In the sanatorium, white room, there is one way conversation between Somerset and Crazed Man. On the desk, there is a photograph of a costume
which is worn by the Crazed Man while doing intimacy with the prostitute. A Polaroid photograph on a white table. It is the photo Wild Bill gave
to Mills. It‟s a picture of a belt, made with extra leather straps so it can be worn securely around the groin. It is a strap-on phallus, except there
is no plastic protuberance. Instead, there is a metal knife – it‟s strap-on
butcher‟s knife. CRAZED MAN
She was… she was on the bed. She was just sitting on the bed.
SOMERSET Who tied her down? You or him?
CRAZED MAN He had a gun. He had a gun… and he made it happen. He
made me do it MORE Walker, 1994: 86 CRAZED MAN
cont‟d sobbing
He made me put that… that thing on. Oh, Christ He made me wear it… and… and he told me to fuck her. He had the
gun in my mouth. Walker, 1994: 87 John Doe forces while pointing a gun to the Crazed Man to rape the prostitute
by strapping the metal blade knife around his phallus. His sadistic action is pretty obvious to let the prostitute feel the pain, suffers from the butcher
knife, while he uses another person the Crazed Man to release his sadism. v.
Pride victim In another case, the sadistic characteristic of John Doe is showed in
the way he murders a beautiful woman embodied sin of pride. John Doe slices her nose, and gives her choices whether call for help but she will not be
recognized as a pretty woman again or take sleeping pills whose bottle is glued to her hand to reduce the pain. He makes the woman to leave her pride
for being beautiful and to make her suffer for her ugly face. There is a cordless phone in her left hand, and her hand clings to it.
Her right hand holds a bottle of prescription pills. Mills tries to open the fingers of this hand with a tongue depressor, but they are super-
glued to the bottle. Mills turns the woman‟s hand slightly so two red pills roll out onto the blanket.
Mills examines the left hand. The phone is glued into it. MILLS
He cut her up and dressed the wounds. SOMERSET
holds up his left hand Call for help, and you‟ll live. But, you‟ll be disfigured.
raises right hand Or, put yourself out of your misery. O‟NEILL
He cut off her nose to spite her face, and he did it very recently. Walker, 1994: 93
Besides his sadistic characteristic toward his five victims above, John Doe also shows no mercy killing to Detective Mills‟ wife. John Doe murders
Mills‟ wife, because he is envy with Mills for having a beautiful wife, a handsome face, and a normal life.
“I tried to play husband… but it didn‟t work out. So, I took a souvenir…her pretty head. Walker, 1994: 117” John
Doe makes a confession for cutting off Mills‟ wife‟s head and brings it to
Mills as a package in which Somerset is the one who opens it and inside is the head. It is showed through Somerset expression after he opens the box.
Somerset stumbles backwards, away from the open box. He is white as a sheet, eyes filled with numb fear. He leans against his car for
support, wretches, sick, holds the back of his hand to his mouth.
SOMERSET No… Walker, 1994: 115
3. Selfish and egocentric
The third characteristic of John Doe is that he is a selfish person. He only cares about himself rather than other people‟s matters. He only thinks all
matters on his own perceptions. Even, he does not concern about others‟
feelings. He has no reason to listen to others‟ opinion. He takes no blame from
others for his condition. Instead, he blames other persons as the guilty ones. He corrects all his actions because he thinks that he is the right one. In the
incident murder place of pride victim, John Doe leaves a note in capitalized words saying “I DID NOT KILL HER. SHE WAS GIVEN A CHOICE”
Walker, 1994: 92. He still does not want to take any complaint or accusation for what he has done. He considers it as a right thing to do. Those murders do
not burden him to be responsible for the consequences. There is another proof to show his selfishness through the dialogue between other characters
Zanjani, 2006: 69 when Mills blames him for killing the victims in which Mills concerns them as innocent people. This is the most crucial point of his
egocentric characteristic. MILLS
You only killed a bunch of innocent people so you could get your rocks off. That‟s all.
JOHN DOE Innocent? Is that supposed to be funny? Look at the people
I killed. An obese man, a disgusting man who could barely stand up… who if you saw him on the street, you‟d point so
your friends could mock him along with you. Who if you saw him while you were ea
ting, you wouldn‟t be able to finish your meal. After him I picked the lawyer. And you
both must have been secretly thanking me for that one. This was a man who dedicated his life to making money by
lying with every breath he could muster… to keeping rapists and murderers on the streets.
MILLS Murderers?
JOHN DOE ignoring
A woman… MILLS
Murderers like you? Walker, 1994: 107 JOHN DOE
ignoring, louder A woman... so ugly on the inside that she couldnt bare to
go on living if she couldnt be beautiful on the outside. A drug dealer... a drug dealing pederast, actually.
laughs at that one And, dont forget the disease spreading whore. Only in a
world this shitty could you even try to say these were innocent people and keep a straight face.
getting worked up Thats the point. You see a deadly sin on almost every
street corner, and in every home, literally. And we tolerate it. Because its common, it seems trivial, and we tolerate, all
day long, morning, noon and night. Not anymore. Im setting the example, and its going to be puzzled over and
studied and followed, from now on.
MILLS Delusions of grandeur. Walker, 1994: 108
The dialogue above shows that Mills tries to interrupt John Doe‟s
saying, but Doe ignores him and keeps continuing his statements that he does not agree with Mills‟ opinion about innocent people. He believes what he has
done is a necessity. He thinks that all the victims he kills are the sinners who need to be punished. Even, Mills mocks him as a delusory person who
assumes himself as a great person “Delusions of grandeur” Walker, 1994: 108. Then, John Doe instead says that Mills will feel blessed because of him.
“You should be thanking me” 1994: 108. John Doe is very satisfied about himself and also a kind of person who is very selfish and confident in
exaggerated ways . “You‟re going to be remembered, and it‟s all because of
me. And the only reason I‟m here right now is because I wanted to be” Walker, 1994: 108.
4. Bookworm
John Doe is described as a person who adores reading, studying, and writing. Before Somerset and Mills find John Doe
‟s apartment, they ask a friend in Bureau to make list of people who read about seven deadly sins
because Bureau has computer to monitor reading habits for certain books which are flagged. It helps to find the I.D. card of those people and their
phone numbers. SOMERSET
If you want to know who‟s been reading Paradise Lost, Purgatory, and say… The Life and Time of Charlie
Manson, the Bureau‟s computer will tell you. It might give us a name. Walker, 1994: 63
Therefore, they get a name and the list of books that have been read by the name. It says Jonathan Doe. He is proven as the one who reads a lot of
books which are mentioned in the text such as “The Divine Comedy, A History of Catholicism, A book called Murderers and Madmen, Modern
Homicide Investigation, In Cold Blood, Of Human Bondage, The Marquis de Sade and Origins of Sadism, and Saint Thomas Aquinas
” Walker, 1994: 64. At his apartment, it is found a lot of thick books put in bookshelves.
Lots of thick, oversized art volumes. A HISTORY OF THEOLOGY. HANDBOOK OF FIREARMS. HISTORY OF THE WORLD.
SUMMA THEOLOGICA. UNITED STATES CRIMINAL LAW REVIEW Walker. 1994: 73.
Besides his pleasure in reading and studying, he also loves to write.
“There are bookshelves on three walls, filled with notebooks. Thousands and
thousands of notebooks ” Walker, 1994: 74. Somerset finds around five-
thousand notebooks on his bookshelves and each notebook has about two hundred and fifty pages
“Well, there are at least five thousand notebooks in this room, and near as I can tell, each notebook contains two hundred and fifty
pages ” Walker, 1994: 77. Those books contain his thoughts and daily
activities stories as Somerset said “It‟s just his mind poured out on paper”
Walker, 1994: 77.
5. Religious
John Doe appears as a religious person too. As the main topic of this study that John Doe uses religious precept, seven deadly sins, as his
motivation even though in a wrong way, still he is a religious person. John Doe is a person who believes that God‟s existence is true. “The Lord works in
mysterious ways ” Walker, 1994: 109. Believing that God exists is a proof
that the person is religious. In addition, by observing the books that he reads, some
of them are about religion. There are “A History of Theology, Summa Theologica Walker, 1994: 73, The Divine Comedy, A History of
Catholicism, Saint Tho mas Aquinas” Walker, 1994: 64. It is obvious from
the title of the books are about religious teachings. In his apartment, there are a lot of stuffs related to religion such as The
Holy Bible “Mills opens the middle desk drawer. It‟s empty except for The Holy Bible” Walker, 1994: 73, a rosary “He opens the next drawer and finds
a rosary…” 1994: 73, some articles about seven deadly sins “…, there‟s a
clutter of pinned up articles about the seven deadly sins ” 1994: 73, and
pictures of Christ “pencil drawings of Christ” 1994, 73.
6. Clever
In the beginning of the story, Mills and Somerset flounder how to find John Doe, because every murder that he has done, he never leaves any trace.
In John Doe‟s apartment, there is nothing related to his identity. Sara, one of
forensics, says to Mills that she and other forensics find trouble to search identity of John Doe. It seems there is no living sign at his apartment.
SARA coming to Mills
We can‟t find anything to hang on to. No paystubs, no appointment books or calendars. Not even an address book.
And, you‟re not going to believe this… MILLS
Keep looking. SARA
It‟s just we haven‟t found any fingerprints yet. Not a single one.
Walker, 1994: 76 John Doe is pretty clever to hide his identity. He does not hang any calendar
and appointment book. Even, his fingerprints cannot be found. This is why in the beginning; the name of John Doe is hard to be discovered yet. It is
effortful for the detectives to trace his identity until they enter his apartment, the identity is still covered.
Besides that, John Doe also intentionally leads the detectives to the next victims for each murder. In first homicide case, gluttony, John Doe leaves
a note quoted from John Milton‟s Paradise Lost.
SOMERSET
