Criminal homicide arouses great public concern, yet its frequent prelude, the threat to kill, has received scant attention from psychiatrists and psychologists. The threat is more often made than fulfilled. Yet this is also true of the threat of suicide which has been the subject of countless research projects and reports. The curiously meager scientific literature cannot be attributed to lack of opportunity for study, as many persons who make homicidal threats either seek treatment or are committed to a hospital for psychiatric examination. Thus within 15 months, 100 patients (one in every 16 admissions) were admitted to the 78-bed Colorado Psychopathic Hospital specifically because they had made homicidal threats. Consideration of the threat to kill will not be restricted to these 100 patients. Statistics on these 55 men and 45 women will be reported as they may throw some light on this neglected problem despite the lack of research controls. Fifty-four patients were admitted on civil court order and 46 were admitted voluntarily. Although no patient was committed by a criminal court, several sought admission as an alternative to the filing of criminal charges. Their ages ranged from 11 to 83 years; 52 were between the ages of 20 and 40, and the mean age was 43% years.