Katie Kurtzman is one of David Ware’s victims. She’s a star student and president of Osborne High’s student council. She’s also a perfectionist to a fault—her mother, a nurse, suspects that Katie has obsessive-compulsive disorder. Inwardly, Katie acknowledges that her mother is probably correct, though she’s too ashamed to admit it out loud. On the night of her murder, Katie is working tirelessly on college applications—she’s determined to go to school as far away from Osborne as possible. David Ward resents Katie for having the privilege to leave Osborne, so he kills her, removes her heart, and places it on a stack of college brochures to mock her ambition.