Father of serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer dies in hospice care

MEDINA COUNTY, Ohio — Lionel Dahmer, the father of serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer, has died at the age of 87.

Lionel Dahmer died while in hospice care in Medina County. The cause of his death has not been reported.

Dahmer’s family, who once lived in a home in Bath Township in Summit County, was thrust into the spotlight in 1991 when Jeffrey Dahmer was arrested in Milwaukee and accused of a grisly string of murders that involved cannibalism and necrophilia. Jeffrey Dahmer was convicted of 15 homicides, although authorities say there were 17 victims, and sentenced to life in prison in 1992.

Dahmer, who graduated from Revere High School in 1978, was murdered in prison at age 34 in November 1994.

Lionel Dahmer remained supportive of his son despite the accusations. He told the Akron Beacon Journal after his son’s arrest that Jeffrey was “not born a monster.”

“How could anyone be polite and kind and pretty normal otherwise and yet do these things unless they are extremely troubled and insane?” he told the Beacon Journal.

Lionel Dahmer visited his son monthly in prison. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports Dahmer recorded several conversations he had with his son while Jeffrey was in prison.

“I had weird thoughts too in my childhood,” Lionel said to Jeffrey in the recordings. “You’re just like me, Jeff. Amazing all the times that I should have been caught I never was. Nothing. Absolutely nothing is too great not to be forgiven.”

Lionel Dahmer was born on July 29, 1936, in West Allis, Wisconsin. In 1959, he earned a bachelor’s degree in chemistry from the University of Wisconsin and also got married to Joyce Flint. Jeffrey Dahmer was born on May 21, 1960.

The couple had another child before divorcing in 1978. Their son claimed his first victim, 18-year-old Coventry Township resident Steven Hicks, that same year.

Dahmer remarried in 1978 to Shari Jordan, who died earlier this year.

Dahmer earned a master of science degree from Marquette University in 1962 and a doctorate in philosophy from Iowa State in 1966.