follow his every word. He would test their devotion by holding Bible classes from morning to 2 am, and making them fast while he ate lavish dinners in front of them. ?The whole Ethiopian famine was personally attributed to my failure,? said Luff. ?I remember tears coming out of my eyes and thinking Oh my God, it?s my fault people are dead. I felt these things and they were real to me.?
Lundgren convinced Luff that Christ?s second coming will only be possible through human sacrifice. To ?quench the fire of God? he chose to murder his followers, the Avory family. He made Luff dig a huge hole in the farm barn. Luff first brought the adults, tied their hands, mouth and eyes with duck tape while Lundgren shot them. The same routine was followed for their three small children, and they were all buried. Months later, Luff realised, ?I began to doubt whether I could continue because God had gotten too ugly to follow anymore.? He gave himself up to the police which led to Jeffrey Lundgrens?s end too.
Case 3: Reginald McFadden, just out of prison two months ago in 1994 for two previous murders, gave his broken down Cadillac for repair. Shocked to hear the high cost of repair, he loitered around the Long Island railroad station. ?There was rage, full rage in me. I decided to go ahead and go back into my hell. I got to a platform and there was Margaret Kierer,? he recounted about 78-year-old Margaret who become his 3rd victim. McFadden attacked her, bound and dragged her to the backyard, brutally raped her and stabbed her to death. ?I?m not remorseful. I?m not sorry. I don?t fear death. I have learned to hate white people. You mark your own fate,? he said.
From Hollywood films to TV reality shows, crime stories make a huge amount of money in the US. If you are a story writer, take advantage of real facts of the many different types of crimes in America to get a subject embedded with a crime potion so that you can cater to their thirst for crime as entertainment.
Shombit Sengupta is a creative business consultant to top managements. Reach him at http://www.shininguniverse.com