Do need to kill someone? Well if you're like me, the need is constant. And if you're also like me, you watch a lot of cop shows. And if you spend ten years of your life falling asleep to murder shows: you learn all the ways a person can get caught. From these years of extensive, accidental research, I've compiled a list of things you should know if you ever need to kill someone.
1. Keep in mind that extreme heat speeds up the rate of decomposition. Keep in mind that extreme cold slows it down. Therefore: commit your murders in the summer.
2. Don't kill anyone you're involved with romantically. You'll be the first person the cops want to talk to. If you must kill someone you're sleeping with, make sure they're sleeping with a lot of other people too, and that one of them has a worse criminal record than yours.
3. Don't bring your cell phone. This seems pretty basic but apparently a lot of people still get caught from this. Don't bring your cell phone when you're stalking them, or when you drive two hours away to dump their body in the desert/river/forest, either. If you must bring a cell phone, act like a criminal who actually knows what they're doing and buy a pay-as-you-go. Buy it at a busy store, and pay for it in cash.
4. In fact, buy all things related to your murder with cash. Duct tape, plastic bags, rope – all this shit will get you caught. Throw the receipts away immediately, in a public trash can in front of the store. And you probably shouldn't purchase the duct tape at the same time as the rope, the saw at the same time as the industrial-sized trash can.
5. If the process of your murder involves a struggle with the victim, make sure to clean their fingernails afterward. They might have tiny pieces of your skin underneath from when they tried to fight for their life.
6. Dump the body in a separate place than the murder scene. This way, the police will have to survey two spots before they can put the pieces of the murder together.
7. Cut off your victim's head and hands. Place these parts in a different area than the rest of the body.
8. If you're throwing a body (or parts of a body) into a lake, don't put it in plastic bags. Plastic bags get filled with the gas that is emitted when a body decays, and then the bags will float. Plastic bags will also prevent water from getting to the body. You want water to get to the body. This speeds up the rate of decomposition and also washes away trace evidence.
9. If you must use plastic bags, use one from a major chain grocery store, and not the little corner shop with the weird bags that say THANK YOU in a heart shape that are only used at five stores total in your city.
10. Arson is useful for eliminating evidence. Your fire might not get as far as you want it to, and the police will almost always recognize that it wasn't of an accidental nature, but it will make it difficult for the crime scene to remain untainted. Keep in mind: Set fire to clothes and curtains because they burn more quickly than furniture.
11. It takes a lot longer to burn up a car than you'd think. Just drive it into a lake instead.
12. If you're trying to stage a botched burglary, remember to a) actually take the valuables, and b) don't leave all the drawers pulled out at the same length, because you can't rummage through a bottom drawer if the top drawer is pulled out on top of it.
13. Don't keep your victim's jewelry, undergarments, hair, etc. as souvenirs. If you absolutely must do this, don't display your souvenirs in photographs, and don't leave all the souvenirs from all your murder victims in the same shoebox in your closet.
14. If you fail a lie detector test, realize this isn't proof of you being guilty. Insist to the police that you must have failed it because you were nervous. Never deviate from this story.
15. Never read anything having to do with poison (if you're using poison), the making of bombs (if you're making a bomb), a how-to on dead body disposal, or a list of tips that'll help you get away with murder. If you get caught with things like these, they're almost as good as a fingerprint. Don't think that you can delete the file or clear your browser history either, because you can't. Once you search or save it, it can always be found, thanks to computer forensics.
16. And absolutely do not ever, ever write a list of tips on how to get away with murder.
