From the 60s-90s, there were many serial killers who were caught and put into custody. But then, it just kinda... stopped? I'm aware that the amount of serial killers is unknowable, but surely, with increases in forensic technology and surveillance, there would be even more caught. But there aren't. What happened?
Spree/mass shootings seem to have taken their place
More sophisticated forensics catching killers before they get the chance to become serial killers?
Killers picking victims cops don’t care about - they don’t get reported - no serial killer
There’s been more than one cop/ex cop serial killer with inside knowledge of police tactics to evade getting caught at the scene even when there is an immediate police response
Iirc this was a big reason Bruce McArthur took so long to get caught, he targeted people from Toronto's gay village. People from the area knew there was a serial killer targeting them, but the police actively denied that there was any reason to believe that until they caught him. They had questioned him 5 years prior in connection to one of his victims after he made a post online saying he had
killed and eaten a man from Toronto's gay village around the same time a man from Toronto's gay village went missing, but was let go, and another of his victims was a homeless man who was never reported missing in the first place.
Green river killer did this too, almost all his victims were sex workers and teenage runaways
And Jeffrey Dahmer.
Such shootings might be like the SEO of murder. Serial killing isn't as efficient so maybe it's fallen out of practice among the murder inclined.
efficiency under pop-a-cap-italism
Oh yeah, I do remember that, when I was a lib in college, I took digital forensics (I fucking hate the whole field now, I grew), and my ex-FBI professor did mention that she was on the case that arrested a Drexel University security guard that had an obsession with woman's shoes. He would steal woman's shoes, and write so many fantasies on his computer about killing women for their shoes. Once, he finally actually killed a woman for her shoes, but he got caught. He's probably textbook serial killer, and would likely have not stopped after his first victim had he not been caught. So there may be many more that never got the chance to become serial.
That was definitely the case of Anthony Sowell, who killed 11 women between 2004-2009 in Cleveland. His victims were all Black women, so nobody cared enough to do anything.