An intense manhunt is under way to capture Resendez-Ramirez  MAP:   Map of crime trail  ALSO: FBI wanted poster and information Description of Rafael Resendez-Ramirez: Age: 38 (Born August 1, 1960) Height: 5-foot-7 inches Weight: 140-50 pounds Hair: Black Eyes: Brown Tattoo: Faded snake on left forearm Scars: Forehead, left arm and wrist RELATED VIDEO Resendez-Ramirez has a long history with the law. CNN's Carol Lin has a timeline of his run-ins with authorities. Real 28K 80K Windows Media 28K 80K What are the motives of a serial killer? CNN's Susan Candiotti has the report. (June 23) Real 28K 80K Windows Media 28K 80K

June 23, 1999
Web posted at: 5:51 p.m. EDT (2151 GMT)

HOUSTON (CNN) -- The FBI agent heading the national manhunt for alleged serial killer Rafael Resendez-Ramirez said Wednesday the suspect, described as a train-riding drifter with many aliases and disguises, could be anywhere in North America.

"We look at this entire country as an area where he could possibly be as well as Canada and Mexico," FBI task force leader Don Clark told CNN, "so, we are not at all looking in one specific area. We are looking where the leads take us."

Resendez-Ramirez is suspected in a series of vicious killings -- all of them at night, near train tracks -- including two last week in Illinois. He was formally charged Monday with the Illinois killings.

Suspect 'careless and sloppy'

He's also wanted for questioning in six more killings -- five in Texas and one in Kentucky. Of the eight slayings, the first of which was traced back to 1997, at least half have occurred this month. That has led authorities to fear the killing spree has intensified.

"He has been linked to several of these cases because he's been very careless and sloppy," said John Douglas, a retired FBI official who pioneered the investigative method of profiling criminal suspects using information collected about them. "He's left his prints behind at many of these scenes."

Authorities also are looking into the Mexican-born suspect's possible involvement in at least a dozen other killings, FBI sources told CNN.

The assistant police chief of Lexington, Kentucky -- where Resendez-Ramirez is implicated in the 1997 beating death of a college student -- said Wednesday the suspect recently contacted relatives in the area.

Assistant Police Chief Fran Root said Resendez-Ramirez's relatives were cooperative with the police when asked about him. But Root declined to identify them, their relation to Resendez-Ramirez or anything about their conversation with the police. Root said the information from the relatives' interview was being passed on to the FBI task force in Houston.

The FBI added Resendez-Ramirez to its Ten Most Wanted list of suspects Monday. A $125,000 reward is being offered for information leading to his arrest.

The FBI command center in Houston, which is coordinating the investigation, has received more than 1,000 tips in the case.

Forensic psychiatrist Helen Morrison, who has interviewed 57 convicted serial killers, said they all share an inexplicable need to kill.

"It's very similar to an addiction," she told CNN. "Someone who takes a little bit of a drug and likes it, and then takes more of a drug, and then all of a sudden needs more and more and more to get the same effect, physical and emotional."

Correspondents Susan Candiotti and Charles Zewe contributed to this report.

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