Drugs and addiction are relevant to the present study: (1) by analogy with drug-taking, the term ‘addiction’ can be applied to serial killing even where drugs are not involved and (2) drugs play an important role in the lives of some serial lust killers. The discussion first turns to two killers where the term ‘addiction’ has been applied but where it appears that drugs were not used. It then looks at two examples of drug-associated killing. Serial lust killer Michael Ross described feeling assailed by intrusive thoughts urging the rape and murder of women. He published an account of his experience in an academic journal concerned with addiction. Joel Rifkin was adopted and seriously bullied by his peers. He described his sexual behaviour as addictive and gave evidence of ambivalence in his killings. Anthony Sowell appears to have been influenced in his sexual addiction by extensive use of crack cocaine.

A desire for belonging is a fundamental feature of humans. Securing and maintaining a bond is rewarding, whereas abandonment, jilting and loneliness trigger strongly aversive feelings. The chapter’s emphasis is upon belonging,and the theoretical basis of understanding Jeffrey Dahmer and Dennis Nilsen is different from those in the preceding chapters. They seem to be motivated by a combination of sexual desire and an abnormally powerful desire to avoid rejection and loneliness. This led them in a perverse direction whereby the need might even be met by a zombie partner. This raises the question of whether finding early on a conventional secure and compliant attachment could have prevented their killings. There is little or no evidence to suggest that they enjoyed killing or held sadistic desires. Dahmer suffered from neglect. Nilsen seemed to imprint upon the image of his dead grandfather.