Friday, October 31, 1997
Cisco College student studies serial killers,
mass murderers
By TANYA EISERER / Abilene Reporter-News
Mason Mires wants to get inside the minds of serial killers
and mass murderers.
Mires, 18, has built up a collection of artwork, letters, postcards
and other memorabilia from a variety of psychopaths, including
Charles Manson, Richard "Night Stalker" Ramirez, David
"Son of Sam" Berkowitz and John Wayne Gacy.
"I'm interested in how people like that think," he
said. "I want to know what made them do what they did."
Mires, a student at Cisco Junior College, plans to attend the
University of Texas to study criminal pathology and psychology.
One would think his mother would worry about her son contacting
some of the nation's most pathological killers, however, Mires
said his mom has actually talked to Manson on the telephone.
"She was a little nervous at first," Mason said.
"Once she realized I wasn't in it for murder, she was all
right with it."
Mires stumbled into his macabre hobby when he started a correspondence
with Manson three years ago while working on a high school term
paper.
"It eventually built into a collection," Mires said.
Mires now uses a post office box to correspond with a variety
of psychopaths. He keeps three-ring binders for Manson, Ramirez,
Pat Kearney and several other killers.
When he writes, Mires doesn't ask directly about their crimes.
Most won't talk about their crimes anyway, he said.
"I read up on a case before I write them; that way I know
what to say and what not to say to get a response," he said.
Mires is not alone in his hobby.
"Most (collectors), like Mason, are people who would never
squash an insect," said Rick Staton, a Baton Rouge-based
collector who has been featured in the A to Z Encyclopedia of
Serial Killers. "The last thing they would do is take a life.
A lot of people live vicariously through these stories. People,
whether they admit it or not, are interested."
Mires' bedroom walls, something of a shrine, are covered with
artwork and letters from an array of murderers.
Kearney has written Mires to give him advice on calculus. Kearney,
an inmate at Corcoran State Prison in California, was a rocket
scientist who put his victims in trash bags.
Ramirez, on death row in California, sent Mires a demonic-looking
self-portrait and other sadistic-looking drawings.
"He's sick," Mires said. "He's probably the
most sick, sadistic one of the whole bunch."
Roy Norris, who drew intricate flowers on the envelopes of
his letters, killed five girls in California with his accomplice,
Lawrence Bittaker.
Unlike most, Norris wrote about his crimes. Mires turned the
letter over to Bittacker's attorney who requested it.
Mires said he asked Norris why Bittaker was referred to as
"Pliers."
"He said the only time he ever saw (Bittacker) use pliers
was when he was tightening the coat hanger arund the girl's neck,"
Mires said. "It was a brutal six-page letter."
His most treasured possession is a 1950s-era Life magazine,
which he keeps hidden, about the serial killer Edward Gein.
Such movies as "Pyscho," "Silence of the Lambs"
and the "Texas Chainsaw Massacre" were loosely based
on Gein, he said.
Mires has also traded with Staton for certain hard-to-find
items, such as the Dec. 19, 1969, Life magazine issue about the
Manson family and a Gacy painting of "Patches" the clown.
Manson, however, has been Mires' most prolific pen pal. He
has numerous letters and two abstract artworks that appeared to
be drawn with crayons.
"(Manson) tells me some pretty off-the-wall things,"
Mires said.
But the teen-ager holds no illusions about Manson's innocence,
however.
"I think Charlie's guilty," Mires said. "Telling
somebody to kill is just as bad as doing it especially when you
have that much control over people."
Mires kept in regular phone contact with Manson until the notorious
criminal was transferred to Pelican Bay State Prison in Crescent
City, Calif., in August for allegedly dealing drugs.
In a recent letter, Manson requested that Mires order him a
Sunday subscription to the Reporter-News because he wanted to
be in the "heart of Texas."
"It's not everyday that Charles Manson subscribes to the
Reporter-News," Mires said.
The subscription begins Sunday.
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Abilene Reporter-News / Texnews / E.W. Scripps Publications
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