Do your friends always express their concern over your undying love for the bad boy/girl? Then maybe you have a mild form of hybristophilia.
As we awkwardly fumble our way through puberty, our sexual desires materialise, but there are some perversions that lie outside the realms of what can be called ‘kinky’.
Mariya, from Arizona, is a 22-year-old hybristophiliac who describes her sexual attraction to people who commit violent and gruesome crimes as ‘severe’.
Here’s the interview with Mariya…
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Being clear that she in no way represents the whole community, Mariya explained that her mind rarely strays from the desire of being with these dangerous criminals, and fantasising about being one of their victims.
Most people’s romantic non-negotiables list consists of quick wit, a captivating set of eyes, undeniable charm, and mutual respect, but hybristophiliacs look for much darker and dangerous qualities.
Speaking to UNILAD, Mariya said:
Hybristophilia is the attraction to people that have committed crimes or outrageous and it can go from things like infidelity all the way up to murder and all the worst things you can think of. It’s having a sexual attraction to those people.
I would say at the age of about 16 I started getting really fascinated with Jeffrey Dahmer, Ted Bundy and Richard Ramirez. I started realising later on, as started reading into their cases, that I was actually attracted to these guys, let alone their minds.
I think it’s the fact I’ve always had these terrible fantasies about different things and I realised a lot of the guys I liked did things like that.
The reason I say mine is more severe is because some of these thoughts, thinking about Dylann Roof and these criminals all day. It’s literally in my head all day. I write letters to some of them, it’s a non stop thought of them and how attractive they are, and fantasies. The other people usually think ‘Ted Bundy is hot’ or ‘Dahmer is hot’ or whatever, and I’m like ‘he’s hot but I wish I could almost be a victim.
I think about them, I post pictures about them, I’ll put them on my wall and say happy birthday to Dylann, or TJ, or Wayne or any of the ones I have tattooed.
Mariya proudly showcased to me her binder of letters received from inmates, many very high profile. The letter writing is a passion of hers that is so treasured, she broke down into tears at the thought of ever having to stop.
One of the most controversial moves Mariya has made was to get the names of racist mass-murderer Dylann Roof, Jeffrey Dahmer (aka the Milwaukee Cannibal), and accomplice to Dean Corll, serial killer Wayne Henley.
Here is the image that has got her banned from Facebook a few times…
As well as regularly posting happy birthday wishes or remembrance posts to those who have been given the death penalty, Mariya has developed very close relationships with some of them.
Mariya, who is a truck driver, is in a relationship with a known killer in Washington state who is a young killer of 3, She would like to keep his identity anonymous. They speak every few weeks to a month on the phone and so far has plans to visit him sometime next year.
Here’s her huge binder…
Mariya gushed about the three men she has tattooed:
My favourite, who is alive, is Wayne Henley. In the 70s he was 15-17 and was one of the accomplices in luring in young boys for Dean Corrl to have his way with and then kill and then they would bury him.
They gave him life and he didn’t really even participate a lot in the crimes. He just didn’t get a fair trial I feel. I’ve talked to him the most. When I wrote my first letter in February, I sent out like six and he was the first one to write back to me. He’s been really special to me.
I got Wayne on my left side, right near my heart and of course I got Dylann Roof right in the middle which is why everyone hates me. I got Jeffrey Dahmer on the right side of my rib cage. They are my favourite tattoos that I’ve got.
This always turns into me being called a racist because I like Dylann Roof. I like him but his views aren’t mine. I’m not racist at all, I love everybody. A lot of people think that because I have him tattooed and I idolise him and find him super attractive, that I’m automatically a racist.
What I really like about him is some of the things he said in his court documents are hilarious. His IQ is slow at times and he just doesn’t care. When he first got arrested they asked him where he ran after he shot everyone and he said he was going to go to Nashville.
They asked him ‘why did you wanna go to Nashville?’ and he just said ‘I don’t know I’ve just never been there before’. I thought that was the funniest thing ever.
Mariya was perfectly aware of the crimes, their effects, and involvement of the men in these crimes, but they don’t put her off.
In fact, they draw her in closer, she explained she enjoyed their minds and the power that they yield with manipulation.
She fantasised, as she often does, about meeting someone like serial killer and rapist Ted Bundy, saying that his ‘sociopathic’ tactics, ‘restraint and slyness of getting away’ are a big turn on. She explained that she thinks “man they could get me, they’d be gone in ten minutes and that’s the end of me”, saying she likes ‘the fear of being with someone that’s like that’.
Mariya said:
As dumb as it is, and I know it’s dumb, but I would get into a relationship with someone that I knew would physically abuse me at times if they’re mad or something. If they’re a cheater, that’s a turn on, if they’ve shot people, abused, any terrible crime you can think of, it doesn’t have an effect on how I see the person.
Which is why Ian Brady is one of the tattoos. The crimes don’t matter to me although I feel very sorry for the victims.I hope their families get better, but I can’t help that I like these guys.
Her most recent letter from John King…
With such a blasé outlook towards the crimes, it begs the question of what Mariya would feel if it was her family or loved ones that were murdered or raped.
It’s a question she gets asked frequently, and in a very truthful response, she said: “The answer is I don’t know what it would be if it was my family. Of course I can say I would be mad immediately. But maybe when they’re in jail I would want to write to them and talk to them. Maybe ask why or become pen pals with them and try to understand them. I don’t think there is any limit to who I want to talk to or who I think about.
One of the most famous hybristophiliacs is Myra Hindley, the accomplice to Ian Brady and together they sexually assaulted and murdered five children.
Jeffrey Dahmer, who raped, murdered, and dismembered 17 men and boys between 1978 and 1991, is the object of many of Mariya’s fantasies. She told me of a trip she took in May this year to his family home in Ohio where he committed his first murder.
Mariya outside Jeffrey Dahmer’s childhood home…
While pointing to a jar of flowers on her window ledge, Mariya explained:
I don’t know if you can see back here but there is a jar over there that has flowers that I personally picked from Jeffrey Dahmer’s childhood home. I put them in a jar and keep them on my windowsill.
It’s where his parents lived, and also where he committed the first murder and I walked around those woods. I’ve got many pictures up on the deck, and on the staircase and down below. I love being able to wake up and see the pretty flowers on my windowsill because I don’t think anybody else has them, because I grabbed the only dandelion in the whole area of his house.
When I put them in the jar, the dandelion died, and all the petals fell onto the rest of the flowers. I just think it’s really pretty and I’ve kept it sealed since I got it in May this year.
I walked by his bedroom window, and all the way in front of the house. It is such a beautiful house, I would buy it if I could and live there. It’s in the richest neighbourhood of Akron, Ohio.
Mariya has bought glasses to match Dahmer’s as well as had t-shirts made to look like one Ted Bundy wore.
The binder that she keeps, containing all of the letters, envelopes, and any drawings by the inmates, is her most prized possession. Unlike many of the hybristophiliacs who write letters to inmates in order to sell them for money, Mariya keeps them, almost like a shrine to all the most evil people in the world. She has no interest in selling any of them, they are very much for her to keep revisiting.
Mariya’s most recent post from an inmate comes from the horrific white supremacist John King who, along with two other racists, dragged the body of African-American James Byrd Jr. for three miles behind a pick up truck, killing him and receiving the death sentence.
John King, who is on death row in Texas, sent Mariya a couple of his commissary lists as well as an origami butterfly.
Mariya runs a hybristophilia group and a group where she shares her experiences with others and helps people write letters to inmates.
The young mother-of-one describes herself as a really sweet person who just happens to have a taste for the most evil people.
She said:
I wish people would take more time to learn about Hybristophilia and actually look into it and not just think that: because it ends in philia that it’s along the same lines as the other bad ones and it’s not a mental disorder either, it just happens to be sexually taboo.
Emails from her prisoner email app…
Some people tell her it’s greatly disturbing, while others see it as a very dark sexual desire.
Either way, it is interesting to understand how a person with hybristophilia thinks and feels.
