Category:Karma Houdini

A "Karma Houdini" is someone who isn't adequately punished for their villainous actions, and escapes justice by "pulling a Houdini" (disappearing) from karma. Many scapegoats have eventually become karma houdinis, due to how much they suffer which eventually covers up their actions in the future.

A Karma Houdini, in this context, can have one of the following scenarios to qualify:

• the villain simply died; in a ruler's case, while still in power. Examples include Joseph Stalin, Mao Zedong, Kim Il-sung, Kim Jong-il, Francisco Franco, Fidel Castro, Leopold II of Belgium, Emperor Hirohito, Vladimir Lenin,François Duvalier and Josip Broz Tito.
• the villain was deposed or put in a vulnerable position, but he/she escaped prosecution. Examples include Idi Amin, Josef Mengele, Augusto Pinochet, Mobutu Sese Seko, Robert Mugabe, Richard Nixon, Suharto,Alfredo Stroessner and Pol Pot.
• the villain never got caught and simply vanished. Examples include Jack the Ripper, Pedro López, Heinrich Müller, the Zodiac Killer, Robert William Fisher, Alexis Flores, D. B. Cooper, Delphine LaLaurie, Mohammed Ali Hammadi, Yaser Abdel Said, and Abdullah Ahmed Abdullah.
• the villain is still alive today, and is either in an invulnerable position or on the run. Examples include Ayman al-Zawahiri, Joseph Kony, Mengistu Haile Mariam, Henry Kissinger, David Duke, Tony Perkins, Issei Sagawa, Brock Turner,Dawood Ibrahim and Tom Metzger.
• the villain committed suicide before he/she could be punished for his/her crimes. Examples include Adolf Hitler, Eric Harris, Dylan Klebold, Jeffrey Epstein, Leonard Lake, Adam Lanza, Seung-Hui Cho, Jim Jones, Chris Benoit, Kevin Loibl, Stephen Paddock and Abu Bakr al-Baghadi.
• protected by juvenile laws such as Daniel Petry, Melinda Loveless and Matias Oyarzo.

NOTE: no matter how painless the death or imprisonment is, deceased (unless they have died of natural causes) and imprisoned villains do not count as karma houdinis, with very few exceptions.