Michael Hernandez — American Psycho
Lions Gate FilmsLike Patrick Bateman in American Psycho (2000), Michael Hernandez was obsessed with serial killers and espoused racist ideals.
Michael Hernandez was 14 years old when he murdered his best friend Jamie Gough. They both attended Southwood Middle School in Palmetto Bay, Florida, with no outward indication of ill will prior to the assault. Luring Gough into the restroom before class, Hernandez slit Gough’s throat — stabbing him over 40 times.
Hernandez put the knife in his backpack and calmly went to class. Gough’s body was found within moments, while a teacher spotted blood on Hernandez and called the police. Hernandez admitted modeling his crimes after American Psycho (2000) after being arrested and charged with first-degree murder. Meanwhile, authorities searched his computer.
His hard drive contained a text file listing Gough and a friend named Andre Martin as victims. A look at his internet search history, meanwhile, revealed that he had spent the days before murdering Gough looking at macabre illustrations of dead people, baby killers in Australia — and endless reviews of American Psycho.
Based on the titular Bret Easton Ellis novel, American Psycho satirized the overt indulgence, racism, and superiority complex of privileged Wall Street brokers in the 1980s. With superficiality dictating their lives, characters mistake each other for different people as everyone looks the same in their homogenous culture.
The film’s satirical elements had apparently eluded Hernandez when he stabbed his Black friend to death. His search history also included reviews of hip-hop albums, brainwashing, bomb-making, and a manual titled “How To Kill Someone.” Martin testified at Hernandez’s trial that the killer was “amused” by horror films.
His racism, meanwhile, was further evident by comments he made in prison upon being sentenced to life on Nov. 7, 2008. While complaining to a cellmate that America had become overly politically correct, he praised American neo-Nazi David Duke — and said “it wouldn’t be like that if we had David Duke as president.”
