In 1986, a family was terrified to learn that a teenage boy had been living in their house without their knowledge.

It was a crime that horrified and baffled the community, but at least nobody had been harmed physically.

Unfortunately, when the culprit was released on bail, he would escalate from being a creep to being a murderer.

This is Monsters. Daniel LaPlante was born on May 15, 1970 in Townsend, Massachusetts.

His childhood was broken, which later shaped his violent behavior.

His parents divorced, and he lived mostly with his mother, who later remarried and had two more

sons.

Daniel said he suffered severe sexual and psychological abuse from several adults in his life, including his

father, stepfather, and psychiatrist. Daniel's most important challenges started early in life.

He had dyslexia, attention deficit disorder, and other learning disabilities.

Those made school extremely difficult, and his classmates saw him as creepy and

weird, which left him isolated. A former classmate remembered him saying, quote,

the guy never really was all that friendly. He never liked to go to parties. He never really

talked much. Kids at school called him the class creep because of his poor hygiene

and odd behavior. That bullying pushed him further into isolation and his family sent him to a

psychiatrist to help with his troubling behavior. The doctor diagnosed him with hyperactivity disorder,

now called ADHD. Daniel later said that only made

things worse, claiming that the psychiatrist had sexually abused him. Daniel started showing

criminal behavior when he was 15 years old. He began with small thefts, which experts say could

have been a coping mechanism to give him some form

of control. His crimes grew into breaking into homes in his neighborhood to steal valuables,

jewelry, and money. He turned those break-ins into psychological games with his victims.

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