In what may be the most comprehensive effort to understand the business of murder-for-hire and its practitioners, a 2014 British investigation scoured 39 years of evidence about hired killers. The authors found hitmen range in age from 15 to 63, with the average being 38-years old. A gun is their weapon of choice. And the most common setting is a suburban streetscape with the target walking a dog or shopping. It also remains a gender-specific occupation. The authors found only one case of a female assassin-for-hire.
The British report proposes four distinct types of contract killers: novices, dilettantes, journeymen and masters. Novices are young, first-time killers often steeped in violent street culture. Dilettantes are generally older and come to the grim business out of dire financial need. Journeymen are local enforcers often well-known to police. Only the final category of master—someone who travels from hit to hit and leaves no local trace—matches the standard Hollywood image of the cool professional killer. It was also the only group for which the authors could find no solid evidence.
“From discussions with our network of informants, it was clear that ‘Masters’ do, indeed, exist,” they write, arguing they often come from military or paramilitary backgrounds. “However, this is impossible to verify with any certainty. These ‘Masters,’ by virtue of evading justice, exist in the shadows—almost like ghosts—and it has therefore been impossible to build up any concrete picture of them.”
The popular image of the ghost-like assassin may thus be real after all. If it is, however, we’re still reliant on Hollywood for the details.
