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Thriller Thursday: Mass Murder in Ohio

Due to this post from Roni Loren (thank you for the warning, Roni) I’ve decided to remove most photos from Thriller Thursday. I hope you’re still able to enjoy them!

In his book, The Anatomy of Motive, legendary FBI criminal profiler John Douglas said mass murderers are different from serial killers. The serial killer is driven by sexual motives, and he continue to kill because he believes he can outwit the police, but mass murderers have an endgame strategy. They are killing to make a statement, and most will either commit suicide when they’re finished or let the cops do it for them.

James Urban Ruppert wasn’t quite that brave.

On March 30, 1975, (Easter Sunday) James Urban Ruppert murdered eleven family members in his mother’s home in Hamilton, Ohio. As an adult, he was described as average, but he was envious of his older brother’s success. James had flunked out of college while his brother was an athletic star and electrical engineer. At the age of 41, Ruppert had moved back in with his mother, who voiced her frustrations at her son’s failed efforts to hold down a job. He also owed his mother and brother money (to add salt in the wound, his brother married Ruppert’s ex-girlfriend and had eight children with her).

Ruppert had an early love affair with guns as they represented the security and male toughness he’d always been told he lacked. Over the years, his continued failures and growing sense of being powerless cultivated his gun fantasies.

Like most mass murderers, James exhibited early warning signs. Ten years before the murders, the Hamilton Police Department received a report of an obscene phone call to the public library. James Ruppert admitted to making the call, and his delusions were voiced to local police. He believed his mother and brother were trying to discredit him by badmouthing him around town, thought the FBI had tapped his home phone, bugged his car and listened in to his conversations in bars and restaurants.

 

James received psychiatric treatment. He still believed the FBI and and police were sabotaging his career, preventing him from keeping a job, and affecting his personal life. Ruppert also believed he was being followed by a variety of law enforcement types.

By the time of the murders, his life was in shambles. His mother was sick of supporting him and threatened to kick him out. Her threats came a few days before their annual Easter family reunion, something James always looked forward to.

In the next few days, he inquired about a silencer and was told they were illegal. He then headed for the Miami River and had target practice with his .357 Magnum. He loved the feeling of control the gun gave him and took no notice of those watching him.

The night before Easter, James spent hours at a local lounge talking up a waitress he knew. He complained about his unemployment, finances, and uncaring family. He also told the waitress he had a problem that needed to be taken care of immediately.

On the afternoon of Easter Sunday, James’s brother and his wife were in the kitchen talking with his mother. The children played around the house.

James had retired to his room, having mentioned something about target practice. While there, he collected a .357 revolver, two .22 pistols. and a rifle. He went downstairs and set the rifle agains the refrigerator. His brother asked about his Volkswagen.

Psychiatrists would later say James believed his brother had been sabotaging the car, and the question brought an onslaught of anger and memories of the injustices he felt his brother had done to him since childhood.

James fired the first shot from his .22 pistol at his brother, and then turned on his sister-in-law. Eleven-year-old David and nine-year-old Teresa ran into the room at the sounds. His mother tried to protect her family, but James shot her and both children. He then began walking through the house killing the rest of his family: Carol, 13; Ann, 12; Leanord III, 17; Michael, 16; Thomas, 15; John, age 4. It took less than five minutes.

James then went to the bathroom, cleaned up, and dressed in fresh clothes. Three hours later, he phone the police and told them there were bodies in the house. He met them at the door and did not resist when taken into custody.

The crime scene would stick with everyone who witnessed the carnage. All eight children and two adults had been shot in the head, execution style. James’s sister-in-law was shot in the chest.

“When I walked through that front door, right into the middle of all that carnage, I saw that little 4-year-old boy, with blue bib corduroy overalls on, a long-sleeve blue cotton shirt and lying on the floor at the foot of the couch, stretched out with a bullet hole in his head.  In his outstretched right hand, he had partially opened the tin-foil purple wrapper off a chocolate Easter egg.”
—Prosecutor John Holcomb.

The defense worked hard to convince the jury that James Ruppert was legally insane and suffered from a paranoid psychotic state. One psychiatrist said Ruppert’s reaction may have been uncontrollable, that the suppressed rage accumulating since childhood had taken over. Psychiatrists from the state said the murders were clearly planned and James knew exactly what he was doing.

The 3-judge panel in Hamilton, Ohio sentenced found Ruppert guilty on all account and sentenced him to life. A mistrial was later declared and the second trial was held 125 miles north in Findlay.

Prosecutors revealed evidence from witnesses who saw Ruppert engaging in target practice, asking about silencers, and talking about solving the problem of his mother. Another guilty verdict, and a another trial granted on appeal in 1982. Ruppert’s defense attorney was convinced he was insane. Finally, on July 23, 1982, a second 3-judge panel found Ruppert guilty of first degree murder in the case of his mother and brother, but not guilty of the rest of the murders by reason of insanity. He received life sentences for both murders, to be served consecutively.

He resides in the Allen Correctional Facility in Lima, Ohio. He was denied parole in 1995 and his next opportunity will be in 2035, when Ruppert is 101 years old.

What do you think? Were significant warning signs missed? Was Ruppert legally insane when he killed the children? Was his sentencing fair?

20 comments on… “Thriller Thursday: Mass Murder in Ohio”

  1. There were definite warning signs, but you can’t lock someone up for appearances. I also don’t get the leap that he was insane while killing the kids. He went to his room for the guns and would have loved to have silencers. And his resentment towards the brother and the ex-girlfriend could carry through to their kids.

    • I agree, Barbara. He knew those kids were there and he had plenty of ammo. And like you said, the resentment probably carried through to the kids. No, you can’t lock someone up for appearances, and sometimes, no matter how hard we try, people slip through the cracks.

      Thanks for stopping by!

  2. Interesting story and variations on that theme exist all over the U.S. Anger, jealousy and years of resentment pile up in a lot of family relationships. It’s the paranoia, the delusions about his brother’s actions, that sets this apart with a hint of what was to come.

    I’m always disturbed when I hear a rant or witness some kind of irrational, delusion-induced behavior, but you can’t arrest someone just because they are crazy. A friend of mine, a big, healthy woman, won’t go in the elevator with her neighbors anymore. They harbor delusions about her and threaten her on a regular basis. Having been on the receiving end of a delusional rant, I know that it makes you feel helpless. You have to disengage, or if you have any possible control (as a parent etc.) try to help that person get help.

    The police told my friend that this was a ‘neighbor thing’ and that they aren’t interested. If she were more vulnerable, I’d be worried about her story leading the local news.

    • I do agree that paranoia and years of anger can build and make a person explode. It’s amazing what sickness and vulnerability can do to the human mind. It’s much more fragile than people realize.

      Wow, that’s very sad about your friend. And it’s so unfair that the only thing she can do is avoid those people. I’d be afraid regardless.

      Thanks for your comment.

  3. I agree with Barbara, there were definitely signs but again, you can’t lock someone up or force them to get treatment because they are weird or display signs. And I think he knew exactly what he was going for ALL the murders!

    • No, you can’t, and sometimes we are so caught up in our own lives it’s very easy to dismiss people like Ruppert as being weird. And you just don’t think about something so awful happening.

      Thanks for posting!

  4. You did a great job on this post!

    I agree that warning bells should have been going off with this guy. When you’ve known someone a long time, though, it’s hard to see that they might be dangerous. You know what’s crazy? I’d bet everybody who knew this guy up close and personal had a funny feeling about him. But, as others have pointed out, making others feel funny isn’t against the law.

    Good to know he won’t be getting out…unless he lives forever. LOL

    • Thank you. And very true – it’s easy to become desensitized to someone’s behavior no matter how off the wall it is. And yes, I bet they did, too. But most of us don’t automatically expect the worst from people when they seem off.

      Yes, thankfully he’s in there for good.

  5. It does seem like he was planning it, from the account you give here, Stacy. But one still has to question the sanity of anyone this evil. I think he’s right where he ought to be, though.
    I found the definition of mass murderer vs serial killer interesting.

    • Yes, at least within 24 hours. It seems his mother kicking him out was his breaking point. I can’t imagine he didn’t plan on killing the kids with all the ammo he had.

      I found that interesting, too. Mass murderers and spree killers are vastly different than serial killers. John Douglas’s profiling is fascinating.

  6. From the shot of his perp walk Ruppert walked erect and from observation looks like he knew what he had done. Any act of mass murder begs the question “Is the perpetrator insane?” The mere act of killing one person can be attributed to threat or vengence. Killing eleven people shows signs of a disconnect on the part of the killer, especially when he notifies the authorities. Ruppert is insane, the act shows it. Splitting his verdict between guilty and guilty by reason of insanity is absurd. He either commited murder with a clear mind and malice in his heart or he was deluded and killed because of mental dellusion. You cannot determine exactly when the snap occured.

    • No, you can’t determine when the snap occurred, and he might have mental issues, but in my mind, anyone asking for silencers – a way to hide the act – indicates he knew right from wrong. And I disagree, splitting the verdict was very odd.

      Thanks for stopping by, Tom.

  7. To some degree, anyone who does this sort of thing is bat-crazy. I have long thought that “guilty but insane” would be a better verdict. Then you could lock the person up AND get them necessary psychiatric treatment. Moreover, those affected by the murderer’s actions would have the relief of knowing that the killer was considered guilty, rather than having the “innocent” term hanging out there, even if the killer is institutionalized.

    Like everyone else here, I agree that you simply can’t know which emotionally disturbed people will go off, and not all of them do. So how do you treat such signs? I do struggle with letting clearly paranoid people have guns, but I’m not sure how to legislate that.

    Great post, Stacy! Your posts always make me think about justice, mercy, the criminal mind, victims, and more.

    • You know, I have to agree with that. Guilty, but insane should be an option. I do think you’ve got to have some degree of mental incapacity, but in cases like Ruppert, he knew right from wrong. His search for silencers, etc. proved that. I don’t know how you’d legislate that, either, especially when some disturbed people are so good at hiding it until it’s too late.

      Thanks for stopping by, Julie.

  8. I hadn’t heard the difference between serial killers and mass murderers described quite that way before. In a way, they’re both seeking gratification, one of pride/ego and the other sexual. It seems to me, though, that mass murderers are actually cowards and Ruppert is a perfect example. Rather than taking the initiative to change whatever’s bothering them, they blame others and then “escape” either through death or jail.

    • I hadn’t either, until I read Anatomy of Motive, but the way Douglas explains it makes perfect sense. His books are a great study of the criminal mind.

      I love your thoughts on both seeking gratification – spot on. And yes, complete coward and looking to blame others for his faults instead of stepping up.

      Thanks, Marcy!

  9. Legally insane or not, this man was definitely in a crazed state when he committed his crimes. Criminals like him think differently than “normal” healthy people, but that doesn’t give them a free pass, or other benefits, IMHO. I agree with Marcy—not signs of strength, but weakness.

    • Yes, he was. My issue (and I don’t know if this is how the law reads) is that I believe he KNEW right from wrong, because he wouldn’t have looked for the silencers, etc. And he didn’t try to hide what he’d done. He accepted the responsibility. So I don’t think he qualifies as insane, or rather, innocent by insanity.

      Thanks for commenting!

  10. Pingback: Why Do I Write Horror? « The Midnight Novelist

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