# You discover a serial killer lives nearby and her kids go to school with your kids **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [April 20, 2016, 4:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-discover-a-serial-killer-lives-nearby-and-her-kids-go-to-school-with-your-kids/752708 "2016-04-20T04:41:55Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![Spice\_Weasel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spice_weasel/32/5435_2.png) [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2017, 2:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-discover-a-serial-killer-lives-nearby-and-her-kids-go-to-school-with-your-kids/752708/101 "2017-06-05T14:16:50Z")
> [@Spoons](#): > > I do. > So, Paul is a nice guy with a certain charm. And along comes Karla, in her late teens and early twenties, impressionable, and who is captivated by him. Instead of asking her to stand on her head and spit quarters–which she would probably have done, at that age–he asks her to do, shall we say, other things. And she does. And in the end, and to make a long story short, she realizes her error and pays the price. > > My own feeling–and that is all it is–is that Karla looks back now, from the age of 47 years, and says, “What the @#$% was I thinking? I was young and stupid!” Young and in love people do, indeed, do stupid things. They quit their jobs and move in with their lovers. They alienate their friends. Sometimes they get into drugs. But they don’t rape, torture and murder teenage girls. The only way I would find her plausibly a victim in this scenario is if Bernardo kept her chained in a box in the basement, starved her and beat her for disobedience or something. But the videotape evidence that was found blows all of that out of the water. This is a sick fucking woman who got lucky enough to meet someone equally as sick. ---
**Author:** ![RivkahChaya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rivkahchaya/32/8919_2.png) [@RivkahChaya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RivkahChaya)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2017, 9:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-discover-a-serial-killer-lives-nearby-and-her-kids-go-to-school-with-your-kids/752708/102 "2017-06-05T21:14:26Z")
Yeah. Sheesh. When I was 20 & 21, I ran up a little credit card debt, drove drunk once, and occasionally served alcohol to under-21 (but over 18) friends. I once went skinny dipping in the county’s lake that was its water source, where this activity was verboten, and at any rate, it was after dark, and the lake was closed. I wrote a paper for a friend in college because she paid me, something we both could have gotten dismissed for (she got an A). I drove over the speed limit and played loud, obnoxious music. That’s the kind of dumb shit you do when you are 20 that you regret, are lucky you didn’t get caught doing, and shape up and don’t do anymore after you get to be a little older. Rape and murder, not so much. ---
**Author:** ![Muffin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muffin/32/4341_2.png) [@Muffin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Muffin)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2017, 11:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-discover-a-serial-killer-lives-nearby-and-her-kids-go-to-school-with-your-kids/752708/103 "2017-06-05T23:05:21Z")
Yeh, Homolka wasn’t into skinny dipping. Dumping one of her three rape/murder victims in a ditch nude, yes. Dismembering one of her three rape/murder victims, encasing the body parts in cement, and dumping her in a pond, yes. But skinny dipping? Nah. I don’t buy for a second that Homolka was an easily led youth. She was evil incarnate whose trigger was tickled by the serial rapist and murderer Bernardo. The pair of them should never see the light of day, but the police and judiciary are quite rightly constrained by law, which works well most of the time but unfortunately did not come up with what I personally would consider a satisfactory result. Read up on the evidentiary issues regarding the tapes that showed Homolka in a very different light than an easily led youth. ---
**Author:** ![Blue\_Blistering\_Barnacle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/blue_blistering_barnacle/32/3386_2.png) [@Blue\_Blistering\_Barnacle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blue_Blistering_Barnacle)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2017, 12:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-discover-a-serial-killer-lives-nearby-and-her-kids-go-to-school-with-your-kids/752708/104 "2017-06-06T00:43:10Z")
nm ---
**Author:** ![Whiskey\_Dickens](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/9fc348/32.png) [@Whiskey\_Dickens](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whiskey_Dickens)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2017, 3:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-discover-a-serial-killer-lives-nearby-and-her-kids-go-to-school-with-your-kids/752708/105 "2017-06-06T15:53:33Z")
> [@Ambivalid](#): > > I wonder how she does it. How does one go about finding a murdering boyfriend? Craigslist? No kidding. Especially in 1990 and you don’t have access to the internet’s vast power of linking the like-minded. What are the odds that these two psychos would 1) Meet, and 2) Express their desires for abhorrence and get reciprocation? Did Bernardo tell every lady he met that he was a weirdo, and finally got a hit on Homolka? ---
**Author:** ![Enola\_Gay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/3ab097/32.png) [@Enola\_Gay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enola_Gay)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2017, 12:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-discover-a-serial-killer-lives-nearby-and-her-kids-go-to-school-with-your-kids/752708/106 "2017-06-07T00:25:19Z")
> [@Whiskey\_Dickens](#): > > No kidding. Especially in 1990 and you don’t have access to the internet’s vast power of linking the like-minded. > > What are the odds that these two psychos would 1) Meet, and 2) Express their desires for abhorrence and get reciprocation? Did Bernardo tell every lady he met that he was a weirdo, and finally got a hit on Homolka? I think their relationship was synergistic. She seemed to kick him into high gear and with her help, his crimes escalated from rape to forcible confinement and murder. She was definitely the brains behind the crimes, as it was her idea to douche Kristen French’s dead body & shave her head to remove forensic evidence. She is also the one who lured Kristen over to the car, and told Paul she’d “have to be gone” (aka murdered) before her parents got there for Father’s Day dinner. And she alone drugged “Jane Doe” and called Paul on the phone to tell him she had a wedding present for him. The letter she wrote to her friend about what assholes her parents were because they wanted her to postpone her wedding so they could grieve the death of the sister she raped & killed tells you everything you need to know about Karla Homolka. She is not a victim in the least, but a true partner in crime. ---
**Author:** ![Evan\_Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/b487fb/32.png) [@Evan\_Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evan_Drake)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2017, 1:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-discover-a-serial-killer-lives-nearby-and-her-kids-go-to-school-with-your-kids/752708/107 "2017-06-07T01:39:27Z")
> [@Whiskey\_Dickens](#): > > No kidding. Especially in 1990 and you don’t have access to the internet’s vast power of linking the like-minded. > > What are the odds that these two psychos would 1) Meet, and 2) Express their desires for abhorrence and get reciprocation? Did Bernardo tell every lady he met that he was a weirdo, and finally got a hit on Homolka? Well, since Mr. Brady has _just_ gone to his reward, how did he and Myra Hindley decide they were going to murder children together, and this was their soulmate, back in the 1960s ? On the other hand, if stuff’s bad, the British really mean Life when the judge says “Life”. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2017, 6:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-discover-a-serial-killer-lives-nearby-and-her-kids-go-to-school-with-your-kids/752708/108 "2017-06-08T06:06:12Z")
> [@Whiskey\_Dickens](#): > > No kidding. Especially in 1990 and you don’t have access to the internet’s vast power of linking the like-minded. > > What are the odds that these two psychos would 1) Meet, and 2) Express their desires for abhorrence and get reciprocation? Did Bernardo tell every lady he met that he was a weirdo, and finally got a hit on Homolka? How have people anywhere, anywhen, met likeminded ones? By shared hobbies is a good way. My grandfather used (part of) the local ref’s association, to which he belonged for over 70 years, as informer net and favors market. How did he find, or was found by, guys who would pay to be a girl’s first, or to fondle a boy’s privates, or who would skew a match’s results in exchange for getting given more-convenient matches? Drop a hint, see how it’s taken. > [@zoogirl](#): > > She must have some feeling for her kids if she’s willing to help out at the school. Not necessarily, not if being helpful gets rewarded. In this case it was: the school was soooOOOooo happy with her they were willing to protect her over the children. ---
**Author:** ![FloatyGimpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/floatygimpy/32/7750_2.png) [@FloatyGimpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FloatyGimpy)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2017, 3:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-discover-a-serial-killer-lives-nearby-and-her-kids-go-to-school-with-your-kids/752708/109 "2017-06-08T15:36:31Z")
> [@Seanette](#): > > If she’s as much the remorseless sociopath as she seems, probably not. She just wouldn’t have the wiring to give a damn about anyone but Karla. I agree with this. She’s a convicted child rapist and murder and she thought it would be a good idea to go spend time with dozens of children, unbeknownst to their parents. That shows a _severe_ lack of common sense and good judgement. Even if she has no evil motives for hanging around other people’s children, she has put her own wishes and desires first. She either doesn’t see how what she is doing is completely inappropriate or she does and doesn’t care. Either way I wouldn’t want that sociopath around my kids without my knowledge and consent. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2017, 12:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-discover-a-serial-killer-lives-nearby-and-her-kids-go-to-school-with-your-kids/752708/110 "2017-06-09T12:59:54Z")
The school’s Facebook page is still unavailable. ---
**Author:** ![RivkahChaya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rivkahchaya/32/8919_2.png) [@RivkahChaya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RivkahChaya)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2017, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-discover-a-serial-killer-lives-nearby-and-her-kids-go-to-school-with-your-kids/752708/111 "2017-06-09T13:22:46Z")
Pardon my cynicism (with a little, but not a lot of sarcasm): it’s like pulling teeth to get parents to volunteer for stuff at school, and we don’t know exactly what she was doing. If she was doing something like carpool line, she may have been using a cell phone or walkie-talkie to let the teacher know which parent was “on deck” to pick up their kid, so that kid could be outside and ready. No contact with kids whatsoever. If I were principal, I’d start going down the list of parents, calling them and saying “The only volunteer we have so far is the child murderer. Please volunteer so we don’t have to let her do it.” Like I said, pulling teeth, but that might just be the pliers that would work. If I had any say, that woman wouldn’t even be allowed to come to the Winter Holiday Pageant. We’ll film it for her. We’ll even stream it to her computer in real time, if she insists, but she can’t set foot on campus. If she has to pick her kids up for an appointment, she drives up, calls to let us know she’s here, and we bring the kids out to her. She doesn’t leave the car. Still, I sympathize with a really desperate school. I was co-room mother one year. ---
**Author:** ![Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e19adc/32.png) [@Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2017, 11:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-discover-a-serial-killer-lives-nearby-and-her-kids-go-to-school-with-your-kids/752708/112 "2017-06-09T23:44:39Z")
It’s a private school, and in Quebec those generally have higher volunteer rates than the average. This being Quebec, it’s rare for schools to have carpool lanes too. We know exactly what Karla Homolka/Leanne Bordelais was doing: she brought her dog into a classroom to make friends with the kids, and she was a parent volunteer on a field trip. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2021, 12:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-discover-a-serial-killer-lives-nearby-and-her-kids-go-to-school-with-your-kids/752708/113 "2021-11-14T00:55:58Z")
Just a bump: Homolka has moved; media has reported on her current whereabouts; Homolka filed complaint to the Quebec Press Council, a self-regulating body for the media; Quebec Press Council told her to get stuffed, she’s a public figure and it’s not an intrusion on her privacy to tell the public the general area where she’s living. > **[Karla Homolka, after moving again near Montreal, can't expect privacy: Quebec...](https://montreal.ctvnews.ca/karla-homolka-after-moving-again-near-montreal-can-t-expect-privacy-quebec-press-council-1.5232444)** > > Convicted killer Karla Homolka may have resettled yet again near Montreal, but she can’t expect privacy from local news outlets, according to Quebec's press council in yet another decision on the matter. > **[Karla Homolka is a public figure, Quebec Press Council rules in dismissing...](https://montrealgazette.com/news/local-news/karla-homolka-is-a-public-figure-quebec-press-council-rules-in-dismissing-complaint)** > > Homolka, now 50 years old, was unconditionally released from prison in 2005. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2021, 12:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-discover-a-serial-killer-lives-nearby-and-her-kids-go-to-school-with-your-kids/752708/114 "2021-11-14T00:59:06Z")
And in other news: > **[Teen killer and serial rapist Paul Bernardo again denied parole](https://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/teen-killer-and-serial-rapist-paul-bernardo-again-denied-parole-1.5480350)** > > Teen killer and serial rapist Paul Bernardo failed in his second parole bid on Tuesday after the parents of two of his victims recounted the enduring pain of his twisted crimes and warned he should never be released from his life sentence. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2021, 12:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-discover-a-serial-killer-lives-nearby-and-her-kids-go-to-school-with-your-kids/752708/115 "2021-11-14T00:59:31Z")
I wouldn’t let my kids go over to her house, but I wouldn’t do anything else. What else could you do? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-discover-a-serial-killer-lives-nearby-and-her-kids-go-to-school-with-your-kids/752708.md?page=5)