In my lifetime I have broken every law that was ever made by both man and God. If either had made any more, I should very cheerfully have broken them also.
Catalog
Carl Panzram
Carl Panzram (June 28, 1891 – September 5, 1930) was a serial killer, rapist, arsonist and burglar. In jailhouse confessions and his autobiography, he claimed that he had committed 21 murders—most of which could not be corroborated—and over 1,000 sodomies of boys and men. After a series of imprisonments and escapes, he was executed in 1930 for the murder of a prison employee at Leavenworth Federal Penitentiary. 2Early life Born in East Grand Forks, Minnesota, the son of East Prussian immigrants Johann "John" and Matilda Panzram, he was raised on his family's farm with five siblings. In 1903, at the age of 12, he stole some cake, apples, and a revolver from a neighbor's home. Soon after, his parents sent him to the Minnesota State Training School. While there, he was repeatedly beaten and tortured by staff members in what attendees dubbed "The Painting House", because children would leave "painted" with bruises and blood. Panzram hated this place of torture so much that he decided to burn it down, and did so without detection. In late 1905, he was released from the school. By his teens, he was an alcoholic and was repeatedly in trouble with the authorities, often for burglary and thef
I made a full confession of this murder of McMahon. You sent a number of witnesses from Salem to identify me, which they done. I do not change my former confession in any way. I committed that murder. I alone am guilty. I not only committed that murder but 21 besides and I assure you here and now…
All of your police, judges, lawyers, wardens, doctors, National Crime Commissions and writers have combined to find out and remedy the cause and effect of crime. With all this knowledge and power at their command, they have accomplished nothing except to make conditions worse instead of better.
I am 36 years old and have been a criminal all my life. I have 11 felony convictions against me. I have served 20 years of my life in jails, reform schools and prisons. I know why I am a criminal.
All my associates, all of my surroundings, the atmosphere of deceit, treachery, brutality, degeneracy, hypocrisy, and everything that is bad and nothing that is good. Why am I what I am? I'll tell you why. I did not make myself what I am. Others had the making of me.
I've been all over the world and I've seen everything but hell and I guess I'll see that soon.
I was dumped into a cell without any medical attention or surgical attention whatever. My broken bones were not set. My ankles and legs were not put into a cast. The doctor never came near me and no one else was allowed to do anything for me. At the end of 14 months of constant agony, I was taken to…
You will find that I have consistently followed one idea through all my life….I preyed upon the weak, the harmless and the unsuspecting.
The boy's name I didn't know. He told me he was eleven years old. He was carrying a basket or pail in his hand. He told me he was going to the store to do an errand. He told me his aunt ran this store. I asked him if he would like to earn fifty cents. He said yes.…I hit him on the back of the head…
A little nigger boy about 11 or 12 years old came bumming around….I left him there, but first I committed sodomy on him and then I killed him….His brains were coming out of his ears when I left him and he will never be any deader.
To some of average intelligence, killing six at once seems an almost impossible feat. It was very much easier for me to kill those six niggers than it was for me to kill only one of the young boys I killed later and some of them were only 11 or 12 years old.
Whenever I met one that wasn't too rusty looking I would make him raise his hands and drop his pants. I wasn't very particular either. I rode them old and young, tall and short, white and black. It made no difference to me at all except that they were human beings.
We would wine and dine and when they were drunk enough they would go to bed. When they were asleep I would get my .45 Colt automatic, this I stole from Mr. Taft's home, and blow their brains out.
They stripped us naked and chained us up to a door, and then turned the fire hose on us until we were black and blue and half blind.
I stayed with him for about a month, hoboing our way east, stealing and burning everything we could. I taught him how to set fire to a church after we robbed it. We got very busy on that, robbing and burning a church regular every chance we got.
At that place I got to be an experienced wolf. I would start the morning with sodomy, work as hard at it as I could all day and sometimes half the night…I was so busy committing sodomy that I didn't have time left to serve Jesus as I had been taught to do in those reform schools.
I made up my mind that I would rob, burn, destroy and kill everywhere I went and everybody I could as long as I lived.
Naturally, I now love Jesus very much. Yes, I love him so damn much that I would like to crucify him all over again!
Mother was too dumb to know anything good to teach me. There was little love lost. I first liked her and respected her. My feelings gradually turned from that to distrust, dislike, disgust and from there it was very simple for my feelings to turn to into positive hatred towards her.
I first began to think that I was being unjustly imposed upon. Then I began to hate those who abused me. Then I began to think that I would have my revenge just as soon and as often as I could injure someone else. Anyone at all would do.