One year ago Wednesday, a frantic man wearing handcuffs flagged down police and told them he had escaped from an apartment after a man threatened him with a knife. The grisly scene police found inside the apartment sent shock waves around the nation.
The discovery of human heads inside a refrigerator and body parts strewn about the floor brought an end to the 13-year killing spree of Jeffrey Dahmer and the unraveling of a horrifying story.Now, one year after his arrest, the 32-year-old Dahmer sits in isolation in an 8-foot-by-10-foot jail cell at the Columbia Correctional Institution in Portage.
Dahmer interacts with the approximately 40 inmates in his unit, and they still consider him a celebrity prisoner. But as he settles into prison life, he is blending in with the population, said Joe Scislowicz, information officer with the state Department of Corrections.
"He is in the process of losing his celebrity status," Scislowicz said. "There are a lot of celebrities here who have lost it over time because they become integrated into the community and that's the expectation with him."
Dahmer, a former candy factory worker, killed his first victim, 18-year-old hitchhiker Steven Hicks, in Ohio in 1978. He moved to Milwaukee and established a pattern of murder that lasted until he was caught.
Dahmer met his victims, often at gay bars, and invited them to his home. Once there he drugged them, killed them, had sex with them and dismembered them. He ate some of the body parts. In all, he killed 17 young men and boys.
Dahmer confessed to multiple killings and was convicted in the slayings of 15. A jury found Dahmer was sane at the time of the killings, and Milwaukee County Circuit Judge Laurence Gram sentenced him to 15 life prison terms. He is not eligible for parole for 937 years.
In the year since Dahmer earned the title as Wisconsin's most notorious serial killer, much has been said about him. Books and comic books have been written, jokes have been invented and even a comedy skit has been performed on Saturday Night Live.
Dahmer himself lives a quiet existence.
He is in administrative confinement, meaning he is not enough of a risk to be placed in the disciplinary unit but too much of one to be in the general population, Scislowicz said.
In the morning Dahmer works between 90 minutes to two hours sweeping, mopping and dusting in his unit. He eats with a small group of inmates in his unit and has the rest of the day to himself. He smokes cigarettes, watches television in his cell, reads and writes. He gets mail regularly.
"He used to get much more. He probably gets six to eight letters a day," Scislowicz said.
In addition to unlimited visits from his attorneys, Dahmer is allowed three two-hour visits a month with people on his visiting list.
"I know that my time in prison will be terrible," Dahmer said at his sentencing, "but I deserve whatever I get because of what I have done."