Learn about serial killers |
Melissa Underwood |
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Dubbed by USA Today as "The Dean of Death," James Fox will visit SIUE to take students into the minds of murderers. Fox is a professor in the College of Criminal Justice at Northeastern University in Boston. He is recognized as an authority on homicide. His resume includes consulting Congress, former President Bill Clinton, former Vice President Al Gore, former Attorney General Janet Reno and Princess Anne of Great Britain. Fox served on Clinton's advisory committee on school shootings and is a visiting fellow with the Bureau of Justice Statistics. Fox has written 15 books and dozens of articles on the topics of serial/mass murder, juvenile murder and statistical methods. He has made numerous TV appearances on "Dateline NBC," "20/20," "48 Hours" and "The Oprah Winfrey Show." One of the foremost authorities on criminology in the United States, Fox had an unlikely start. "I got into this field by accident," he told USA Today. "I needed a course to finish my undergraduate degree." Criminology was available and convenient. So he took it and was hooked. Even now, 23 years after completing doctoral studies, he gets a kick out of chasing statistics. "My adrenaline starts to pump when there is a mass murder somewhere," Fox said. "The media calls start coming in and I'm just overtaken by it." The lecture, "Overkill: Serial Murder Exposed," will be presented at 7 p.m. Thursday in the Morris University Center Conference Center. Fox will closely examine the driving forces behind serial murders. He will present testimony from the murderers, their families and the surviving victims. Jeffrey Dahmer, Ted Bundy and John Wayne Gacy are among those to be discussed. Fox's program will be illustrated with his collection of full-color slides. The free program is sponsored by the Current Affairs Committee of the University Center Board. For more information, call Mindi Ernst at 650-3371. | |