Donald Gaskins

Donald Henry Gaskins, Jr. (born March 13, 1933 in Manning , Florence County , South Carolina , † September 6, 1991 ) was an American serial killer .

Life

Gaskins grew up as an illegitimate child with four half-siblings. His stepfather abused him while his mother was indifferent to him. Because of his small physique, he was teased by his classmates. At the age of 11 he left school and helped out in a car repair shop and on the local farm. With two boys of the same age, he began to commit burglaries and rapes . After the friendship ended, he broke into a house alone, where he was surprised by a 13-year-old girl. He then knocked her down with an ax and was admitted to a reformatory until she was of legal age. Then Gaskins worked on a tobacco plantation. With a colleague, he burned down their tobacco plantations on behalf of the owners in order to get the insurance premiums. When he was confronted by his employer, Gaskins killed his daughter, whereupon he was sentenced to five years in prison. While in custody, he cut a fellow inmate's throat and was given solitary confinement. In 1955 he escaped from prison, but was caught and served until 1961. Between 1962 and 1968 he was arrested twice more for rape.

In 1969 Gaskins began his series of murders. He later justified his actions by saying that they helped him against his depression. The exact number of his murders is not known; he claims it is over 100. Gaskins raped and killed both men and women, including his 15-year-old niece and a two-year-old child. The sadistic Gaskins tortured his victims, sometimes for days, before drowning or beating them and, according to his own unconfirmed testimony, sometimes even ate them up. In 1976, Gaskins was betrayed by an accomplice and sentenced to seven life sentences on seven counts of murder. He received the death penalty for murdering a fellow inmate and was executed in 1991. Gaskins died in the electric chair .

During his incarceration, Gaskins worked with writer Wilton Earl on his autobiography Final Truth , which appeared in 1993.

literature

• Donald H. Gaskins, Wilton Earl: Final Truth - The Autobiography of a Serial Killer , Adept Incorporated, ISBN 0-9632422-0-2