In truth, the actions of the smartest criminal go unnoticed, so he is unlikely to appear on this list. A multitude of people, endowed with superior mental abilities, chose a life of crime, some for financial reasons, and some in order to annoy the police with their ability to hit and avoid getting caught. As this list shows, many serial killers had above average IQs. Research by criminologists, psychologists and psychiatrists has not yet established the cause of this behavior.
Some have used their gifts of intelligence to steal through armed robbery and through elaborate plans to break into well-protected museums, shops and banks. However, others relied on fraud, pretending to be another person, to steal goods, services and money. All criminals mentioned here, with the exception of two brothers who escaped due to legal formality, and the killer who committed suicide, were caught and punished for their atrocities. All have demonstrated exceptional intelligence to their investigators. Here are the 10 smartest criminals in the world, their crimes and the price they paid to break the law.
10. Frank Abagnale
Frank Abignay is internationally known for his book Catch Me If You Can and Steven Spielberg's film based on it. As a teenager, Abagnale plastered the country with fake checks and pretended to be a Pan American pilot. The disguise allowed him to travel for free around the country, and later around the world. Pan American uniforms were credible, and Abagnale took advantage of this to distribute false checks. He later pretended to be a doctor at a hospital in Atlanta. He then borrowed the identity of a lawyer in Louisiana, confirming it with a fake diploma from Berkerley. He nevertheless passed the exam on the third try.
Abagnale was arrested in France, and after serving his term there, he was sent to a Swedish prison. After 6 months he was sent home. The FBI helped him to be released early in exchange for cooperation in the field of calculating counterfeiters. Abagnale's connections with the FBI led to a career in security, later investigations by journalists showed that much of the story was exaggerated, and Abagnale confirmed this. Various sites claim that he has an IQ of over 140 and has undoubtedly beaten banks and businesses with millions of dollars. He turned this experience into a world renowned financial security and banking fraud consultant, popular lecturer and bestselling author.
9. Andrew Cunenen
About three months in 1997, Andrew Cunenen went into disrepute with a string of murders. The list of his victims includes the famous Chicago developer Lee Miglin and designer Gianni Versace. Kjunenen's five notable victims were brutally murdered after he forged a personal relationship with them. The only exception was William Reese. Kyunenen killed him only to steal a truck, which he took to the beach in Miami. Following the assassination of Reese, Kyunanen's fourth murder in a month, he was placed on the FBI's list of Ten Most Wanted. On July 15, 1997, Kyunenen killed Versace on the front porch of his Miami beach house.
Kyunenen committed suicide eight days later without leaving a suicide note explaining his motives. Returning on the trail of the killer, investigators found out that he used methamphetamine, prescription opioids, cocaine and marijuana. He also drank a lot and built relationships with older wealthy men in order to steal their credit cards. He was known as a pathological liar who exaggerated his achievements and created a false biography. He also had an IQ of over 140, which was tested at a school in La Jolla. Kyunenen most likely suffered from antisocial personality disorder, living most of his short and brutal life at the expense of older, wealthy men.
8. Theodore Kaczynski
Theodore Kaczynski had the dubious honor of being the most expensive and long-sought subject in FBI history until he was arrested in 1995. Kaczynski was a genius in mathematics and entered Harvard University at the age of 16. His IQ was 152. He excelled in his classes, and despite what some called him secretive and withdrawn, the people who lived with him at Eliot House claimed that he was attractive and friendly. At Harvard, he participated in a psychological study, during which he was verbally and emotionally abused, his reactions were filmed, and after a while these notes were shown to him. Some argue that his mental problems came from the research. He later received his Ph.D. in mathematics from the University of Michigan. After working at the University of California at Berkeley, Kaczynski decided to "get off the radar."
From a small hut he built near Lincoln, Kaczynski attacked the symbols of society, which he believed were imposing something on him. At first, his actions were small acts of sabotage against encroachment on real estate development. In 1978, he launched a series of bombings that killed three people and injured 23. From 1978 to 1995, 16 bombs, delivered by mail or hand to hand, were attributed to the man who became known as the Unabomber. He also sent letters to newspapers describing his deeds and motives. He demanded that his essay, Industrial Society and Its Future, be published to prevent the bombings. When this was done, some scholars have compared it to Orwell's 1984. Kaczynski is serving eight life sentences with no parole at Supermax Prison in Florence, Colorado.
7. Karl Gugasyan
Karl Gugasyan's name is poorly known outside the circle of law enforcement agencies. An army veteran with special forces experience, Gugasyan was preparing for his Ph.D. in statistics and probability from Pennsylvania State University. He claimed to have made a living by gambling. In fact, he made his living by robbing banks. Carefully planned robberies, in which he walked into a bank wearing a mask before closing, usually on Fridays. He especially often wore the Freddy Krueger mask. He selected small banks at the edge of the forest and studied the area from topographic maps. From the scene of the crime, he fled into the forest, where he hid the loot and cards in plastic bags or polymer pipes in the bushes. Then he rode his motorcycle to the truck and calmly left.
After robbing more than 50 banks in 30 years, the boys, playing in the forest, stumbled upon one of his hiding places. Over the ensuing months, police in several states found a couple more of these places in the woods near the banks that he robbed. Gusasyan was caught, but he immediately agreed to cooperate with the police. And he collaborated so successfully that his sentence was shortened from 115 to 17. In prison, he taught mathematics to his inmates. He also agreed to create a bank robbery video for the FBI. He served his time in federal prison in Fort Dix, New Jersey, and was released in 2017. The FBI calls him the most productive bank robber in American history.
6. Gerard Blanchard
In November 2007, Canadian Gerard Blanchard was expected to spend 164 years in prison due to 16 charges of fraud and robbery in Canada and around the world. He offered prosecutors a deal based on information about the Star of the Empress Sissi, a pearl and diamond ornament worn by Elizabeth of Bavaria in the 19th century. The star was on display at the Schönbrunn Palace in Austria.Blanchard told Canadian authorities that the Star on display was a fake, which he bought from the palace's gift shop, and that the real Star had been stolen by him. He offered to show the police where the real Star is in exchange for a shorter period. Austrian authorities were aware of the forgery, but released little information regarding the investigation.
Blanchard told police that at night he parachuted onto the roof of Schönbrunn in 1998, turned off the alarm and replaced the Sissy Star. The change went unnoticed for two whole weeks, and by that time Blanchard was already in Canada. He hid a priceless gem in Winnipeg. He knew that it was impossible to sell the Star, but he kept the pearl with him anyway. When Blanchard led the Canadian police to the pearl, it had been nine years since the theft. His term was cut to eight years, but he served only two. The accomplices in his crimes were not convicted.
5. Rodney Alcala
In the middle of a two-year streak of murders, Rodney Alcala appeared on the television program Dating Game. He won a date with his girlfriend Cheryl Bradshaw, who abandoned him, calling the man "creepy." Perhaps it was the wisest decision in her life. Following his arrest and conviction for several murders before and after his television appearance, Alcala became known as the Dating Game Assassin. From 1977 to 1979, Alcala killed at least five women in California, and was convicted of murders in New York in 1971 and 1977. According to the police, Alcala tortured his victims: he strangled them to a pulp, revived and repeated the process.
Alcala also used his persuasiveness to convince young men and women that he worked as a professional photographer and collected "portfolios" of hundreds of naked girls and teenagers in provocative poses. After his conviction in California, several states named him "a person of interest" in unsolved crimes, including Washington and Wyoming. A UCLA graduate who also studied cinematography claimed that Alcala's IQ was over 160. At the time of this writing, he is still imprisoned in California.
4. Hasan and Abbas O
Hassan and Abbas O may have committed the perfect crime when they stole over $ 6.8 million worth of jewelry from a German department store. In a robbery, as in a Hollywood movie, three masked men climbed down from the roof on ropes to the seventh floor of a store. Having stolen the jewelry, the bandits climbed the rope ladder and fled. They left behind one latex glove, by which the police managed to find the DNA of two twins, Hasan and Abbas O. Under German law, their last name cannot be made public. In February, police arrested the brothers and charged them with robbery.
According to German law, neither one could be convicted, because DNA showed that only one had left the glove, not both. "From the evidence that we have, we can say with certainty that one of the brothers committed a crime, but it is impossible to determine which of them," the court ruled. For obvious reasons, the twins kept quiet about their involvement in the crime. With no other evidence and no third suspect, the German authorities released the twins on March 18th, 2009. The statute of limitations for robbery in Germany is 10 years. During this time, German law prohibits police from monitoring the brothers' bank accounts and tapping their phones. The brothers' only comment on the crime was that they were grateful to the state for their release. They got away with it.
3. Charlene Williams
Charlene Williams and her husband, Herald Gallego, (also known as Stephen Sykes) killed 10 people in Sacramento, California from 1978 to 1980. Even before their streak of murders, Gallego had a career as a criminal. He was arrested 23 times since the age of 13. Charlene was married twice before meeting Gallego. She came from Stockton, was an accomplished violinist, and had an IQ of over 150. She and her husband began their murderous rampage in September 1978 when Charlene convinced two teenage girls to escort her to a truck where Gallego was waiting with a pistol. They kidnapped the girls, Gerald raped both of them, and then shot them in the back of the head.
In June 1979, they kidnapped another pair of girls at a Washoe County fair, the remains of which were found only two decades later. In April 1980, two more girls disappeared from a store near Sacramento. They were beaten to death in Nevada. At least two adult women were kidnapped and killed by the couple in the summer of 1980. Finally, in November, a witness caught Williams and Gallego abducting the married couple as they were leaving a party. The police traced the vehicle's license plate, but did not manage to save the spouses. After serving her sentence, Charlene was released from prison in 1997. Gerald died in 2002 while in prison.
2. Richard Loeb
Richard Loeb was the son of a senior executive at Sears, Roebuck and Company. As a very talented and intelligent child, Loeb jumped several grades in school and had an IQ above 150. Skipping classes caused isolation from classmates due to the fact that he was several years younger than most of them. As a child, Loeb became addicted to lies and dreamed of the life of a criminal. As a teenager, he made some of his fantasies come true, committing several petty thefts and arson. At the age of 14, he entered the University of Chicago, where he met Nathan Leopold, who was 2 years older than him. Both were homosexual and engaged in physical relationships. In 1921 Loeb transferred to the University of Michigan and graduated in 1923. Loeb was 17 years old and became the youngest graduate in the history of the school.
In 1924, Loeb returned to Chicago for his graduation job, reunited with Leopold and convinced him to join the murder for the thrill of crime. Their victim was 14-year-old Bobby Franks, Loeb's cousin. After the boy's murder, the couple demanded a ransom from the boy's father. The assassination and subsequent trial was a national sensation, with Clarence Darrow fighting to protect the criminals, challenging the death sentence. Loeb was sentenced to life plus 99 years. While serving his sentence at Stateville Prison in Joliet, Loeb was stabbed to death by another inmate.
1. Nathan Leopold
Nathan Leopold, the other half of Leopold and Loeb, had an IQ of about 200. He entered the University of Chicago at the age of 15 with a strong interest in ornithology. He had few friends due to social awkwardness and was in awe of Loeb, who could easily manipulate him. Leopold later said that he did not want to join the murder of Bobby Franks and claimed that the fatal blow to the boy (Franks was beaten to death with a chisel) was inflicted by Loeb. At the trial, Loeb argued the opposite. Leopold was given the same verdict as Loeb, but while sitting in Stateville, he escaped the fate of a partner. Instead, Leopold volunteered for medical experiments conducted by the University of Chicago and the US Army to discover new treatments for malaria during World War II.
Leopold was deliberately infected with malaria in order to participate in research. First, he recruited other volunteers, and then oversaw the experiments, writing down reports of the results. The jailers, army officers and scientists at the University of Chicago spoke highly of his work during his research. In 1958, Leopold was released from prison and worked as a radiologist at Castaner General Hospital in Puerto Rico. He received his master's degree from the University of Puerto Rico and taught there, while also doing leprosy research at the university hospital. Leopold died in August 1971 in Puerto Rico from complications of diabetes. During his lifetime, he spoke five languages fluently, possessed several degrees, wrote two books, and received eternal disgrace as half of the infamous duo of Leopold and Loeb.
