Michael Bruce Ross was born on July 26, 1959, in Putnam, Connecticut. He was the oldest of four children in his family. His parents were Patricia Hilda Laine and Dan Graeme Ross. The family lived on a chicken farm in Brooklyn, Connecticut.

Michael's early home life was challenging. His mother struggled with mental health issues and had been institutionalized. She would sometimes leave the family, and when she was at home, she was known to be abusive, especially towards Michael. In addition, there are claims from family and friends that Michael suffered from sexual abuse by his uncle, who died by suicide when Michael was just six years old.

As a child, Michael displayed troubling behaviors. By the age of 12, he had engaged in inappropriate sexual behavior with two younger girls. In response to this, his father punished him with physical beatings, while his mother often watched and made comments.

Despite the difficulties at home, Michael did well in school. He was a bright boy and graduated from Killingly High School in 1977. He then attended Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, where he studied economics, graduating in May 1981. After college, he worked as an insurance salesman.

During his time in college, Michael began to show signs of antisocial behavior. In his sophomore year, he started stalking women. His behavior escalated, and in his senior year, he committed a serious crime for the first time.

Between 1981 and 1984, Michael Bruce Ross committed a series of murders in Connecticut and New York. He murdered eight girls and women aged between 14 and 25. During this time, Ross also raped seven of his eight murder victims. He was also accused of raping a 21-year-old woman named Vivian Dobson in 1983 and another woman named Candace Farris in Indiana. The local police did not pursue charges against him for these allegations, as they did not have enough evidence.

Ross confessed to all eight murders and was convicted for the last four. On July 6, 1987, he was sentenced to death in Connecticut. In 2001, while on death row, he pleaded guilty to first-degree manslaughter for killing Paula Perrera in New York in 1982. He was given a sentence of 8 and 1/3 to 25 years in prison for that crime. Ross spent almost 18 years on death row before his execution in May 2005.

The victims of his murders included Dzung Ngoc Tu, Tammy Williams, Paula Perrera, Debra Smith Taylor, Robin Dawn Stavinsky, April Brunais, Leslie Shelley, and Wendy Baribeault. He was captured on June 29, 1984, after police linked him to the crimes through various pieces of evidence.

During his time in prison, Ross became a devout Catholic. He often met with priests and prayed regularly. He also helped others in prison by translating documents into Braille and mentoring fellow inmates. He maintained a relationship with his fiancée, Susan Powers, who continued to visit him even after they broke up in 2003.

Ross's execution was set for May 13, 2005, at Osborn Correctional Institution in Somers, Connecticut. Leading up to his execution, he expressed regret for the pain caused to the families of his victims. He did not eat a special last meal and instead had the standard prison meal of turkey à la king with rice and vegetables. When asked if he wanted to say anything before his execution, he declined.

Ross was pronounced dead at 2:25 a.m. His remains were buried at the Benedictine Grange Cemetery in Redding, Connecticut. His execution was significant as it was the first in Connecticut since 1960 and the first to be conducted by lethal injection in the state. After his execution, a psychiatrist who had argued against it received a letter from Ross, indicating his feelings about the matter. Ross remains the last person executed in Connecticut, as the death penalty was abolished in the state in 2012.