Isn’t it strange? Our tendency to be drawn towards fear and the exhilarating rush that follows. Obviously, no one truly wants to be chased by a real axe murderer in the pitch black night. However, we do appreciate a good scare, as long as it’s not a real threat. This feeling of simulated terror is what links thrilling exploits such as roller coaster rides, horror films, and BASE jumping. It has a certain intriguing charm that’s near impossible to resist. That’s why you might find this list irresistible, even with the unnerving dread it could evoke. You may even be driven to delve into the details of these unresolved mysteries, to the point of being haunted by the idea that the same axe murderer who preyed on Jane Doe fifty years ago might invade your home. Usually, we would ease your worries, reassuring you about the rarity of such incidents. But in this specific situation, we simply can’t. The unnerving truth is that the criminals responsible for these horrifying actions have still not been caught. They remain at large. We deeply regret adding to your nocturnal frights. Here are 25 profoundly disturbing and unsolved crimes.
The Brabant Killers
Belgium’s most notorious unsolved crime spree, between 1982 and 1985 a series of violent attacks left 28 dead and 40 injured.
The Original Nightstalker
This serial killer was active in California between 1979 and 1986. He raped at least 50 women and murdered 10 people.
The Icebox Murders
After Charles Rogers murdered and dismembered his abusive father and mother, he disappeared and was never heard of again. The police found his parents in their freezer.
Ashley Freeman and Laura Bible Disappearance
It was December 29, 1999 and Laura Bible was sleeping over at her friend Ashley Freeman’s house. That night Ashley’s parents were shot in the head and the home was set on fire. The girls were never found.
Zodiac Killer
This was a serial killer that operated in northern California during the 60s and 70s. His name came from several cryptic messages that he sent to the local press.
The children who went up in smoke
It’s another story of children disappearing during a fire, except this time it was 5 kids. On the night before Christmas of 1945, in Fayetteville, West Virginia, the Sodder family home caught fire and burned down. The mother and father escaped with four of the children while the other five were never heard of again.
Disappearance of Ray Gricar
Ray, the district attorney of Centre County, Pennsylvania disappeared without a trace. His laptop was found in a river a few counties over while his home computer had searches for how to destroy a hard drive. His car was also found in a nearby county.
Chicago Tylenol murders
In 1982 several people were poisoned and died when they swallowed tylenol capsules that had been laced with potassium cyanide.
Disappearance of Amy Lynn Bradley
Amy went missing during a cruise with her family in 1998. One year later a man was approached at a brothel by a woman claiming to be Amy Bradley and asking for help. He reported it to the police several months later but by that point the brothel had burned down.
Jack the Ripper
Possibly the most famous unsolved crime, this English serial killer has haunted the collective imagination for more than a century.
Hinterkaifeck murders
Hinterkaifeck is a small town in Bavaria, Germany where a family was brutally murdered in 1922. The family’s neighbors reported that several days prior to the attack the father had mentioned that he noticed tracks in the snow leading from the forest to the family’s home but the tracks didn’t lead back to the forest. Apparently he had also had mentioned sounds in the attic, but this was all reported to police after the murder.
Villisca Axe Murders
On the night of June 9, 1912, the Moore family was bludgeoned to death with an axe in the small town of Villisca, Iowa. One suspect was tried twice but acquitted.
Annecy Shootings
High in the French Alps, nearly the entire family of Iraqi-born British tourist Saad al-Hilli was killed by a sniper in 2012. Nobody has been convicted.
Texarkana Moonlight Murders
In 1946 the city of Texarkana was terrorized by a killer who struck in the middle of the night over a span of 10 weeks. It even led to a movie called the “The Town That Dreaded Sundown”.
Isdal Woman
Possibly Norway’s greatest mystery, this unidentified woman was found dead in the Isdalen Valley near the city of Bergen. Her passport was burned, her fingerprints had been sanded, and any possible piece of identifying evidence had been eliminated. The mystery remains unsolved.
Boy in the Box
This is the name given to an unidentified murder victim between the ages of 4 and 6 whose naked and battered body was found in the Fox Chase section of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in 1957. He is known as America’s Unknown Child and his identity has never been confirmed.
Colonial Parkway Killer
The Colonial Parkway Killer was a serial killer believed to have murdered at least 8 people along the Colonial Parkway in Virginia between 1986 and 1989. Three couples were murdered and one is missing/presumed dead.
Lake Bodom murders
On June 5, 1960, four teenagers went camping on the shores of Lake Bodom in Finland. Early in the morning 3 of them were murdered with a knife. The surivor, Nils Wilhelm, was charged 44 years later but then acquitted.
Murder of JonBenét Ramsey
In 1996 police found the body of 8 year old JonBenét in the basement of her family’s Colorado home. Initially the parents were suspected on allegations of child abuse but the controversial case has still not been solved.
Assassination of Olof Palme
Olof Palme, Prime Minister of Sweden, was murdered on February 28, 1986 in Stockholm, Sweden. He was fatally shot while walking home from the cinema with his wife. Even though more than 130 people have confessed to the crime, it remains unsolved.
Dyatlov Pass incident
In 1959, nine skiers/hikers were killed in the northern Ural Mountains of Russia. They had apparently cut open their tents from the inside in order to escape whatever eventually killed them. Theories range from enraged local tribesmen to an avalanche.
The murder of Ken McElroy
Ken McElroy was the town bully of Skidmore, Missouri. One day he was shot in broad daylight in front of 46 witnesses, including his wife. Nobody called an ambulance and upon being interviewed nobody except for his wife could name a suspect. The DA declined to press charges and no shooter was ever named.
West Mesa Murders
This refers to the case of 11 women being found buried in the desert outside of Albuquerque, New Mexico in 2009. No suspects have been named.
Disappearance of Maura Murray
Maura Murray disappeared on the evening of February 9, 2004 after crashing her car on route 112 in Haverhill, New Hampshire. A nursing student at University of Massachusetts, she had told her professors early in the week that she had a family emergency. No such emergency existed.
The case of Bradford Bishop
A foreign service officer, in 1976 Bradford murdered his wife and children in Maryland and then disappeared. Since then numerous sightings have been reported in Europe but because he worked for the foreign service, and immigration/air travel was harder to track back then, the case is cold for now.