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WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — BTK serial killer Dennis Rader is a "monster" who caused indescribable pain to the families of his victims, tearful relatives testified Thursday at his sentencing hearing. Rader himself expressed remorse in a rambling statement.

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"Nancy's death is a like a deep wound that will never, ever heal," Beverly Plapp, sister of victim Nancy Fox, testified. "As far as I'm concerned, Dennis Rader does not deserve to live. I want him to suffer as much as he made his victims suffer."

"This man needs to be thrown in a deep, dark hole and left to rot," she said. "He should never, ever see the light of day."

Those who spoke called him a coward, and they quietly sobbed.

"No remorse, no compassion _ he had no mercy," said Kevin Bright, the brother of victim Kathryn Bright, who himself was shot but managed to flee. "I think that's what he ought to receive."

Rader appeared saddened during the hearing and wiped away tears. His voice choked as he made a rambling address to the courtroom, saying he had been dishonest to his family and victims and selfish.

"I know the victim's families will never be able to forgive me. I hope somewhere deep down, eventually that will happen," he said.

"I brought the community, my family, the victims, dishonor." he said. "It's all self-centered."

He admitted he tracked his victims "like a predator."

Said his lawyer, Steve Osburn: "To judge Mr. Rader as a human being, as a man, is beyond this court's jurisdiction, and that's something that Mr. Rader will have to face at a later time in front of a higher being."

Rader, 60, a former church congregation president and Boy Scout leader, led a double life, calling himself BTK for "bind, torture and kill." The slayings terrorized the Wichita area until Rader was arrested in February. He pleaded guilty in June to 10 murders committed from 1974 to 1991.

The sentencing hearing, which began Wednesday, was in many ways is a formality, with the only issue before the judge whether Rader will serve his 10 life sentences consecutively or concurrently. Kansas had no death penalty at the time the killings were committed.

Testimony earlier in the hearing focused on Rader's gruesome fantasies. Earlier Thursday, Capt. Sam Houston of the Sedgwick County Sheriff's Office said those fantasies were often fueled by the final moments of his victims' lives.

"He could live in that moment for years," Houston said.

Rader's last known victim was 63-year-old Dolores Davis, whom he handcuffed and tied with pantyhose before he choked her to death in 1991. The killer told police it took two or three minutes for her to die.

Rader tossed Davis' body under a bridge. He returned later to take Polaroid photographs of her wearing a feminine mask Rader himself had worn for his own bondage fantasies.

Prosecutors flashed a photograph of Rader wearing the mask, tied to a chair and donning a woman's blond wig. They also showed other pictures the killer took in which he had bound himself and was wearing a dress he had taken from Davis' house _ apparently reliving the ecstasy of the murder.

On Wednesday, Detective Clint Snyder testified that Rader told investigators he used a squeeze ball to strengthen his grip after finding his hands numbed during strangulations.

In describing one killing, Rader told Snyder: "I'm sorry. I know this is a human being, but I'm a monster."

Kansas Bureau of Investigation special agent Larry Thomas testified that after Rader killed Josephine Otero's parents and brother in 1974, he took the 11-year-old girl to the basement and told her: "Well, honey, you're going to be in heaven with the rest of your family."

Rader then hanged the girl and masturbated over her body.

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