H. H. Holmes killed people.
H. H. Holmes . While he confessed to 27 murders , only nine could be plausibly confirmed and several of the murders he confessed to were people who were still alive . He is commonly said to have killed as many as 200 , though this figure is traceable only to 1940s pulp magazines . Many victims were said to have been killed in a mixed-use building he owned , located about 3 mi west of the 1893 Chicago World 's Fair and said to have been a World 's Fair Hotel , though evidence suggests that the hotel portion was never truly open for business . Besides being a serial killer , Holmes was also a successful con artist and a bigamist , the subject of more than 50 lawsuits in Chicago alone .