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Mass murder
Mass murder
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1637 Nov 7 1637 Nov 8 |
Anne Hutchinson (b.1591) and her followers were tried as heretics and banished from the Mass Bay colony to Rhode Island. Links: USA, Rhode Island, Religion, Mass murder 
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1637 |
The Archbishop of Canterbury launched an effort to revoke the charter of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, but the boat carrying the English authorities sank on its way. This period in Pilgrim and Puritan history was covered by Sarah Vowell in “The Wordy Shipmates” (2008). Links: Britain, USA, Mass murder
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1940 Mar 5 |
Stalin among others signed an Order for the massacre at Katyn, Poland. Soviet agents shot 21,768 Polish military officers, intellectuals and priests who had been taken prisoner during the invasion. Between April and May some 25,700 (15,000) Polish citizens were massacred by the Soviets in the Katyn and Miednoje (Mednoye) forests on the outskirts of Moscow and at Kharkov in western Russia (later Ukraine). Some 14,700 Polish officers were identified by their uniforms. Documents were made public in 1992 by Boris Yeltsin, Russia's first post-Soviet leader. They included a letter by Lavrenty Beria, head of the secret police, recommending the execution of the Polish prisoners of war. The letter bears the signatures of Soviet dictator Josef Stalin and three other members of the Politburo. Excavations of the sites began in 1994. 6,313 Polish officers were all shot in the back of the head near Mednoye. 9,000 Russians were also massacred at the site. In 2008 Andrzej Wajda directed the film “Katyn.” In 2004 Russia's top military prosecutor closed the investigation after concluding that the massacre did not constitute genocide. In 2009 Russia's Supreme Court rejected appeals to re-open the investigation. On April 7, 2010, Russian PM Vladimir Putin attended a memorial ceremony. Hours later he said Stalin had ordered the atrocity as revenge for the death of Red Army soldiers in Polish prisoner of war camps in 1920. Links: Russia, Ukraine, Poland, USSR, Mass murder
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1969 Nov 12 |
Free-lance reporter Seymour Hersh first broke the story of the Mar 16, 1968, massacre at My Lai. The US Army admitted to the massacre of civilians at My Lai and announced an investigation of Lt William Calley. The number of civilians who were killed numbered at least 100. Lt. Calley was later found guilty of murder, and sentenced to life imprisonment at hard labor. Calley was the only person ever charged in connection with the events at My Lai. The nation was shocked and divided by the claims from Calley that he was following orders and that he was a scapegoat. President Richard Nixon in 1971 ordered him released from prison and placed under house arrest, and finally a federal judge threw out all charges against Calley and ordered him freed. Although the charges were later re-instated on appeal, he served no more jail time for the massacre at My Lai. Links: USA, Vietnam, Mass murder
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1973 Aug 19 |
In Santa Cruz, Ca., Herbert Mullin (b.1947) was declared guilty of first-degree murder in the cases of Jim Gianera and Kathy Francis, because they were premeditated, while for the other eight murders he was found guilty of second-degree murder because they were more impulsive. His story was later told by Donald T. Lunde and Jefferson Morgan in “The Die Song: A Journey in the Mind of a Mass Murderer.” Links: USA, California, Murder, Mass murder
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1975 Jul |
In Chile 119 dissidents were kidnapped as part of Operation Colombo. Their bodies were never found. In 2008 98 people were indicted on charges of kidnapping the victims. Links: Chile, Mass murder
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1975 |
The USS Constitution (aka Old Ironsides) was restored and reopened to the public in Boston Harbor. Links: USA, Ship, Mass murder
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1977 1978 |
The Ethiopian Red Terror, or Qey Shibir, was a violent political campaign in Ethiopia undertaken during the leadership of the Derg, a socialist military junta. Hirut Abebe-Jiri, imprisoned and tortured during a purge known as the “Red Terror,” later set up an organization to archive, translate and index the Derg files. As many as 100,000 people were killed during the campaign as Mengistu sought to transform the country into a Soviet-style workers' state. Links: Ethiopia, Mass murder
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1978 Jan 15 |
Lisa Levy and Margaret Bowman, two students at Florida State University in Tallahassee, were murdered in their sorority house. Theodore Bundy was later convicted of the crime, and executed. Links: USA, Murder, Florida, Mass murder
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1978 Feb 15 |
Ted Bundy (1946-1989), American escaped serial killed, was recaptured in Pensacola, Fla. Bundy eventually confessed to 29 murders. Links: USA, Murder, Florida, Mass murder
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1978 Dec 21 |
Police in Des Plaines, Ill., arrested John W. Gacy Jr. and began unearthing the remains of 33 men and boys that Gacy was later convicted of murdering. 27 bodies were found under his house, 2 in the back yard and 4 were fished out of the nearby Des Plaines River. He was executed in 1994. Links: USA, Illinois, Mass murder
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1979 Aug 9 |
In California Forrest Silva Tucker, William McGirk and John Waller escaped from San Quentin prison in a hand made kayak named Rub-a-Dub-Dub. McGirk (38) was captured Oct 31. Waller was recaptured within months. Tucker was caught after a few years in Boston in a credit scam but was released in error. He was later identified as a member of the Massachusetts "Over the Hill Gang" and in 1999 was caught on suspicion of robbing a Florida bank. Links: USA, California, SF Bay Area, Mass murder
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1982 Feb 2 |
Pres. Hafez Assad ordered the Syrian army under his brother, Rifaat Assad, to crush a fundamentalist Muslim revolt in Hama. As many as 25,000 people were killed. The Muslim Brotherhood played a role in the crushed uprising. Links: Syria, Mass murder, Massacre
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1982 Mar 13 |
In Guatemala at the Massacre of Rio Negro 177 Achi Maya women and children were killed by Xococ patrolmen. On Nov 30, 1998, three Xococ pro-government fighters, Carlos Chen, Pedro Gonzalez and Fermin Lajuj, were sentenced to death for their war crimes in the massacre. In 2003 the PBS documentary "Discovering Dominga" told the story of a Mayan girl who survived the massacre and her struggle to discover what happened to her family. In 2008 5 former paramilitary members were sentenced to 780 years each in prison for massacring 26 people at Rio Negro. Links: Guatemala, Mass murder
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1984 Dec 13 |
In Peru 123 people, including men, women and children from area farming communities, were slaughtered at Putis, in Ayacucho province. Army soldiers suspected the farmers supported guerrillas with the Shining Path. According to a later government-appointed truth commission, the military offered Putis as a safe haven for people fleeing Shining Path rebels in the region. Soldiers then tricked villagers into digging their own grave and killed them on suspicion of ties to the guerrillas. In 2008 a Peruvian forensics team began excavating a mass grave containing the remains of 123 men, women and children killed by the military at Putis. In 2009 DNA tests identified 28 of 92 bodies, including 15 women and five children. Links: Peru, DNA, Mass murder
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1997 Dec 22 |
In Mexico some 70 pro-government gunmen of the Peace and Justice paramilitary group killed 45 people, including 21 women 9 men and 15 children, in the Tzoztzil Indian village of Acteal. Opposition groups called for the resignation of Gov. Julio Cesar Ruiz Ferro, who had repeatedly denied the existence of paramilitary groups in the state. In 1998 12 officials of the state attorney general’s office were arrested for failing to stop the massacre. The government paid compensation to families of the victims and to the wounded. In 1999 20 government supporters were sentenced to 35 years in prison and 81 people were still scheduled for trial. In Dec 2007 authorities re-arrested Antonio Santiz, the alleged mastermind of the massacre. Santiz had been arrested for his alleged involvement in 2000, but a judge threw out the charges in 2001, ruling there wasn't enough evidence. In 2008 a Mexican judge sentenced brothers Antonio and Mariano Pucuj to 26 years in prison for their participation in the massacre. In August, 2009, Mexico's Supreme Court ordered freedom for 20 men convicted in the Acteal massacre and new trials for six more, ruling that prosecutors used illegally obtained evidence. In November, 2009, the Supreme Court ordered the release of nine more people convicted in massacre, ruling their convictions were based on illegally obtained evidence. New trials were ordered for 16 others. Links: Mexico, Atrocities, Mass murder
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2002 Feb 28 |
In India Hindu mobs in Gujarat state killed at least 96 people as they burned shops and attacked residences in Ahmadabad to avenge the killing a day earlier of Hindu activists. A Hindu mob descended on the Gulberg Society, a cluster of homes in Ahmadabad, leaving Ehsan Jafri, a former Congress MP, and 68 others dead. In 2007 videotaped confessions showed Hindu activists acknowledging their roles in the killings and detailing blatant state collusion. In 2011 a court sentenced 31 Hindus to life imprisonment for killing dozens of Muslims by setting a building on fire in a village in Mehsana district. 33 Muslims, including 20 women who had taken shelter there, were burned alive. Links: India, Mad Crowd, Mass murder
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2008 Jan 24 |
In Sri Lanka 16 victims of what appeared to have been execution-style killings were found by villagers in a district 206 km (130 miles) north of the capital Colombo. Links: Sri Lanka, Mass murder
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2008 Mar 27 |
In Kansas City, Mo., a judge convicted Terry Blair (46) of killing 6 women in 2004. Blair faced life in prison. Links: USA, Missouri, Mass murder
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2008 Apr 10 |
Most families in the April 16, 2007, Virginia Tech mass shootings agreed to an $11 million state settlement. Links: USA, Virginia, Mass murder
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2008 May 26 |
In Chile 98 people were indicted on charges of kidnapping victims in 1975, whose bodies were never found. Links: Chile, Mass murder
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2009 Mar 31 |
In Cambodia Kaing Guek Eav (aka Duch), the chief Khmer Rouge torturer, formally apologized for the deaths of more than 14,000 people at S-21 prison, the first Pol Pot cadre to accept blame for crimes committed by the regime 30 years ago. Links: Cambodia, Mass murder
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2016 Jul 26 |
In Japan Satoshi Uematsu (26) went on a stabbing rampage near Tokyo at the Yamayuri-en facility for the mentally disabled where he had been fired, killing 19 people. Months earlier he had given a letter to Parliament outlining the bloody plan and saying all disabled people should be put to death. This was Japan's deadliest mass killing in decades. In 2020 a court sentenced Uematsu to hang for the killings. Links: Japan, Mad Man, Mass murder
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2019 Oct 3 |
It was reported that survivors and family of 58 people who were slain in Las Vegas on Oct. 1, 2017, in the deadliest mass shooting in modern US history, have reached a settlement of at least $735 million with MGM Resorts. Links: USA, Nevada, Lawsuit, Mass murder
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2021 May 26 |
A shooting at a maintenance and dispatch center for the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority in San Jose, Calif., left 10 people dead, including the gunman, and others injured. Officials identified the gunman as Samuel James Cassidy (57), a maintenance worker who had been with the V.T.A. for at least a decade. Police later found 22,000 rounds of ammunition at Cassidy's home. In 2022 relatives of 8 of the 9 people shot reached an $8 million settlement with the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority. Links: USA, California, Mad Man, Mass murder, San Jose
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2022 Aug 18 |
Mexican officials called the 2014 disappearance of 43 students a state crime that was covered up by the government, in another damning assessment of the previous administration's actions regarding one of Mexico's worst human rights atrocities. Links: Mexico, Govm't Scandal, Mass murder
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