Pure Evil

A few days ago  a policeman was quoted as applying that description to Karen Matthews, who had kidnapped and drugged one of her numerous children in the hope of sharing a reward for finding her again.

I'm not sure whether the term has any meaning, because I suspect that whatever horrors anyone might perpetrate, it would always be possible to imagine worse, but suppose we don't insist on the precise meaning and treat the phrase as singling someone out as a prominent apostle of the world of darkness, to what sort of person should we apply it?

I envisage an evangelist of evil, inspiring others to forsake the good (whatever that is) and embrace the evil, a person sinning with flair and imagination, and seducing others with  saturnine charm.

Karen Matthews is quite the opposite; it is hard to imagine anyone following when she beckons. I certainly find her most unpleasant, but in a trivial way. I should like her to die from some undignified cause, like a boil somewhere it would be too rude to mention.