Girl, 11

by Amy Suiter Clarke

It sounds like every choice in your life until now has been made for you.

The amount of pain a woman can bear with a smile on her face is astonishing.

Jim Clemente, who has a saying: “Genetics load the gun, personality and psychology aim it, and experiences pull the trigger.” It takes a perfect, devastating blend of circumstances to create a serial killer. Childhood trauma is only part of it.

“My parents didn’t want me to become a police officer. They had hoped I would study medicine, like my brother. But I saw the way the world pressured and even forced some women to bear children, only to let them flounder once they were born. I wanted to protect them from that. I am keenly aware of who the system leaves behind. In this country, police have rarely served people who look like me. That’s why I’m here — I work for them.”

Do you have anything you want Elle to play on her podcast? Natalie: Um, yeah. Don’t give him attention. Sash: What do you mean? Natalie: Just that he would want everyone to be talking about him, and I don’t think you should. He killed a bunch of people who never got to be famous for anything other than being dead. I don’t think he should get the attention because he did that to them.

The man we knew as the Countdown Killer wanted nothing more than to have every one of you looking into his background, holding up the terrible things we’ve uncovered about his childhood and jilted romance as some evidence for why he was the way he was. He wanted to control the narrative around himself. I’m sure he would have loved for you to dissect his every thought and motivation. So, I’m not going to give him what he wants, and I hope you won’t either. Don’t share every moment of his life on your blogs and Reddit posts. Don’t delve into the gruesome way he controlled and murdered girls, the unverifiable theories about what he may have done in the twenty years between his triad killings. Don’t give him the satisfaction of a legacy, even if it is the worst kind of legacy a person can have. Talk instead about the lives he stole, the futures of the women he wiped out before they could make a name for themselves on this planet. Talk about Amanda Jordan and the impact she had in her eleven short years. Focus on the girls whose lives he ended, not the pitiful life he used as a reason for doing so.