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Perfect MurderThe perfect murder is a murder which benefits the murderer, but also has no negative consequences for the murderer; usually, this simply means that the murderer is never caught. There are several factors which might contribute to the perfect murder: - The murderer has an impeccably trustworthy witness who will provide them with an alibi, and there are no other witnesses who might contradict this alibi.
- The murderer had no apparent motive to commit the crime, and so will not be suspected by the investigators.
- The murderer doesn't retain any incriminating items or leave behind any physical evidence of their presence at the scene of the crime.
- At no stage in planning, committing or covering up the crime does the murderer ever take another person into their confidence on any suspicious or illegal matter.
The concept of the perfect murder is closely connected with detective fiction and often crops up in the whodunnit and the locked room mystery. In the latter case, the murderer usually tries to make their crime 'perfect' by creating the illusion that there is no physically possible way in which they could have committed the crime. For example, the victim is found dead in an empty room with only one door, which is locked and bolted on the inside. The murderer, of course, has used some clever method to lock the door after departure, and a verdict of suicide means that no foul play will ever be suspected. The idea of a "motiveless" perfect murder is explored in the novel Strangers on a Train by Patricia Highsmith, famously adapted into a movie by Alfred Hitchcock. The scheme is for two strangers who both want someone dead to meet randomly and "trade murders", each doing the other's dirty work so that they will each have no discernible motive for the crime they have committed.
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