You wouldn't want to go on a double date with these killer couples. Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we’re taking a closer look at 20 of the most infamous and terrifying serial killer couples in history.
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00:00He was a real tough, dangerous guy.
00:04A rebel without a cause that spread terror in a community.
00:07Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we're taking a closer look
00:10at 20 of the most infamous and terrifying serial killer couples in history.
00:14The crimes committed by Moore's murderer Myra Hindley shocked the nation.
00:20Yaroslav and Dana Stolilovi
00:22Between September 2001 and December 2002,
00:25Yaroslav and Dana Stolilovi went on one of the most notorious
00:28and shockingly violent crime sprees in Czech history.
00:31The married couple, who had struggled for money in the past,
00:34ruthlessly targeted a number of elderly, retired, and presumably wealthy people,
00:38typically by forcing their way into their homes and then tying their victims up.
00:42The Stolilovis then robbed what they could,
00:44before killing the people they stole from.
00:46In most cases, a combination of attempted cover-ups
00:49plus major mistakes by the investigating police
00:52meant that the pair was never even suspected.
00:54Until, after months of terror and a total of eight murders,
00:58they were found at the scene of the crime,
01:00and both were sentenced to life imprisonment.
01:02David and Catherine Burney
01:04The Morehouse murders are one of the darkest cases in modern Australian history.
01:08The Burneys drove around, waiting to spot a single girl to abduct.
01:12Stirling Highway was their favorite hunting ground.
01:15Girls were enticed to the car by what they thought
01:18was a harmless married couple asking for directions.
01:22They happened over the course of five weeks in 1986,
01:25when David and Catherine Burney of Perth lured five women and girls
01:28to their home at 3 Morehouse Street.
01:30The victims were subjected to horrifying sexual abuse,
01:33and in some cases, they were kept trapped in the residence for days.
01:37The first four women were murdered at the end of their ordeal,
01:40and their bodies were buried in a shallow grave.
01:42The fifth was able to escape, however, make it to the police,
01:46and ensure that her captors were finally caught.
01:49Both were sentenced to four terms of life imprisonment.
01:52The Burneys were sentenced to life on four counts of willful murder,
01:56to be served concurrently.
01:58That meant a 20-year minimum jail term.
02:01But Justice Wallace said then,
02:03in my opinion, you should not be released from prison ever.
02:07James Marlowe and Cynthia Kaufman
02:09Disturbingly, this killer couple also committed their crimes
02:12over a number of weeks in 1986, but this time in California and Arizona.
02:22James Marlowe and Cynthia Kaufman met shortly after Marlowe was released
02:31from a separate stint in prison.
02:32They then toured the country, got married,
02:35and began targeting and killing apparently random female victims.
02:38While it's thought that the true extent of their murder spree is still unknown,
02:42both Marlowe and Kaufman were convicted and sentenced to death in 1990.
02:53Susan and Michael Baer Carson
02:55Kaufman, who is still living on death row,
02:58was the first woman to be issued with the death penalty
03:00following its reinstatement in California in 1977.
03:04Susan and Michael Baer Carson
03:06Susan Baer Carson, formerly Susan Barnes,
03:08and Michael Baer Carson, formerly James Carson,
03:11met and married shortly after James' first marriage ended in 1977.
03:15The couple labeled the San Francisco witch killers Michael Baer Carson
03:20and his second wife Susan, smiling as the camera rolled.
03:23The pair became involved in mysticism,
03:25with James' first wife reportedly becoming frightened of him,
03:28which led to her breaking off all contact for the safety of her and their daughter.
03:32Meanwhile though, Susan and now Michael truly did descend into madness and depravity.
03:38Between March 1981 and November 1983,
03:41the pair murdered three people,
03:43including two who Susan is said to have decided were witches.
03:46They were caught after killing their final victim on the side of the road.
03:50In full view of passing cars.
03:52They were later convicted of three murders and sentenced to 75 years to life in prison.
03:56Paul Bernardo and Carla Homolka
03:59The most infamous couple in Canadian history,
04:02Paul Bernardo and Carla Homolka killed three young women throughout the early 90s.
04:06Their first victim was Homolka's younger sister, Tammy.
04:09Two days before Christmas in 1990, the couple severely mistreated her.
04:14Tammy Homolka then choked on her vomit and died.
04:17Tammy Homolka's unexpected death would not signal the end of Paul and Carla's deviant games.
04:23The couple then kidnapped Leslie Mahaffey and Kristen French.
04:26Only this time, they intentionally killed the girls.
04:29After they were captured, Homolka conned the investigators
04:32and received a very favorable plea bargain in exchange for testifying against her husband.
04:38While Bernardo was sentenced to life, Homolka was freed on July 4th, 2005.
04:43She has remained free ever since and even started a family.
04:47Ultimately, the deal Carla made with the prosecution would stand.
04:52She would serve just 12 years for her part in the crimes.
04:57Fred and Rose West
04:58The horrific crime spree of Fred and Rose West lasted throughout much of the 70s and 80s.
05:04By the time they were finally arrested in the 90s, the couple had killed at least 10 people.
05:09The Wests would kill their victims inside their Gloucester house
05:12and bury their remains in the basement and yard.
05:1525 Cromwell Street was the burial ground for nine young women.
05:19Fred was the more prolific killer of the two,
05:22having killed at least two people without the involvement of his wife.
05:25His personal body count may exceed 13.
05:28Fred and Rose West appeared at Gloucester Magistrate's Court,
05:32jointly charged with nine murders.
05:34Rose helped kill nine women with her husband,
05:36in addition to her stepdaughter, whom Fred had from a prior marriage.
05:40Their Gloucester home later became known as the House of Horrors.
05:45Raymond Fernandez and Martha Beck
05:47In 1947, a single mother of two named Martha Beck placed a personal ad in the newspaper,
05:53and it was answered by a man named Raymond Fernandez.
05:59Beck developed an intense fascination with Fernandez,
06:02and even sent her children away so she could devote herself to him.
06:06The two quickly fell into a routine of violence,
06:09and killed at least three people in the late 40s.
06:12One was a 66-year-old woman named Janet Fay,
06:15and the other two were 28-year-old Delphine Downing and her daughter.
06:19Downing's neighbors alerted the police and the couple was arrested.
06:23Both were executed on the same day, March 8, 1951.
06:28Fernandez was 36 and Beck was 30.
06:31Oh my God. Oh my God.
06:34He kills for me.
06:36Gwendolyn Graham and Kathy Wood
06:39This couple worked as nurses' aides in Michigan's Alpine Manor nursing home.
06:43Beginning in January of 1987,
06:45the two conspired to kill elderly patients suffering from Alzheimer's.
06:49For the next few months, both Graham and Wood took the lives of five nursing home residents.
06:54Wood cooperated with police, telling them that Graham suffocated the women with washcloths
06:59while she was the lookout.
07:01Graham later began dating another nurse at the facility and moved with her to Texas,
07:06effectively ending the crime spree.
07:08However, Wood told her ex-husband about the crimes,
07:11and he in turn informed the authorities.
07:13Wood portrayed herself as a victim during the resulting trial,
07:16but it's now believed that she masterminded the whole enterprise
07:19to exact revenge against Graham, who had begun dating another woman.
07:24It worked, and Graham was given life in prison.
07:27I thought that Gwen was the first person to ever love me.
07:29Samantha Baczynski and Patrick Celopak
07:32In Michigan in spring 2006,
07:34Samantha Baczynski and Patrick Celopak killed three people in a matter of days
07:38in a shocking crime spree that caught national and international attention.
07:42The pair first murdered a married couple, Scott and Melissa Barrels,
07:46who was pregnant at the time in the Barrels' own home.
07:49Then, while subsequently on the run,
07:50the couple also killed a man named Winfield Johnson.
07:53Johnson had offered Baczynski and Celopak a place to stay,
07:56unaware of the crimes that they had already committed.
07:59Over time, he found out though,
08:01and Celopak shot him twice in the back, almost 17 years later in 2003.
08:06It was also reported that Celopak had attempted to murder
08:09another prisoner in jail, Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow.
08:12The story of Bonnie and Clyde has long captured the attention
08:15and imagination of America and the world.
08:18The most infamous outlaws of all were a pair of young lovers,
08:24whose two-year crime spree included armed robbery, car theft, abduction,
08:29murder, and a series of dramatic gun battles across at least 11 states.
08:34The infamous outlaws were media sensations in the 1930s
08:38at the height of the Great Depression.
08:40As key figures in a notorious gang, the Barrow Gang,
08:43they were involved in numerous major robberies and multiple killings
08:46until their own violent deaths in 1934.
08:49In all, they're thought to have killed at least 13 people, and likely more.
08:54Thanks to a series of photographs discovered of them,
08:56including many of them posing with weapons,
08:58the couple is still insanely recognizable even today.
09:02But the legend of Bonnie and Clyde would continue to captivate the world
09:06for generations to come.
09:08At the time, they were among a select group of criminals
09:11referred to by authorities as public enemies.
09:14Michel Fournieret and Monique Olivier
09:16Operating across France and Belgium for 16 years
09:19between 1987 and their eventual arrest in 2003,
09:23Michel Fournieret and Monique Olivier murdered at least eight people,
09:27including multiple young girls.
09:29They had met via a prison pen pal scheme in the 1980s
09:32at a time when Fournieret was serving a sentence for multiple sexual assaults.
09:36Back then, Fournieret had reportedly written of his depraved fantasies,
09:40and Olivier had responded saying that she would help him to fulfill them.
09:44Over the following years, after Fournieret's release,
09:47the couple would drive across France and Belgium
09:49concocting elaborate ruses to trick victims into their vehicle,
09:52after which they would abuse and ultimately kill them.
09:55Carol M. Bundy and Doug Clark
09:57These two met at a bar in 1980 and quickly developed a relationship.
10:02She instantly became infatuated with a man named Doug Clark.
10:06It wasn't long before Clark moved in with Bundy
10:09and embarked on his now infamous killing spree that would leave multiple people dead.
10:14While the two would later be known as the Sunset Strip Killers,
10:17the killings themselves were mostly committed by Clark.
10:21Two months later, Doug told Carol he killed the two runaways.
10:26The homicides troubled Bundy, but she nevertheless remained an accomplice,
10:30refusing to give up Clark.
10:32Bundy eventually told her ex-lover Jack Murray about the crimes,
10:35but she killed him to ensure his silence.
10:38However, the crime spree troubled Bundy so much
10:41that she eventually confessed to the authorities,
10:43and she and Clark were both arrested.
10:45She tells them that she and Doug are the serial killers they have been looking for.
10:50Alton Coleman and Debra Brown
10:52In 1983, Debra Brown was engaged to be married when she met a criminal named Alton Coleman.
10:58They quickly developed a relationship, and Brown left her fiancé to be with Coleman.
11:03Coleman was facing a criminal trial relating to a previous crime
11:06when he and Brown fled Illinois to Wisconsin.
11:09He saw the approaching officer and took off.
11:12There, they killed the young Vernita Wheat.
11:15This began a killing spree that spread throughout the American Midwest.
11:19They were eventually caught and arrested on July 20, 1984,
11:23having killed a total of eight people.
11:25With surprising ease, they were able to corner Coleman.
11:28Both were sentenced to death,
11:30but Brown was later spared and given life in prison.
11:33Coleman was executed by lethal injection on April 26, 2002.
11:38Gerald and Charlene Gallego
11:40Gerald and Charlene Gallego killed 10 people from September 1978 to November 1980.
11:46Charlene Williams came from a supportive family,
11:49but her life fell into disrepair when she started using drugs.
11:53Things got even worse when she met and married a career criminal named Gerald Gallego.
11:57He thought he was God's gift to women.
11:59Their crime spree began on September 11, 1978,
12:02when they abducted two teenage girls.
12:05The Gallegos were caught abducting an engaged couple in November of 1980,
12:09and the police were promptly informed.
12:11College sweethearts Mary Beth and Craig would be Gerald and Charlene's final victims,
12:17as their abduction led to their arrest.
12:20This led to their arrests, and Gerald was sentenced to death.
12:24Charlene was given nearly 17 years in exchange for testifying against her husband.
12:29Charlene's testimony allowed the prosecution to secure the sentence they desired.
12:34Henry Lee Lucas and Otis Toole
12:36The names Henry Lee Lucas and Otis Toole are well known.
12:40For a time, it was believed that Lucas had killed over 600 people,
12:44making him the most prolific killer in American history.
12:48Lucas bragged to police that he killed more than 600 men, women, and children.
12:53Toole claimed 125 victims.
12:56However, it was later found that these confessions were fabricated
13:00so that Lucas could enjoy rewards in prison.
13:02Lucas and Toole likely developed a sexual relationship after meeting in 1976,
13:07and the extent of their crimes remains ambiguous.
13:10They met at a soup kitchen in Jacksonville,
13:13soon became lovers, and moved in together at Toole's mother's house.
13:17Lucas was confirmed to have killed two people in 1983,
13:21and eight other victims remain disputed.
13:23Toole is widely suspected of having killed the young Adam Walsh in 1981.
13:28The nature of their crimes may forever remain uncertain,
13:31but they nevertheless conspired to fool the authorities
13:35and wasted precious time and resources in the process.
13:38He died in prison on September 15, 1996.
13:42Ian Brady and Myra Hindley
13:44Known as the most evil woman in Britain,
13:47Myra Hindley embarked on a horrific crime spree with her boyfriend, Ian Brady.
13:51The crimes committed by Moore's murderer, Myra Hindley, shocked the nation.
13:56Between July 1963 and October 1965,
13:59Brady and Hindley killed five young persons
14:01and dumped at least some of their bodies in the Saddleworth Moor.
14:05It's because of this that their crime spree is now known as the Moor's Murders.
14:09A case like this was unique.
14:11For the first time in British history,
14:14a woman had been implicated in a killing partnership.
14:17One of their victims buried at the Moor was Leslie Ann Downey.
14:20The couple's dealings with Downey were captured on tape and in various photos,
14:24ensuring that Brady and Hindley became infamous public enemies in Britain.
14:31Charles Starkweather and Carol Ann Fugate
14:34These two met in 1956, when Starkweather was 18 and Fugate 13.
14:39Starkweather quickly grew attached to Fugate
14:42and dropped out of high school to be closer to her.
14:44The two eventually began a relationship,
14:47and Starkweather killed Fugate's mother, stepfather, and sister on January 21, 1958.
14:53I think he got in an argument over Carol with Mr. Bartlett,
14:58and I think it just escalated from there.
15:00They were Starkweather's second, third, and fourth victims,
15:04as he had killed a gas station attendant the previous November.
15:07Starkweather and Fugate then embarked on a crime spree throughout Nebraska and Wyoming
15:12that left a further seven people dead.
15:14In the space of less than two months, 11 innocent people had died
15:19in a killing spree that sent shockwaves around the United States.
15:23Fugate claimed that she never personally took a life, but Starkweather said otherwise.
15:27Regardless, Starkweather was executed for his crimes,
15:30and Fugate was released from prison in 1976 after spending 17 years behind bars.
15:37Until they had been stopped, they would have kept going.
15:39There was nothing behind. They had no remorse. They had no reason.
15:43Ray and Fay Copeland
15:45From 1986 to 1989, Ray and Fay Copeland conspired to kill five men,
15:51although their victim count may be as high as 12.
15:54They appeared to be just an elderly farm couple that were
15:58kind of shy and didn't mix much with the people.
16:01The Copelands ran a farm in Mooresville, Missouri, but Ray was a proven fraud,
16:06so local providers refused to sell him cattle.
16:09To get around this, Copeland devised a scam.
16:12He would pick up drifters, write them fraudulent checks,
16:15and have them buy the cattle for him.
16:17There were eight men wanted for writing bad checks to cattle auction houses
16:21in central Missouri. All had disappeared from the area without a trace.
16:27He would then sell the cattle for a profit before the checks bounced
16:30and kill the drifter who bought it to ensure their silence.
16:33Despite the efforts of her defense team,
16:35Fay was found to be a knowing accomplice to her husband,
16:38and both were sentenced to death.
16:41Ray Copeland was convicted of five counts of murder and sentenced to death.
16:46Alvin and Judith Neely
16:48In 1980, 27-year-old Alvin Neely left his first wife
16:52and eloped with 16-year-old Judith Adams.
16:55Two years after their marriage,
16:57the Neelys kidnapped the young Lisa Milliken from a mall in Rome, Georgia.
17:01Milliken was subsequently taken to an Alabama motel and killed.
17:05Just a few days later, the Neelys did the same thing to Janice Chapman
17:08after shooting her fiancé John Hancock.
17:11However, Hancock survived and reported the Neelys to the authorities.
17:15The next day, he was at the Rome police station sitting on a bench
17:19when he heard a recording of Judith Neely's voice.
17:22They were promptly arrested, and 18-year-old Judith Neely
17:25became the youngest American woman ever sentenced to death.
17:29However, this was later commuted to life in prison in 1999.
17:33You don't see those crimes around here.
17:34That's something that you always hear about somewhere else,
17:38and it was just so a tragedy.
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17:56Inessa Tarverdieva and Raman Potkapaev
17:59Hailing from Stavropol, Russia, Inessa Tarverdieva and Raman Potkapaev
18:04were part of the gang of Amazons.
18:06This serial killing family also consisted of the couple's two children,
18:10Victoria and Anastasia.
18:12The entire family was supposedly aided by Potkapaev's sister and her husband,
18:16a law enforcement officer who fed the family inside information.
18:20Between 2007 and 2013, the gang of Amazons embarked
18:24on a massive crime spree that left dozens dead.
18:27The victims included a lieutenant colonel and his family,
18:30and a patrol officer who pulled over Potkapaev and Victoria.
18:33However, it was this confrontation that proved their downfall.
18:37Potkapaev was killed by responding officers,
18:39and the rest of his family was rounded up and arrested.