View source for Serial killer Carroll Cole enjoyed killing kittens

[[Category:Long-term_Incidents]]
[[Category:Iowa]]
[[Category:California]]
[[Category:Nevada]]
[[Category:Dogs]]
[[Category:Cats]]
[[Category:HumanVictims]]
{{Infobox Person of Interest
| name = Carroll Edward Cole
| status = Deceased
| age = 47 (at time of execution)
| occupation = 
| involvement = Murdered at least 16 women.
| punitive_measure = Executed by lethal injection on December 6, 1985.
| pii_status = 
| image = Carroll Cole.jpg
| caption = Carroll Cole on November 14, 1984
| title = Serial murderer and animal abuser
}}
'''Carroll Edward Cole''' (May 9, 1938 – December 6, 1985) was an American serial killer who was convicted of five murders and confessed to at least 11 others between 1971 and 1980.<ref name="enwiki_cole">{{cite web|url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carroll_Cole|title=Carroll Cole|website=Wikipedia|access-date=September 20, 2025}}</ref> His case is a quintessential study in the developmental psychology of a violent offender, providing a clear illustration of the "Graduation Hypothesis," where childhood animal cruelty serves as a direct rehearsal for adult homicide.<ref name="radford_cole_profile">{{cite web|url=https://maamodt.asp.radford.edu/psyc%20405/serial%20killers/Cole.%20Carroll%20-%202005.pdf|title=Carroll Edward Cole|website=Radford University|access-date=September 20, 2025}}</ref> His entire criminal career was driven by a displaced matricidal rage, with his victims serving as surrogates for the mother he obsessively hated.<ref name="wondery_tcat">{{cite web|url=https://wondery.com/shows/true-crime-all-the-time/episode/5632-carroll-edward-cole/|title=E217: Carroll Edward Cole|website=Wondery - True Crime All The Time|access-date=September 20, 2025}}</ref>

== Early life and maternal abuse ==
Cole's violent trajectory was forged in a childhood of profound psychological and physical abuse inflicted by his mother, Vesta. After his father left to serve in World War II, Vesta began having numerous extramarital affairs.<ref name="radford_cole_profile" /> She forced the young Carroll, beginning at age five, to witness these encounters and would beat him to ensure his silence, creating a toxic association in his mind between female sexuality, betrayal, and violence.<ref name="radford_cole_profile" />

The most damaging abuse was a systematic assault on his gender identity. Vesta frequently dressed him in girls' clothing and forced him to serve tea to women, a deep humiliation for a boy who was already being relentlessly teased by peers for his "girly name."<ref name="radford_cole_profile" /> This targeted abuse led to what psychiatrists later diagnosed as "confusion concerning sexual identification" and was a primary catalyst for his pathology.<ref name="radford_cole_profile" />

== First killings: The Graduation Hypothesis in practice ==
Cole's first acts of killing were critical developmental steps that directly align with the Graduation Hypothesis, which posits that offenders rehearse on animals before escalating to humans.<ref name="morehead_grad_hypothesis">{{cite web|url=https://scholarworks.moreheadstate.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1466&context=msu_theses_dissertations|title=From Animal Cruelty to Serial Murder: Applying the Graduation Hypothesis|website=Scholarworks @ Morehead State|access-date=September 20, 2025}}</ref>

=== The first animal victim ===
In 1945, at age seven, Cole claimed to have a "blackout" and awoke to find he had strangled the family puppy.<ref name="radford_cole_profile" /> This event was the first physical manifestation of his rage and, critically, established **strangulation** as his signature method of exerting power—the same method he would use on nearly all of his human victims.<ref name="morehead_grad_hypothesis" />

=== The first human victim ===
A year later, at age eight, his violence "graduated" to a human target. He drowned a classmate, Duane, who had been teasing him.<ref name="radford_cole_profile" /> Decades later, Cole revealed the true motivation, stating that the act was directly linked to his mother: "I was primed, I had made the mental commitment I was going to get even with my mother, and things just built up and built up and became an obsession."<ref name="enwiki_cole" /> This confession confirms that his violent acts, even from childhood, were a form of displaced matricidal rage.

=== Later animal cruelty ===
As an adult, following a period of sexual frustration, Cole admitted that he "got pleasure from killing kittens by wringing their necks."<ref name="radford_cole_profile" /> This marks a crucial evolution from reactive rage to proactive, pleasure-seeking violence. It occurred as his violent sexual fantasies intensified and he began non-lethally strangling girlfriends during sex to heighten his excitement, fully fusing the act of killing with sexual sadism.<ref name="radford_cole_profile" />

== Adult murders and displaced matricide ==
The central driver of Cole's murders was his unresolved rage toward his mother. He almost exclusively targeted women he met in bars whom he perceived as promiscuous, as they reminded him of his "adulterous mother."<ref name="radford_cole_profile" /> This process of projection allowed him to cast these women as surrogates for Vesta and then symbolically murder her repeatedly, providing a continuous ritualistic release for his inexhaustible hatred.<ref name="wondery_tcat" />

== Failures of the mental health system ==
Cole's violent career was enabled by repeated institutional failures. He was a man who, possessing a genius-level IQ of 152, understood his own dangerous urges and repeatedly sought help.<ref name="radford_cole_profile" /> In 1961, he flagged down a police car to confess his "urges to rape and strangle woman."<ref name="apple_brutal_nation">{{cite web|url=https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/carroll-cole/id1574203844?i=1000684666470|title=Carroll Cole|website=Apple Podcasts - Brutal Nation|access-date=September 20, 2025}}</ref> Despite being diagnosed with "sadistic, abnormal sexual tendencies," he was released. A psychiatrist, Dr. Weiss, wrote the prescient note, "He seems to be afraid of the female figure and ... must kill her before he can [have intercourse with] it," but still approved his release.<ref name="radford_cole_profile" /> On another occasion, a doctor dismissed his threats, and Cole killed Essie Louise Buck shortly after being discharged.<ref name="radford_cole_profile" />

== Capture, confession, and execution ==
Cole was arrested for his final murder in Dallas, Texas, in 1980.<ref name="enwiki_cole" /> He subsequently confessed to numerous killings across the country. He showed no remorse, stating, "I knew exactly what I was doing and I'm not sorry for what I did."<ref name="radford_cole_profile" /> A dramatic shift occurred after his mother, Vesta, died in 1984. With the psychological engine of his rage extinguished, his life's "mission" was over. He dropped all his appeals and actively sought the death penalty, orchestrating his own execution.<ref name="enwiki_cole" /> Carroll Cole was executed by lethal injection at Nevada State Prison on December 6, 1985.<ref name="enwiki_cole" />

== References ==
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