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Working as a journalist for ''[[Argosy (magazine)|Argosy]]'' magazine in the 1960s, [[Thomas Harris]] traveled to Mexico to interview an American mental patient, Dykes Askew Simmons, who was being detained at Nuevo León State Prison in [[Monterrey]]. While jailed, Simmons had been shot by a prison guard, once in each calf, and he was treated by a skilled "prison-doctor" whom Harris had referred to as "Dr. Salazar". Harris described him as a "small, lithe man with dark red hair" who "stood very still" with "a certain elegance about him". A prison guard later informed Harris that Salazar was, in fact, a convicted murderer who could "package his victim in a surprisingly small box".<ref name=":0">{{Cite web|last=Valdez|first=Maria G.|date=July 29, 2013|title=Thomas Harris, 'Silence Of The Lambs' Author, Reveals Hannibal Lecter Was Inspired By Real Life Mexican Doctor|url=https://www.latintimes.com/thomas-harris-silence-lambs-author-reveals-hannibal-lecter-was-inspired-real-life-129778|access-date=November 12, 2020|website=Latin Times|language=en}}</ref> Salazar inspired Harris to create a character with a "peculiar understanding of the criminal mind".<ref name=":0" />
[[File:Doctor Balli.jpg|thumb|left|Doctor Alfredo Ballí Treviño, a convicted murderer, was the inspiration for Lecter.]]
Salazar is believed to be Alfredo Ballí Treviño, the last criminal to be condemned to death in Mexico, in 1959.<ref name=":0" /> Ballí was a surgeon and physician from an upper-class family who had murdered his colleague and boyfriend, Jesus Castillo Rangel. Ballí had held a towel soaked in chloroform over Rangel’s face, causing him to lose consciousness; Ballí then transferred the body to an adjacent bathroom where he slit Rangel’s throat and drained his body completely of blood before dismembering his corpse. Ballí is suspected of killing and dismembering several hitchhikers in the countryside during the late 1950s and early 1960s. Harris incorporated some of these details into [[Buffalo Bill (character)|Buffalo Bill]]'s development as a killer in [[The Silence of the Lambs (novel)|''The Silence of the Lambs'']].<ref>{{cite magazine|first=Diego Enrique |last=Osorno|url=https://www.vice.com/es_mx/read/hannibal-lecter-es-de-monterrey |title=Hannibal Lecter es de Monterrey |magazine=[[Vice (magazine)|VICE]]
In her book ''Evil Serial Killers'', [[Charlotte Greig]] asserts Lecter was inspired at least in part by the serial killer [[Albert Fish]].<ref>{{cite book|first=Charlotte|last=Grieg|title=Evil Serial Killers: In the Minds of Monsters|publisher=Arcturus Publishing|location=London, England|date=2009|isbn=978-1841932897|page=27}}</ref> Greig also states that, to explain Lecter's pathology, Harris borrowed the possibly apocryphal story of serial killer and cannibal [[Andrei Chikatilo]]'s brother Stepan being kidnapped and eaten by starving neighbors.<ref>Grieg, pg. 102</ref> The location of the book ''[[Hannibal (Harris novel)|Hannibal]]'' was inspired by the [[Monster of Florence]] and, while preparing the book, Harris traveled to [[Italy]] and was present at the trial of the main suspect, [[Pietro Pacciani]].<ref>{{cite web | first=Douglas | last=Preston | title=The Monster of Florence | url=https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2006/07/the-monster-of-florence/304981/ | work=[[The Atlantic]] |
==Character==
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