HALF a century ago serial killer David Berkowitz began his reign of terror in New York city – shooting random women at point blank range.
Today the question remains, why did the man – calling himself The Son of Sam – go on this murderous rampage?
GettySerial killer David Berkowitz smirked after being caught[/caption]
APVictims Valentina Suriani, Christine Freund, Virginia Voskerichian and Stacy Moskowitz[/caption]
GettyOne of the letters Berkowitz sent to the police as the elusive ‘Son of Sam’[/caption]
Berkowitz, 72, who is serving a life sentence for six murders and seven attempted murders, decided to confess all in a series of taped interviews in 1980.
Now journalist Jack D Jones has revealed the contents of those interviews in a new Netflix documentary titled Conversations with a Killer: The Son of Sam Tapes.
Jones, who covered prison and had spoken to many inmates, became obsessed with Berkowitz – even visiting him at weekends during his free time.
Having sat across from one of America’s most notorious serial killers for hours on end, the reporter believes Berkowitz took “gratification” from seeing victims’ families grieve and, in his twisted mind, wanted to be “a hero”.
Berkowitz, though, is a slippery character who keeps changing his story.
After being caught he told detectives that a 6,000-year-old demon, speaking through the dog of his neighbour Sam Carr, ordered him to commit the murders.
But he told Jack that story was a “sham” to excuse slaying “innocent people”.
Jack says: “He was a modern Jack the Ripper character with a gun. This was some crazy motherf***er.”
When the reporter received a letter from New York’s notorious Attica prison in 1980 with the name D Berkowitz on it, he could hardly believe it.
Just three years earlier the former US soldier had been caught by police following the biggest manhunt in New York’s history.
The Son of Sam had targeted young women with long brunette hair, often firing at the men they were with as well.
Having stabbed two young women in December 1975, both of whom survived the vicious attacks, he switched to using a .44 caliber handgun.
From his first shooting in July 1976 to a final failed plan to commit a massacre in August 1977, fear spread across the Big Apple.
Both young men and women stopped going out at night as the police appeared powerless to stop a killer who struck at will.
When Berkowitz was apprehended, police officers found bizarre messages scrawled in red all over the walls of his spartan apartment.
He was a modern Jack the Ripper character with a gun
Jack D Jones
To the world, this loner was a dangerous “nut job”. But that is not the impression Berkowitz gave when Jack first met him.
“Berkowitz comes over, bounds round the table and to my surprise he stuck his hand out and says ‘hi, I’m David,’” Jack recalls.
“He’s the last person you’d expect to be a serial killer.”
Intrigued, Jack wanted to know what his motivation was for ending the lives of so many young people.
Over the weeks he says “we formed an ongoing relationship” and slowly Berkowitz opened up about his past.
Making of a murderer
Berkowitz was adopted by the childless Pearl and Nathan Berkowitz, with his birth mother Betty Broder not wanting to keep a child she’d had with a married man.
He told Jack: “My parents were very nice, fair, kind, loving people, everything positive.”
But he admits to being “very mean” to his devoted adoptive mother, saying: “I used to rip up her clothes, tear a hole in her blouse or something.”
Berkowitz also used to set fires in stairwells.
Berkowitz comes over, bounds round the table and to my surprise he stuck his hand out and says ‘hi, I’m David.’ He’s the last person you’d expect to be a serial killer
Jack D Jones
His dad Nathan thought that rather than telling Berkowitz that his mother had given him up, he would lie and say she had died in childbirth.
That, though, made the youngster feel guilty about the death of his birth mum.
Then his adoptive mother Pearl died from cancer when Berkowitz was aged just 14 – and in 1974 he tracked down his birth mother.
He disapproved of Betty having him out of wedlock and thinking he “was an accident”, adding: “It’s like a volcano erupting.”
Twisted logic
Berkowitz resented others seemingly following a similar path to his mother.
Often his targets would be couples making out in parked cars late at night – and in his depraved mind, “It felt like I was getting revenge.”
But there might be another reason. While serving in the US Army in South Korea, Berkowitz started experimenting with drugs, including the hallucinogenic LSD.
Friends felt he changed after this, and he became more of a loner on leaving the forces in 1974.
It has been suggested that the Robert De Niro movie Taxi Driver, about a vigilante New Yorker, released in February 1976, could have inspired him.
But Berkowitz had already stabbed two women by this point and told Jack: “The movies didn’t cause it, but they did reassure me.”
Cowardly killer
GettyDonna Lauria was Berkowitz’s first victim to die[/caption]
AP:Associated PressStacy Moskowitz was the last person to be shot dead by the Son of Sam[/caption]
APStacy’s boyfriend Robert Violante was shot in the eye, leaving him permanently blinded[/caption]
APPolice officers reading about the .44 killer, as he was first known[/caption]
Berkowitz did, however, buy himself a .44 Bulldog gun because he found it hard to kill someone with a knife.
The coward didn’t like to make eye contact with his victims.
Jack says: “He told me he was seeking out women he could kill. He said he had to view his victims as what he wanted them to be.
“When his intended victims asked him if he needed any help or would smile, he couldn’t do it.”
There were occasions where he ended up helping people he had initially targeted.
He told Jack: “I was always upholding the image of a good upstanding citizen.”
In his spare time Berkowitz, who worked various dead end jobs, had helped fire trucks get to blazes.
The movies didn’t cause it, but they did reassure me
David Berkowitz
Jack says: “His whole life he’d been practising keeping this horrible side of himself inside. David Berkowitz was looking to be a hero.”
But the psychotic side of his personality took over.
Donna Lauria, 18, was his first victim to die, gunned down as she got out of a car in the Bronx in July 1976.
Berkowitz said: “I had so much anger, one killing wasn’t going to quench it.”
Late at night he would trawl the city planning his next murder, mainly choosing couples sat in cars.
After 20-year-old secretary Stacy Moskowitz was shot in the head in July 1977 her funeral was shown on television. Her boyfriend Robert Violante survived the attack but was shot in the eye, leaving him permanently blinded.
Jack recalls: “He remembered the grieving process everybody was going through. He seemed to get gratification from it.”
Stacy was to be his final victim.
Snared by parking ticket
A parking ticket led detectives to Berkowitz, who a neighbour described as “that nut”.
They became even more suspicious on learning Berkowitz had shot a dog belonging to Sam Carr for barking.
With the police closing in, Berkowitz headed to the wealthy Hamptons on the coast near New York with the intention of massacring holiday makers with an automatic weapon.
But the terrible weather stopped him.
Berkowitz admits on tape: “When it started to rain and there was no one around, I got in the car and went home.”
After his arrest he claimed he committed murder because Sam the Demon “made me do it”.
It was all just a sham, to be frank with you
David Berkowitz
Berkowitz was declared mentally fit to stand trial and pleaded guilty to all of the shootings, and was sentenced to 25 years to life.
In his interview with Jack, though, he admitted to making up the voice in his head line because he had to “convince myself that I’m not the one that’s doing this”.
He confessed: “It was all just a sham, to be frank with you.”
Even though Berkowitz will be forever known as the Son of Sam, he does not think there was anyone called Sam behind his bloody crimes.
Jack thinks that this loner was desperate for attention, concluding: “He achieved what he wanted. A lifetime of notoriety.”
It could be argued that another documentary about Berkowitz will just give him what he wants. But with his next parole hearing due in May 2026, it should also convince everyone how truly dangerous this serial killer is.
Conversations with a Killer: The Son of Sam Tapes is streaming on Netflix now.
New York PostHis arrest was front page news[/caption]
A parking ticket led to Berkowitz being caught
GettyBerkowitz took drugs in the army, which those close to him say changed him[/caption]
GettyThe killer signed his notes ‘Son of Sam’[/caption] Published: [#item_custom_pubDate]
