Monsters May Be Closer Than They Appear
Those who know a serial killer well might have a cognitive disadvantage.
Posted July 25, 2025 | Reviewed by Tyler Woods
In June, Peacock released a docuseries that focused on Rex Heuermann’s family. He's the chief suspect in seven of the murders attributed to the Long Island Serial Killer (LISK), with potentially more to be assigned. His wife of twenty-seven years, Asa Ellerup, filed for divorce , but she maintains a position that her husband was incapable of the murders: “No. I don’t believe my husband did this." She dismissed his torture porn and graphic checklists for murder as “absurd.” In contrast, Heuermann’s daughter, Victoria, admitted the possibility that he’s LISK, but said she’s still on the fence.
People express surprise about Asa’s stance in light of the mounting evidence. Yet she offers multiple reasons: he’s a family man, she never saw this behavior, he doesn’t need the services of sex workers, he kept no secrets from her. She admits she might be in denial , and she’s not alone.
More and more people are discovering relatives or close associates who were living double lives. News items are full of them. From cheating spouses to religious con artists to family men with a murder habit, many have learned to successfully pose as morally normal. Assisting them is a cognitive quirk in those they know that distorts objectivity, so that their flaws or bad acts are minimized. This can take the form of affinity bias , the halo effect , or just an avoidance of cognitive dissonance , depending on the relationship and circumstances.
Years ago, I included a chapter in Inside the Minds of Serial Killers that focused on people who were close to a killer, partly because outsiders believe that a spouse or close associate “had to know.” But thanks to positive-leaning biases, they often don’t. I can name a number of intelligent people who just didn't see.
Among the best—and most agonizing—descriptions of this distortion came from Lionel Dahmer, Jeffrey Dahmer’s late father. After watching his son’s 1992 sentencing for the murders of seventeen men, he wrote A Father’s Story . He realized that the naïveté through which he’d repeatedly interpreted Jeffrey’s behavior had been influenced by his personal fears. He admitted he’d failed to spot the clues, even the obvious ones. He simply couldn’t.
Lionel had been in his son’s small apartment. It smelled a bit, yes, but not that badly. He was stunned to learn that police had found Polaroid photos of dismembered males, pickled genitalia, skulls in a closet, heads in the refrigerator, and receptacles full of decomposing human remains. He recalled questioning Jeff’s reason for a standalone freezer and accepting his justification that it would help to save money. It was actually intended for freezing his victims’ parts.
Lionel admitted he was unaware of his son’s early substance abuse problem, although he'd noticed that Jeff often seemed vacant—“enclosed”—as if spaced out. Lionel had also found liquor bottles emptied and refilled with water. Jeff had been uninterested in girls, but Lionel viewed this as shyness not homosexuality . Jeff had a full-size male mannequin in his closet and Lionel believed him when he said that it was a “prank.”
Lionel came to understand that he just didn’t let himself see. To grasp Jeff’s deviance reflected badly on him , the father, and each incident, while potentially disturbing, had alternate explanations—better ones. Easier to live with.
When Jeff resided at Lionel’s mother’s home, she asked Lionel to check out a terrible odor. When Lionel confronted Jeff, he said he liked to experiment with chemicals on chicken parts from a grocery store. Lionel found “meat juice” near the garbage cans that seemed to back him up. “I allowed myself to believe Jeff,” Lionel mused, “to accept all his answers regardless of how implausible they might seem…. More than anything, I allowed myself to believe that there was a line in Jeff, a line he wouldn’t cross… My life became an exercise in avoidance and denial.”
Lionel’s position is understandable. So is Asa’s. Parents, spouses, and close friends often view the behavior of those for whom they have positive regard in the best possible light. It’s why troubled kids aren’t taken to counselors. Parents hope it’s just a phase they’ll outgrow. On the day Lionel Dahmer realized that his son was a liar , alcoholic , exhibitionist, thief, and child molester, he thought, “even all those grotesque and repulsive behaviors could be thought of as a stage through which he would one day pass.”
So, those who develop a shadowed existence beneath a normal facade benefit from these distortions. They exploit the pass they’re granted. If caught, they know their lies will often be accepted, reframed, or forgiven, maybe even facilitated.
We can grasp, then, why those who are emotionally close to a serial killer without knowing it might beat themselves up when the killer is outed. They're mystified over how they failed to see what was right in front of them. Some will cling to their former sense of the person. Like many biases, this distortion has an emotional frame, firmly rooted and resistant. On a tribal level, it might once have been an evolutionary advantage, but it adapts poorly for modern society...and, in some cases, for personal security.
Whether a halo effect, selective perception, or cognitive dissonance is at work, the tendency to view things in benign terms when it’s about someone we know can be a cognitive disadvantage. No matter what evidence is presented to the contrary, we’re prone to believing that our loved ones would never do something like that . This leaves us vulnerable to aligning with them, even when it makes us seem ignorant.
Dahmer, L. (1994). A Father’s Story . NY: William Morrow.
Haselton, M.G., Nettle, D., & Andrews, P.W. (2005). The evolution of cognitive bias. In Buss D.M. (ed.). The Handbook of Evolutionary Psychology . Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons.
Nolasco, S. (2025, June 28). Rex Heuermann's ex-wife Asa Ellerup and their daughter, Victoria Heuermann, are speaking out in 'Gilgo Beach Killer: House of Secrets'. Fox News .
Ramsland, K. (2006). Inside the minds of serial killers. Westport, CT: Praeger .
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Katherine Ramsland, Ph.D., is a professor of forensic psychology at DeSales University and the author of 69 books.
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