The Book of Murder Quotes

“There is a comedian I follow on Instagram named Rodney Norman. He once posted his perspective on enduring hardship, saying: “You’re either a child of God or a cosmic miracle, either way you’re pretty friggin’ awesome.”
― Matt Murphy, The Book of Murder: A Prosecutor's Journey Through Love and Death

“But I will go a step further. Not only are many true serial killers perfectly capable of functioning in society, and not only are their actions usually not the product of childhood abuse, in my experience many of them grew up in circumstances that were the exact opposite. Many of them, to put it lightly, were spoiled rotten as kids. They had every advantage and opportunity in life and came from a psychological position far closer to extreme entitlement than victimhood. They kill because they want to. They kill because they sexually get off on it. They kill because, to them, killing is fun.”
― Matt Murphy, The Book of Murder: A Prosecutor's Journey Through Love and Death

“Counterintuitively, some of the worst nations for extradition are the UK, France, and, not far behind them, Spain. They are often very difficult to work with. Erin set up a call with the special agent in charge of the FBI in Prague.”
― Matt Murphy, The Book of Murder: A Prosecutor's Journey Through Love and Death

“Each country has its own extradition treaty with the US and various levels of cooperation. The consensus pick for the most extradition-friendly country in Europe was, interestingly, the Czech Republic. Apparently, all countries from the former Soviet bloc have a great deal of respect for the American system of justice and trust the fairness and due process afforded criminal defendants here.”
― Matt Murphy, The Book of Murder: A Prosecutor's Journey Through Love and Death

“There was the nice, charming, manipulative, draw-you-in part,” Cortney ended up testifying about Nayeri. “And then there was this angry, crazy, temper-driven, scary part. And it could go from zero to a thousand in a minute….Of course, I was in love with him.”
― Matt Murphy, The Book of Murder: A Prosecutor's Journey Through Love and Death

“First, they reminded me that no matter how bad our lives seem to be, at least we get to wake up in the morning and try to make it better. We can be in the most toxic relationship, desperate for money, for companionship, for anything—and yet we still have pizza, we still have Netflix, we can still enjoy something. We still have a chance. Maybe murder cases are so compelling, in part, because sometimes we need to remember that.”
― Matt Murphy, The Book of Murder: A Prosecutor's Journey Through Love and Death

“So, what is the takeaway from this, aside from never underestimating a California beach kid and her dog? The first is not to fall victim to the fallacy that we can do a better job at intuitively spotting psychos than Debra Newell did. When we are lonely, we can be very sympathetic targets to the emotionally unhinged or predatory.”
― Matt Murphy, The Book of Murder: A Prosecutor's Journey Through Love and Death

“When dealing with strangers, especially those we meet online, predators often show warning signs that you can spot if you’re looking—but that the well-meaning, naive, and forgiving among us might miss.”
― Matt Murphy, The Book of Murder: A Prosecutor's Journey Through Love and Death

“I prosecuted several horrific murder cases where my victim met her killer online. Loneliness, and the fundamental human need for interpersonal connection, coaxes some people into letting their guard down in ways that perhaps they shouldn’t. We have all been there before, in one way or another, but never within the context of the current format of dating apps and the promises of quick connection, quick sex, and quick love.”
― Matt Murphy, The Book of Murder: A Prosecutor's Journey Through Love and Death

“The truth, as Sam finally explained it: He and Xavier went to meet Cathy. Sam went to her car, and they began arguing. Xavier heard Cathy begin to scream and he went to pull Sam away, assuming he had gotten physical. He didn’t realize Sam had a knife and was stabbing her. Xavier accidentally cut his hand trying to pull Sam off her. Cathy got away, but Sam chased after her, and cut her face and her head. Xavier helped Sam put Cathy into the trunk, where Sam cut her wrists and neck, sealing her fate. Just like I had argued. Going back to the example of our two cowboys, the initial flurry of knife wounds could have been a second-degree murder. But the throat slash and cuts on the wrists made it a pure, cold-blooded first-degree offense. They drove to the hospital lot and parked, and left the car.”
― Matt Murphy, The Book of Murder: A Prosecutor's Journey Through Love and Death

“Over time, you begin to see patterns in domestic violence cases that may be instructive. Very few domestic violence murders happen out of the blue. If I had to pick the four horsemen of an impending DV apocalypse, they would be jealousy, manipulation, anger, and control. They manifest in different ways, but, unfortunately, too often the result is death.”
― Matt Murphy, The Book of Murder: A Prosecutor's Journey Through Love and Death

“There was an ex-husband who waited in ambush during a custody exchange, killing his ex-wife and her father after a bad day in Family Court. He had been insistent in the morning that his wife’s attorney be present during the exchange and was no doubt disappointed that he didn’t get to kill him,”
― Matt Murphy, The Book of Murder: A Prosecutor's Journey Through Love and Death

“We can all relate to the fundamental awfulness of a case where domestic violence escalates into death—which is far and away the most common type of murder you see in suburban areas.”
― Matt Murphy, The Book of Murder: A Prosecutor's Journey Through Love and Death

“According to the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence, one in four women and one in nine men have experienced severe physical violence from an intimate partner, and there are more than ten million domestic violence instances per year in the US.”
― Matt Murphy, The Book of Murder: A Prosecutor's Journey Through Love and Death

“When monsters like Alcala are released, they will kill other people. It may not be popular to say this, especially in an era of professed “criminal justice reform,” and when we want to believe that everyone is redeemable, but Rodney Alcala was living proof that some people are not. Sexual predators do not get better. They may get better at not getting caught, but they do not change. When we release violent sexual predators, it is only a matter of time before more innocent people, and their families, suffer.”
― Matt Murphy, The Book of Murder: A Prosecutor's Journey Through Love and Death

“think there is an important lesson here, especially as states like California start to swing back to a policy of therapy and early release. Predators like Rodney Alcala do not reform. There is no “treatment” that can modify the behavior of a genuine sexual psychopath, and attempting to fix these people is nothing short of reckless folly.”
― Matt Murphy, The Book of Murder: A Prosecutor's Journey Through Love and Death

“When it was at last time to give my closing argument, I could finally let loose, and I went pretty hard. I raised my voice, pointed my finger at him, and walked that jury through every single charged, sadistic act committed by the demon in the room with us.”
― Matt Murphy, The Book of Murder: A Prosecutor's Journey Through Love and Death

“The pathologists’ testimony was disturbing. They methodically explained how the victims had died: Alcala would strangle these women, but do it slowly, bringing them back, again and again, to the brink of life so that he could violate them in every way possible. There was a copious amount of semen found at every scene. He would keep them alive so that he could recharge and do it again and again before finally deciding to watch the light of life leave their eyes. And then he would pose them and photograph their dead bodies. Rodney Alcala was a monster. There is no other word for him.”
― Matt Murphy, The Book of Murder: A Prosecutor's Journey Through Love and Death

“Napoleon Bonaparte once said, “Never interrupt your enemy when he is in the process of making a mistake.”
― Matt Murphy, The Book of Murder: A Prosecutor's Journey Through Love and Death

“But how exactly did I end up prosecuting a case that took place when, like Robin Samsoe, I had also just turned twelve years old? The background that I am about to describe might be more than a little upsetting, not just in the brutality of the crimes committed, but for the unforgivable failures of the criminal justice system in the way it handled a prolific sexual predator.”
― Matt Murphy, The Book of Murder: A Prosecutor's Journey Through Love and Death

“At the same time, the uncomfortable truth is that the person standing in front of us at Starbucks could be a serial killer and we would never know. The reason why “Jack the Ripper” was never caught, I believe, is precisely because he was able to walk away from those horrific crime scenes and instantly blend in with everyone else in 1880s London. “Jack the Ripper” was successful precisely because he wasn’t Buffalo Bill.”
― Matt Murphy, The Book of Murder: A Prosecutor's Journey Through Love and Death

“In my humble opinion, based on an admittedly anecdotal sampling of a mere half dozen or so of these individuals, this truly misses the mark. In my experience, these guys are not only perfectly capable of perceiving the emotions of other people, they are highly attuned to them. They lustfully enjoy the imposition of fear, pain, and cruelty on innocent others. Not only do they perceive this suffering, they derive immense sexual gratification by inflicting it.”
― Matt Murphy, The Book of Murder: A Prosecutor's Journey Through Love and Death

“This driving desire is not the absence of a thing, but a thing in itself. It is a burning, lustful, joyous desire to prey upon, dominate, and then inflict as much fear and pain as possible. We just don’t seem to have a word for it. Cruelty partially fits, sadism comes close, the German word schadenfreude (taking delight in the suffering of others) is in the ballpark, but there isn’t a term I am aware of that accurately describes what compels these people to do what they do. I believe in science, but the farther you go back in the historical record, the more you encounter a simple word, religious in origin, that may most accurately summarize the mindset of true serial killers. It seems to fit better than anything else: evil.”
― Matt Murphy, The Book of Murder: A Prosecutor's Journey Through Love and Death

“but a thing in itself. It is a burning, lustful, joyous desire to prey upon, dominate, and then inflict as much fear and pain as possible. We just don’t seem to have a word for it. Cruelty partially fits, sadism comes close, the German word schadenfreude (taking delight in the suffering of others) is in the ballpark, but there isn’t a term I am aware of that accurately describes what compels these people to do what they do. I believe in science, but the farther you go back in the historical record, the more you encounter a simple word, religious in origin, that may most accurately summarize the mindset of true serial killers. It seems to fit better than anything else: evil.”
― Matt Murphy, The Book of Murder: A Prosecutor's Journey Through Love and Death

“I looked for years, but I couldn’t find Buffalo Bill. Instead, I kept encountering defendants who were pretty much exactly the same as the serial rapists I had been prosecuting in Sexual Assault for the previous four years. Instead of sad, lonely outcasts, serial rapists tend to be arrogant, narcissistic, cruel, and entitled. They typically have jobs, steady relationships with consenting sexual partners, no shortage of academic ability, and social success. In my experience, most of them have no misconceptions regarding their moral compass. They know their actions are wrong—they just don’t care.”
― Matt Murphy, The Book of Murder: A Prosecutor's Journey Through Love and Death

“In the end, the final judgment read as follows: “‘His crimes are those of an antisocial, sadistic, bloodthirsty being, who considers himself privileged to commit these atrocities because he was once upon a time treated in an asylum for insanity, and thereby escaped well merited punishment. He is a common criminal and there are no ameliorating circumstances to be found in his favour’—V. was sentenced to death.”
― Matt Murphy, The Book of Murder: A Prosecutor's Journey Through Love and Death

“Contrary to my own misconceptions, it turns out that serial killers have been around for as long as there have been people—neither the modern world nor America is to blame. After discussing the well-known case of Jack the Ripper, Dr. von Krafft-Ebing discusses the far lesser known Vacher the Ripper, who stalked the French countryside in the late 1800s, murdering perhaps two dozen people. He would rape, strangle, and mutilate his victims, who included girls, women, and boys. It was said that he was born “of honourable parents and belonged to a mentally sound family. He never had a severe illness, [and] was from his earliest infancy vicious, lazy and shy of work.”
― Matt Murphy, The Book of Murder: A Prosecutor's Journey Through Love and Death

“These are not the same as the sadistic, sexual predators like Ted Bundy, John Wayne Gacy, or Jeffrey Dahmer, who would fit any definition we might want to apply. I prosecuted thirteen defendants during my time in Homicide who met the most basic requirements, but only six were true serial killers, and between them they likely accounted for well over a hundred murders, and certainly over a hundred separate sexual assaults. They were clever, prolific, and incredibly cruel.”
― Matt Murphy, The Book of Murder: A Prosecutor's Journey Through Love and Death

“The case was beyond compelling. In fact, it reminded me of the plot to the old movie Body Heat starring William Hurt and Kathleen Turner. There was money, betrayal, sex, and murder. Bill McLaughlin was fifty-five years old at the time of his death, and had been a brilliant businessman.”
― Matt Murphy, The Book of Murder: A Prosecutor's Journey Through Love and Death

“They had their assumptions about who was responsible, as did the police, but it would take a full fifteen years before murder charges were filed. Rather than yell, or publicly criticize the investigation, these women sent cookies to the Newport Beach Police Department each year on the anniversary of the slaying. It was the gentlest of reminders not to forget about their dad. These were wonderful human beings showing grace under the worst circumstances imaginable. Meeting them for the first time broke my heart, and the more I learned, the more motivated I became.”
― Matt Murphy, The Book of Murder: A Prosecutor's Journey Through Love and Death