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Unsung heroes in the face of horrorMay Bleeker
Catch me a Killer
Numbering myself amongst that group kindly referred to as “sensitive viewers” (or “sissies” to our less compassionate friends), it took me a while to finish this book. I had to read it in gulps, with lots of fresh space in-between, in order to gain some distance from the intimate close-ups with South African serial killers. Notorious as always, we have managed to take second place in the world for the number of serial murderers that walk amongst us. At times reading like a fact file, this who’s who of serial killers provides names, dates and details relating to various cases, and tracks them from their gruesome starting points, to their lock-up ends. Spanning years of work in the SAPF, Micki Pistorius logs her experiences, her perceptions, and a mountain of information on the murder of innocent people. Fuel for an active imagination, especially in an environment that dishes up violence for breakfast, lunch and the late night news, this book is not for the faint-hearted. If you don’t mind seeing strangers in a new light of suspicion, if you don’t mind realising the often arbitrary nature of death and how it comes about at the hands of tortured, lost, and twisted people, then read this book. It illuminates the dark interiors of the men who commit these crimes, explores their methods, thoughts, and confessions, and through the experiences of the writer, one gets a hint of their internal realities. A whiff of sulphur, an impression of their painful, bleak internal workings. A continual thread throughout the book, is the personal experiences of the writer. One obtains her internal perspective of events and their impact, but strangely, as if from a distance. “The abyss” is referred to as a space in which the writer senses and perceives information relating to the serial killers active at the time, but this space remains only vaguely defined, and while responses are intensely personal, the narrative somehow seems distant and im-personal. A shield, perhaps, for just how close and personal can you safely get, with reality-based horror like this? Of interest, is the way the writer compiles the profiles, how she deduces startlingly accurate characteristics, from the minutest of seemingly unrelated details of crime-scenes. More useful still, to those amongst us who brave these hellish circumstances in the name of work or duty, this book provides insight into how serial killers ‘become’, and offers a plausible psychological framework for understanding the processes involved. This offers the small glimmering possibility of intervention, should the signs be recognised early enough, and acted upon in time. The most valuable thing I took from this book, was the view it provided me of the work done by members of the (then) South African Police Force (now the South African Police Service), and the kinds of people that make up that service. In the descriptions I caught glimpses of people largely unsung and unseen. Solid, courageous people, doing the work of grown-ups.
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