Executed May 10, 1994 at 12:58.m. by Lethal Injection in Illinois

















11th murderer executed in U.S. in 1994

175th murderer executed in U.S. since 1976

1st murderer executed in Illinois in 1994

2nd murderer executed in Illinois since 1976





Since 1976 Date of Execution State Method Murderer

(Race/Sex/Age at Murder-Execution) Date of

Birth Victim(s)

(Race/Sex/Age at Murder) Date of

Murder Method of

Murder Relationship

to Murderer Date of

Sentence 237 05-10-94 IL Lethal Injection John Wayne Gacy W / M / 30 - 52 03-17-42 Greg Godzik, 17

John Szyc, 19

Robert Piest, 15

John Butkovich, 17

Tom Boling

David Talsma

Robert Winch

Russell Nelson

John Mowery

Robert Gilroy, 18

Matthew Bowman

John Prestige

Rick Johnson

William Carroll, 16

Samuel Stapleton

Randall Reffelt

Darrell Simpson

Billy Kindred

Frank Landingin

James Mazzara

+ 13 unidentified males 1972-78 Strangulation Acquaintances 03-13-80

On December 11, 1978, a 15-year-old Des Plaines high school sophomore, Robert Piest, disappeared shortly after leaving work at a pharmacy where Gacy had recently completed a remodeling job. Police put Gacy under surveillance, and when it was learned that two teenage employees of Gacy, Gregory Godzik and John Butkovich, also had recently disappeared, the police obtained a search warrant for Gacy's home. A roll of film belonging to Piest was seized in the ensuing search. A second search warrant was executed and three lime-covered bodies were found in the crawl space. Gacy pointed officers to the precise locations of certain bodies in the crawl space and stated that he had lured the victims to his home, either expressly for sex or through the promise of employment, and then strangled them. A total of 29 bodies were recovered on the property and 4 more were discovered in a nearby river. Gacy recanted his confession and did not testify at trial, where he asserted an insanity defense unsuccessfully.

Citations:

People v. Gacy , 468 N.E.2d 1171 (Ill. 1984) (Direct Appeal).

People v. Gacy , 530 N.E.2d 1340 (Ill. 1988) (PCR).

Gacy v. Welborn , 994 F.2d 305 (7th Cir. 1993) (Habeas).

Gacy v. Page , 24 F.3d 887 (7th Cir. 1994) (Habeas/Stay).

Final / Special Meal:



Fried chicken, French fries, Coke and strawberry shortcake.

Last / Final Words:



"Kiss my ass."

Internet Sources:



Cook County Circuit Court Clerk: John Wayne Gacy

The "Killer Clown" - People v. John Wayne Gacy, 79C-69 et seq.

The 33 indictments of John Wayne Gacy document the State of Illinois case against one of the most prolific and notorious murderers in United States history. Gacy, a construction contractor, lived in a quiet suburb northwest of Chicago. He made himself well known in his community for his political work and his help to charitable causes. He often appeared at children's performances dressed as a clown. But the friendly clown had another life.

The law caught up with Gacy late in 1978. The mother of a young man who disappeared after applying to Gacy for a job notified the police. A search warrant allowed police to search Gacy's home. Warrant pages 1,2,3. Authorities eventually discovered the remains of 27 corpses underneath the house, plus 2 more under the garage and driveway. Eventually Gacy told police he had thrown 4 other corpses into the DesPlaines River.

Gacy was indicted for 33 murders. Indictment 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8. He was found guilty in March of 1980. Verdit pages 1. Judge Louis B. Garippo sentenced him to death. Execution pages 1,2,3,4. The Circuit Court ruling was appealed. The Supreme Court of Illinois affirmed the death sentence of execution by lethal injection. Supreme Court pages 1. On May 10, 1994, the sentence was carried out. Clerk's Memorandum .

People v. John Wayne Gacy may be viewed in the Archives Reading Room. This large case file totals 22 boxes. Much of the written and visual material is extremely graphic in nature. To view the file, contact the Archives at 312-603-6601.

SerialKillers Archives by David Lohr

John Wayne Gacy was born on March 17, 1942, in Chicago Illinois. According to the book Killer Clown, by Terry Sullivan and Peter Maiken, Gacy seemed to have a regular childhood with the exception of his turbulent relationship with his father, John Wayne Gacy Sr. The authors describe the father as an unpleasant, abusive alcoholic prone to physically and verbally assaulting his children. They describe Gacy as deeply loving his father and wanting desperately to gain his approval and attention, but failing to win him over. (Gacy Sr. died on Christmas Day 1965.)

After attending four high schools during his senior year and never graduating, Gacy dropped out of school and left Chicago for Las Vegas. While there, he worked part time as a janitor for Palm Mortuary. Unhappy in Vegas, he returned to Chicago a few months later.

During the early 1960s, Gacy enrolled in a business college and developed a talent for salesmanship. A born salesman, he could talk his way in and out of practically any situation. Upon graduating, he went to work as a management trainee at Nunn Bush Shoe Co in downtown Chicago. He excelled in his position and within weeks was transferred to Springfield, Ill., to manage a mens clothing outlet for the company, where he remained employed for nearly a year. Shortly after his promotion, Gacy married into a wealthy family and relocated with his new bride to Waterloo, Iowa. In 1966, at the request of his father-in-law, Gacy took over management of the familys chicken restaurant. Gacy quickly became a well-known and liked member of the community, according to later accounts in the Waterloo Courier.

However, all was not well with Gacy. The future serial killer would be arrested for the first time in 1968. The felony charge, attempting to coerce a male employee into homosexual acts, came as a big surprise to those who thought they knew this likable father of two infants, especially his wife of two years. Gacy pled guilty to sodomy and was sentenced to 10 years in Iowas State Mens Reformatory in Anamosa. His wife filed for divorce following the sentencing. Angered, Gacy informed her he did not want to see his children again and would henceforth consider her and the two kids dead.

After serving 18 months, Gacy was paroled in 1971 and moved back to Chicago. He went to work as a construction contractor and then started his own construction business. That July he remarried a recently divorced women he had met through mutual friends and, with financial assistance from his mother, moved into a house in Des Plaines, with financial help from his mother. In February 1971, Gacy again ran into trouble with the law. He was charged with the attempted rape of a young man. The charges were dropped when the victim failed to appear in court for the hearing.

Gacy had a talent for business. According to the Des Plaines Journal, he was known by local merchants as a sharp businessman, who would often undercut his business rivals' contracts by hiring on a number of high-school age employees to cut his costs. His business grew. Gacy spent part of his leisure time hosting elaborate street parties for friends and neighbors, dressing as a clown, and entertaining children at local hospitals. He also immersed himself in organizations such as the Jaycees and the local Democratic party. As a Democratic precinct captain he once had his picture taken with First Lady Rosalyn Carter.

Gacys second wife divorced him in March of 1976. According to accounts in Harlan Mendenhalls book, Fall of the House of Gacy, Gacy's second wife felt she could no longer cope with the marriage due to her husband's unpredictable moods and bizarre obsession with homosexual magazines. The couple did not have children.

On Dec. 12, 1978, the police again focused their attention on John Wayne Gacy. Robert Piest, a teenage stock boy at a local Des Plaines pharmacy, had come up missing. Gacy was the last person seen with the boy prior to his disappearance. When investigators ran a background check on Gacy, they were surprised to discover that he had previously served time for committing sodomy on a teenage boy. With this incriminating information, investigators were able to obtain a warrant to search Gacys house. During the execution of the warrant, investigators entered a crawl space located beneath the home. A rancid odor was quickly noticed. The smell was believed to be faulty sewage lines and was quickly dismissed. Without any noticeable incriminating evidence, investigators returned to headquarters to run tests on the evidence they seized.

During a review of the items confiscated from Gacys house, investigators soon realized that they had unknowingly seized a piece of critical evidence. One of the rings found at Gacys house belonged to another teenager who had disappeared a year earlier. With this new information, investigators began to realize the possible enormity of the case that was unfolding before them. Following the discovery of their new information, it was not long before investigators were able to obtain a second search warrant for Gacys home.

On Dec. 22, 1978, Gacy, realizing that his dark secrets were about to be exposed, confessed to police, telling them that he had murdered approximately 33 young men over the past seven years. He also drew them a detailed map to the locations of 28 shallow graves under his house and garage. Further he admitted to dumping five others into the Des Plaines River. Gacy told detectives, "There are four Johns." He later explained that there was John the contractor, John the clown, and John the politician. The fourth person went by the name of Jack Hanley. Jack was the killer and did all the evil things.

Gacys murder trial began Feb. 6, 1980, in the Cook County Criminal Courts Building in Chicago. During the five-week trial the prosecution and the defense called more than 100 witnesses to testify. The defense strategy was to establish that Gacy was insane and out of control at the time of the killings. To bolster this claim the defense put on the stand psychiatrists who had interviewed Gacy prior to trial. After the closing arguments, the jury deliberated for only two hours before finding Gacy guilty of murdering 33 people.

On March 13, 1980, Gacy was sentenced to die. Gacy was transported to Menard Correctional Center in Illinois. He would remain there for just over 14 years until he was transported to the Statesville Penitentiary near Joliet for execution.

On May 9, 1994, Gacy sat down for his last meal: fried chicken, French fries, Coke and strawberry shortcake. Prison officials later described his demeanor as "chatty . . . talking up a storm." In a phone interview shortly before his execution, he told a Knight-Tribune reporter, "There's been 11 hardback books on me, 31 paperbacks, two screenplays, one movie, one off-Broadway play, five songs, and over 5,000 articles. What can I say about it?" But of course, he quickly protested, "I have no ego for any of this garbage."

Just after midnight on May 10, 1994, Gacy was executed by lethal injection. For his last words, Gacy snarled, ''Kiss my ass.''

The Crime Library: John Wayne Gacy

John Wayne Gacy, Jr. (By Rachael Bell and Marilyn Bardsley)

It is no surprise that John Wayne Gacy, Jr. was admired and liked by most who had known him. He was a sharp businessman who had spent his time, when not building up his contracting company, hosting elaborate street parties for friends and neighbors, dressing as a clown and entertaining children at local hospitals and immersing himself in organizations such as the Jaycees, working to make his community a better place to live. People who knew Gacy thought of him as a generous, friendly and hard-working man, devoted to his family and community. However, there was another side to Gacy that few had ever witnessed...

It was May 22, 1978, and Jeffrey Ringall had recently returned from a winter vacation in Florida to his home in Chicago. He decided to reacquaint himself with the city by visiting New Town, a popular area of Chicago where many popular bars and discos could be found. While walking through the area, his path was blocked by a black Oldsmobile. The heavy-set driver leaned out from the window and complimented Ringall on his unseasonable tan. He continued to make small talk and then asked if Ringall wanted to share a joint with him while they rode around town.

Ringall was delighted to escape the cold and share a marijuana cigarette with the stranger. He hopped in the car and began to smoke with his friendly new acquaintance. Before they were half way through with the joint, the man grabbed Ringall and quickly shoved a rag over his face doused with chloroform. Ringall lost consciousness and only briefly reawakened a couple of times during the car ride. During his wakeful periods Ringall watched in a daze as street signs passed, trying to make sense of what was happening to him. Yet before he was able to understand where he was and what was happening, the stranger again covered his face with the chloroform-soaked rag and he passed out. Once when he was awake, Ringall remembered being in a house and seeing the heavy-set man naked before him. Ringall also remembered seeing on the floor a number of varying sized dildos that the stranger pointed out to him and remarked on how he was going to use them on his unwilling prisoner. That evening Ringall was viciously raped, tortured and drugged by the sadistic stranger.

Later the next morning, Ringall awoke from one of his blackouts fully clothed and under a statue in Chicagos Lincoln Park. He was surprised to be alive after the trauma that was inflicted on his body. He made his way to his girlfriend's and later to the hospital where he stayed for six days. During his hospital stay, Ringall reported the incident to the police who were sceptical about finding his rapist, given the little information that Ringall could provide. Along with skin lacerations, burns and permanent liver damage caused from the chloroform, Ringall suffered severe emotional trauma.

Yet, he was fortunate to be alive. Ringall was one of the few victims of John Wayne Gacy, Jr. to have survived. During a three-year-period, Gacy went on to viciously torture, rape and murder more than thirty other young men, who would later be discovered under the floorboards of his home and in the local river.

The Beginning

Chicago's Irish inhabitants and Mr. and Mrs. John Wayne Gacy marked the day with celebration. It was St. Patricks Day and Marion Elaine Robinson Gacy and John Wayne Gacy, Sr. welcomed their first son into the world at Edgewater Hospital in 1942. John Wayne Gacy, Jr. was the second of three children. His older sister Joanne was born two years before him and two years later came his youngest sister Karen. All of the Gacy children were raised Catholic and all three attended Catholic schools where they lived on the northern side of Chicago. The neighborhood in which Gacy grew up was middle class and it was not uncommon for young boys to take on part-time jobs after school. Gacy was no exception and he busied himself after school with a series of part-time positions and Boy Scout activities. The young Gacy had newspaper routes and worked in a grocery store as a bag-boy and stock clerk.

Although he was not a particularly popular kid in school, he was liked by his teachers and co-workers and had made friends at school and in his Boy Scout troop. He always remained active with other children and thoroughly enjoyed outdoor scouting activities. Gacy seemed to have a very normal childhood with the exception of his relationship with his father and a series of accidents that affected him. When Gacy was eleven years old he was playing by a swing set when he was hit in the head by one of the swings. The accident caused a blood clot in the brain. However, the blood clot was not discovered until he was sixteen. From the age of eleven to sixteen he suffered a series of blackouts caused by the clot, yet the blackouts ceased when he was given medication to dissolve the blockage in the brain.

At the age of seventeen, Gacy was diagnosed with a non-specific heart ailment. He was hospitalized on several occasions for his problem throughout his life but they were not able to find an exact cause for the pain he was suffering. However, although he complained frequently about his heart (especially after his arrest), he never suffered any serious heart attack. During Gacys late teens, he suffered some turmoil with his father, although relations with his mother and sisters were very strong. John Wayne Gacy, Sr. was an abusive alcoholic who physically abused his wife and verbally assaulted his children. Although John Sr. was an unpleasant individual, young Gacy deeply loved his father and wanted desperately to gain his devotion and attention. Unfortunately, he was never able to get very close to his father before he died, something which he regretted his entire life.

After attending four high schools in his senior year and never graduating, Gacy dropped out of school and left home for Las Vegas. While in Vegas, he worked part time as a janitor in a funeral parlor performing odd jobs. He was not happy in Vegas because he couldn't get a decent job. He tried desperately to earn enough money to get back home. However, it was difficult because there were few jobs available for those who did not have a high school diploma. It took him three months to earn enough money for a ticket back to Chicago where his two sisters and mother joyfully awaited his arrival.

Soon after Gacy returned from Las Vegas in the early 1960s, he enrolled himself into a business college and eventually graduated. While at business college, he perfected his talent in salesmanship: Gacy was a born salesman who could talk his way in and out of almost anything. He put his talents to work when he was hired at his first job out of business school at the Nunn-Bush Shoe Company. He excelled in his position as a management trainee and it was not too long after his start with the company that he was transferred to manage a mens clothing outlet in Springfield, Illinois. It was during this time that Gacys health again took a turn for the worse. He had gained a great deal of weight and he began to suffer more problems with his heart condition. Soon after his hospitalization for his heart, he was hospitalized again for a spinal injury. His weight, heart and back problems would plague Gacy for the rest of his life, yet that would not stop him from his work or other activities.

While in Springfield, Gacy became involved in several organizations that served the community: the Chi Rho Club where he was membership chairman, the Catholic Inter-Club Council where Gacy was a member of the board, The Federal Civil Defense for Illinois, the Chicago Civil Defense where Gacy was a commanding captain, the Holy Name Society where he was named an officer and the Jaycees where Gacy devoted most of his time to and eventually became first vice-president and "Man of the Year." It was obvious that Gacy took his involvement in community organizations very seriously and he devoted most of his free time to them. Many who knew Gacy at this time considered him to be very ambitious and eager to make a name for himself in the community. He worked so hard that on one occasion he was hospitalized for nervous exhaustion. However, once again he refused to let his health problems stand in the way of life and happiness.

In September 1964, Gacy met and married a co-worker named Marlynn Myers whose parents owned a string of Kentucky Fried Chicken fast food restaurant franchises in Waterloo, Iowa. Fred W. Myers, Gacys new father-in-law, offered him a position with one of his franchises. Soon after that Gacy and his new wife moved to Iowa. Life seemed to hold a lot of promise for Gacy at this time in his life.

Gacy began working for his father-in-law, learning the business from the ground up. On average he worked for twelve hours a day, yet it was not uncommon for him to work fourteen or more hours a day. He was enthusiastic and eager to learn, with hopes of one day taking over the string of fast food restaurants. When Gacy was not working, he was active in the Waterloo, Iowa, Jaycees. Gacy worked tirelessly performing volunteer work for his community through the Jaycees. It was there that he made most of his friends and spent most of his time. In Clifford L. Linedeckers book, The Man Who Killed Boys, he quoted Charlie Hill, a Jaycee volunteer who knew well: "He wanted to be very successful and he wanted to be recognized by his peers.... [Gacy] was always working on some project and he was devoted to the Jaycees. The club was his whole life."

However, Gacy managed to find some time with his wife when not working for his father-in-law or doing volunteer work. Marlynn gave birth to a boy shortly after their move to Iowa and soon after the birth of their son, they celebrated the birth of a daughter. The Gacys had every reason to be happy during the first few years in Iowa. They had a nice house in the suburbs and a loving and healthy family. Marlynn enjoyed looking after the children and John was happy in work and with the Jaycees. He was even working on a campaign for the presidency of the Jaycees. Everything seemed almost too good to be true, and indeed it was.

Rumors

Everything seemed to be looking good for John Wayne Gacy, Jr. Yet, his lucky streak would not last too much longer. Rumors were spreading around town and amongst Jaycee members regarding Gacys sexual preference. It seemed that young boys were always in Gacys presence. Everyone heard the stories that Gacy was homosexual and made passes at the young boys who worked for him at the fast food franchises. Yet, people close to him refused to believe in the gossip, until May of 1968 when rumors became truths.

In the spring of 1968, Gacy was indicted by a grand jury in Black Hawk County for allegedly committing the act of sodomy with a teenage boy named Mark Miller. Miller told the courts that Gacy had tricked him into being tied up while visiting Gacys home a year earlier, and had violently raped him. Gacy denied all the charges against him and told a conflicting story, stating that Miller willingly had sexual relations with him in order to earn extra money. Gacy further insisted that Jaycee members opposed to him becoming president of the local chapter organization were setting him up.

However, Millers were not the only charges that Gacy would have to face. Four months later Gacy was charged with hiring an eighteen-year-old boy to beat up Mark Miller. Gacy offered Dwight Andersson ten dollars plus three hundred more dollars to pay off his car loan if he carried out the beating. Andersson lured Miller to his car and drove him to a wooded area where he sprayed mace in his eyes and began to beat him. Miller fought back and broke Anderssons nose and managed to break away and run to safety. Soon after Miller called the police, Andersson was picked up and taken into police custody where he gave Gacys name as the man who hired him to perform the beating.

A judge ordered Gacy to undergo psychiatric evaluation at several mental health facilities to find if he were mentally competent to stand trial. Upon evaluation, Gacy was found to be mentally competent. However, he was considered to be an antisocial personality who would probably not benefit from any known medical treatment. Soon after health authorities submitted the report, Gacy pleaded guilty to the charge of sodomy.

When the judge finally handed down the sentence, Gacy received ten years at the Iowa State Reformatory for men, the maximum time for such an offence. John Wayne Gacy, Jr. was twenty-six years old when he entered prison for the first time. Shortly after Gacy entered prison, his wife divorced him on the grounds that Gacy violated their marriage vows.

While in prison Gacy adhered to all the rules and stayed far from trouble. He was a model prisoner, realizing that there was a high possibility of an early parole if he remained non-violent and well behaved. Eighteen months later, Gacys hopes came true, his parole was approved. On June 18, 1970, Gacy left the confines of the prison gates and made his way back to his place of birth in Chicago.

New Beginnings

John Wayne Gacy, Jr. immediately began to put his life back on track again after moving back to Chicago. He knew he could not afford to let the past disrupt his future if he could help it. The only thing that seemed to have weighed Gacy down was the death of his father while Gacy was in prison. Gacy went through difficult periods of depression after his release from prison because he regretted never saying goodbye to his father. He felt cheated that he never had a chance to improve his relationship with John W. Gacy, Sr., a man whom he loved dearly despite of his abusive behavior. However, although deeply saddened by unresolved conflicts with his father, Gacy refused to let it ruin his future. Gacy moved in with his mother and obtained work as a chef in a Chicago restaurant. A job that he enjoyed and worked at with enthusiasm.

After four months of living with his mother, Gacy decided it was time he lived on his own. His mother had been impressed with how her son had readjusted to life outside the prison walls and she helped him obtain a house of his own immediately outside Chicagos city limits. Gacy owned one-half of his new house located at 8213 West Summerdale Avenue in the Norwood Park Township and his mother and sisters owned the remaining half of the home. Gacy was very happy with his new two-bedroom 1950s ranch style house that was located in a nice, clean, family oriented neighborhood. He was quick to make friends with his new neighbors, Edward and Lillie Grexa, who had lived in the neighborhood since the time it had been first built. After only seven months of living in his new home, he was spending Christmas evening with the Grexas, whom he had invited over for dinner with his mother. The neighbors became fast friends and often gathered together for drinks or a game of poker in the comfort of their homes. The Grexas had no idea of Gacys criminal past or his most recent run in with the law.

A little more than a month after the Grexas had visited for Christmas dinner at Gacys home, he had been charged with disorderly conduct. The charges stated that Gacy had forced a young boy, whom he had picked up at a bus terminal, to commit sexual acts upon him. Gacy had been officially discharged from his parole for only a few months before he was already breaking the law again. However, Gacy slipped through the system when all charges against him were dropped, due to the no-show of his young accuser at the court proceedings. Gacy was a free man once again.

On June 1, 1972 Gacy married Carole Hoff, a newly divorced mother of two daughters. Gacy had romanced the woman who was in a state of emotional vulnerability and she immediately fell for him. She was attracted to Gacys charm and generosity and she believed he would be a good provider for her and her children. She was aware of Gacys prison experience, yet she trusted that he had changed his life around for the better. Carole and her daughters quickly settled into their new home with Gacy. The couple maintained a close relationship with their neighbors and the Grexas were always invited over to Gacys house for elaborate parties and barbecues. As flattered as they were to receive such invitations by their young neighbors, they were always bothered by a horrible stench that prevailed through the house. Lillie Grexa was sure a rat had died beneath the floorboards of Gacys house and she urged him to solve his problem. However, Gacy blamed the horrible stench on the moisture build-up in the crawl space under his house. Yet, it wasnt a problem with moisture beneath the house. Gacy knew the real and more sinister cause for the stench and he kept the truth from everyone for years.

Although many friends, family members and neighbors complained about the strange smells coming from Gacys house, it certainly didnt stop them from attending his theme parties. Gacy threw two memorable barbecue parties in which he invited all those close to him. On one occasion more than three hundred guests showed up to attend one of Gacys parties. The two that were attended by the most people were a luau theme party and a Western theme party. Both were huge successes. Gacy thrived on the attention he received from people who had either been to or heard of the parties. He liked to feel important.

In 1974, Gacy decided he wanted to go into business for himself. He began a contracting business named Painting, Decorating, and Maintenance or PDM Contractors, Incorporated. He hired young teenage boys to work for him. He told friends that he hired such young men to keep the costs low. However, that was not Gacys only reason for hiring teenage boys: Gacy intended to seduce his young employees. His homosexual desires and urge to inflict harm were slowly becoming more apparent to those around him, especially his wife.

Carole and John had drifted apart by 1975. Their sex life had come to a halt and Gacys moods became more unpredictable. He would be in a good mood one moment and the next moment he would be flying into an uncontrollable rage and throwing furniture. He was an insomniac and his lack of sleep seemed to have only exacerbated his other problems. Gacy was rarely home in the evenings and when he was, he was either fixing something with the outside of the house or working in the garage. However, there was one thing that Carole was extremely worried about. It was not only that Gacy showed no sexual interest in her that hurt Carole, but also what pained her even more was when she began to find magazines with naked men and boys in her house. She knew that Gacy was reading them and he acted nonchalantly about his new choice of reading material. In fact, Gacy had told Carole that he preferred boys to women. Naturally, Carole was distressed and she soon filed for divorce. The couples divorce became final on March 2, 1976.

Although Gacy was having marital problems, he refused to let it hold him back from realizing his dream of success. Being a man who thrived on and delighted in recognition and attention, Gacy turned his sights to the world of politics. It was in politics that Gacy hoped to make his mark in the world. He had high aspirations and hoped to one day run for public office.

Gacy realized that he had to get his name out and make himself known by participating in volunteer projects and community activities. He also knew that if he were to succeed in politics he had to win over the people. Gacy had a natural talent when it came to persuading others and he creatively came up with a way to gain the recognition he sought. It was not long before Gacy caught the attention of Robert F. Matwick, the Democratic township committeeman for Norwood Park. As a free service to the community, Gacy and his employees volunteered to clean-up Democratic Party headquarters. Gacy further impressed Matwick when the contractor dressed up as "Pogo the Clown" and entertained children at parties and hospitals.

Unaware of Gacys past and impressed by his sense of duty and dedication towards the community, Matwick nominated Gacy to the street lighting commission. In 1975, Gacy became the secretary treasurer. It seemed as if Gacys dreams of success were beginning to come true; however his career in politics would be short-lived. Troubles started to brew when rumors began to circulate about Gacy having homosexual interest in teenage boys. One of the rumors stemmed from an actual incident that took place during the time Gacy was involved with cleaning the Democratic Party headquarters. One of the teenagers who worked with Gacy on that particular project was sixteen-year-old Tony Antonucci. According to the boy, Gacy made sexual advances towards him, yet backed off when Antonucci threatened to hit him with a chair. Gacy joked about the situation and left him alone for a month.

The following month while visiting Gacys home, Gacy again approached Antonucci. Gacy tried to trick the young man into handcuffs and believing he was securely cuffed he began to undress the boy. However, Antonucci had made sure that one of his hands was loosely cuffed and he was able to free himself and wrestle Gacy to the ground. Once he had Gacy on the ground he handcuffed him, but eventually let him go after Gacy promised he would never again try touching him. Gacy never made sexual advances towards Antonucci again and the boy remained working for Gacy for almost a year, following the incident.

Missing

Seventeen-year-old Johnny Butkovich was like most young men who enjoyed cars and he took great pride in his 1968 Dodge on which he was continually working. He particularly loved to race his car, a hobby that cost quite a bit for a young man of seventeen. In order to pay for new parts to sustain his hobby, he knew he had to get a job. Johnny began doing remodeling work for Gacy at PDM Contractors -- a position that he enjoyed and that paid well. He and Gacy had a good working relationship, which made the long hours pass by more quickly. However, their working relationship ended abruptly when Gacy refused to pay Johnny for two weeks of work -- something Gacy did often to his employees in order to save money for himself.

Angered that Gacy had withheld his pay, Johnny went over to his boss's house with two friends to collect what he believed was rightfully his. When Johnny confronted him about his pay check, Gacy refused to pay him and a large argument erupted. Johnny threatened that he was going to tell authorities that he was not deducting taxes from earnings. Gacy was enraged and screamed at him. Finally, Johnny and his friends realized that there was little they could do and they eventually left Gacys house. Johnny dropped off his friends at their house and drove away, never to be seen alive again.

Michael Bonnin, also seventeen, was not too different from Johnny in that he enjoyed working with his hands. He especially liked doing wood working and carpentry and he was often busy with several projects at a time. In June of 1976, he had almost completed work on restoring an old jukebox, yet he never had a chance to finish the job he had begun. While on route to catch a train to meet his stepfathers brother, he disappeared.

Billy Carroll, Jr. was the kind of boy who seemed to be always getting into trouble ever since his parents could remember. At the age of nine he was in a juvenile home for stealing a purse and at age eleven he was caught with a gun. Billy was mischievous and spent most of his time on the streets in Uptown, Chicago. At the age of sixteen, Billy was making money by arranging meetings between teenage homosexual boys and adult clientele for a commission. Although Billy came from a very different background than Michael Bonnin and Johnny Butkovich, they all had one thing in common -- John Wayne Gacy, Jr. Just like Johnny and Michael, Billy also disappeared suddenly. On June 13, 1976, Billy left his home and was never seen alive again.

Gregory Godzik loved his job with PDM Contractors and he didnt mind doing the odd jobs that his boss required of him, such as cleaning work. The money from his job also allowed for him to buy parts for his 1966 Pontiac car, a time-consuming hobby. He was proud of his car and, although it was a bit of an eye sore, it served its purpose. On December 12, 1976, Gregory dropped his date off at her house, a girl he had had a crush on for some while, and drove off towards his home. The following day police found Gregorys Pontiac, but Gregory was missing. He was seventeen years old.

On January 20, 1977, nineteen-year-old John Szyc also disappeared much like the other young men before him. He had driven off in his 1971 Plymouth Satellite and was never seen alive again. Interestingly, a short while after the young man vanished, another teenager was picked up by police in a 1971 Plymouth Satellite while trying to leave a gas station without paying. The youth said that the man he lived with could explain the situation. The man was Gacy, who explained to police that Szyc had earlier sold him the car. Police never checked the car title which had been signed eighteen days after Szycs disappearance with a signature that was not his own. In Linedecker's The Man Who Killed Boys, the author points out that Szyc had known not only Gregory Godzik and Johnny Butkovich but had also, "been an acquaintance of John Gacy, although he hadnt worked for PDM Contractors."

Robert Gilroy was an outdoorsman, avid camper and horse lover. On September 15, 1977, eighteen-year-old Gilroy was supposed to catch a bus with friends to go horseback riding but he never showed up. His father, who was a Chicago police sergeant, immediately began searching for Robert when he heard that his son was missing. Although a full-scale investigation was mounted for his son, Robert was nowhere to be found.

More than a year later another young man named Robert Piest would vanish mysteriously. The investigation into his disappearance would lead to not only the discovery of his body but the bodies of Butkovich, Bonnin, Carroll, Szyc, Gilroy and twenty-seven other young men who had suffered similar fates. It would be a discovery that would rock the foundations of Chicago and shock all of America. Robert Piest was only fifteen when he disappeared from just outside the pharmacy where he had worked just minutes earlier. His mother, who had come to pick him up from work, had been waiting inside the pharmacy for Robert, who had said hed be right back after talking with a contractor who had offered him a job. Yet, Robert never returned. His mother began to worry as time passed. Eventually her worry turned to dread. She searched the pharmacy area outside and inside and still Robert was nowhere to be found. Three hours after Robert's disappearance, the Des Plaines Police Department was notified. Lieutenant Joseph Kozenczak led the investigation.

Soon after learning the name of the contractor who had offered the job to Piest, Lt. Kozenczak knocked at the mans door. When Gacy answered, the lieutenant told him about the missing boy and asked Gacy to go with him to the police station for questioning. Gacy said he was unable to leave his home at the moment because there was a recent death in the family and he had to attend to some phone calls. Gacy showed up at the police station hours later and gave his statement to police. Gacy said he knew nothing about the boy's disappearance and left the station after further questioning.

Lt. Kozenczak decided to run a background check on Gacy the next day and was surprised to find that Gacy had served time for committing sodomy on a teenager years earlier. Soon after Lt. Kozenczaks discovery, he obtained a search warrant for Gacys house. It was there that he believed they would find Robert Piest. On December 13, 1978, police entered John Wayne Gacy, Jr.s house on Summerdale Avenue. Gacy was not at his home during the investigation. Inspector Kautz was in charge of taking inventory of any recovered evidence that might be found at the house. Some of the items on his list that were confiscated from Gacys home were: A jewelry box containing two drivers licenses and several rings including one which had engraved on it the name Maine West High School class of 1975 and the initials J.A.S; A box containing marijuana and rolling papers; Seven erotic movies made in Sweden; Pills including amyl nitrite and Valium; A switchblade knife; A stained section of rug; Color photographs of pharmacies and drug stores; An address book; A scale; Books such as, Tight Teenagers, The Rights of Gay People, Bike Boy, Pederasty, Sex Between Men and Boys, Twenty-One Abnormal Sex Cases, The American Bi-Centennial Gay Guide, Heads & Tails and The Great Swallow; A pair of handcuffs with keys; A three-foot-long two-by-four wooden plank with two holes drilled in each end; A six mm. Italian pistol with possible gun caps; Police badges; An eighteen-inch rubber dildo was also found in the attic beneath insulation; A hypodermic syringe and needle and a small brown bottle; Clothing that was much too small for Gacy; A receipt for a roll of film with a serial number on it, from Nisson Pharmacy; Nylon rope.

Three automobiles belonging to Gacy were also confiscated, including a 1978 Chevrolet pickup truck with snow plow attached that had the name "PDM Contractors" written on its side, a 1979 Oldsmobile Delta 88 and a van with "PDM Contractors" also written on its side. Within the trunk of the car were pieces of hair that were later matched to Rob Piests hair.

Further into the investigation, police entered the crawl space located beneath Gacys home. The first thing that struck investigators was a rancid odor that they believed to be sewage. The earth in the crawl space was sprinkled with lime but seemed to have been untouched. Police found nothing else during their first search and eventually returned back to headquarters to run tests on some of the evidence and research the case more. Gacy was called into the police department and told of the articles that they had confiscated. Gacy was enraged and immediately contacted his lawyer. When Gacy was presented with a Miranda waiver stating his rights and asked to sign it, he refused when instructed by his lawyer. Police had nothing to arrest him on and eventually had to release him after more questioning about the Piest boy's disappearance. Gacy was put under twenty-four hour surveillance.

During the days following the police search of Gacys house, some of his friends were called into the police station and interrogated. Gacy had told his friends earlier that police were trying to charge him with a murder but claimed he had nothing to do with such a thing. From the interviews police gathered little information on any connection with Gacy to Robert Piest. Friends of Gacy could not believe he was capable of killing a teenage boy. Frustrated due to the lack of evidence that police had linking Gacy to Piest they decided to arrest Gacy on possession of marijuana and Valium. Unknown to police at the time, Gacy had recently confided in a friend and co-worker a day before his arrest that he had indeed killed. Gacy further confided in his friend that he killed about thirty people because they were bad and trying to blackmail him.

Around the time Gacy was arrested, he was awaiting action on the Ringall case in which he had been charged with rape. Determined to find his rapist, Ringall had months earlier waited by one of the highway exits that he was able to remember during one of his wakeful episode in Gacys car, before being chloroformed again. Finally, after hours of waiting by the exit, he spotted the familiar car and followed it to Gacys house. Upon learning Gacys name, he immediately filed charges of sexual assault. Finally, after intense investigation and lab work into some of the items confiscated by police from Gacys house, they came up with critical evidence against Gacy. One of the rings found at Gacys house belonged to another teenager who had disappeared a year earlier named John Szyc. They also discovered that three former employees of Gacy had also mysteriously disappeared. Furthermore, the receipt for the roll of film that was found at Gacys home had belonged to a co-worker of Robert Piest who had given it to Robert the day of his disappearance. With the new information, investigators began to realize the enormity of the case that was unfolding before them.

It was not long before investigators were back searching Gacys house. Gacy had finally confessed to police that he did kill someone but said it had been in self-defense. He said that he had buried the body underneath his garage. Gacy told police where they could find the body and police marked the gravesite in the garage, but they did not immediately begin digging. They first wanted to search the crawl space under Gacys house. It was not long before they discovered a suspicious mound of earth. Minutes after digging into the suspicious mound, investigators found the remains of a body. That evening, Dr. Robert Stein, Cook County Medical Examiner, was called in to help with the investigation. Upon his arrival at Gacys house, he immediately recognized a familiar odor --the distinctive smell of death.

Stein began to organize the search for more bodies by marking off the areas of earth in sections, as if it were an archaeological site. He knew that the excavation of a decomposing body must be done with the utmost care to preserve its integrity and that of the gravesite. Throughout the night and into the days that followed the digging progressed under the watchful eye of Dr. Stein.

Death Count

On Friday, December 22, 1978, Gacy finally confessed to police that he killed at least thirty people and buried most of the remains of the victims beneath the crawl space of his house. According to the book Killer Clown: The John Wayne Gacy Murders by Sullivan and Maiken, Gacy said that, "his first killing took place in January, 1972, and the second in January, 1974, about a year and a half after his marriage." He further confessed that he would lure his victims into being handcuffed and then he would sexually assault them. To muffle the screams of his victims, he would stuff a sock or underwear into their mouths and kill them by pulling a rope or board against their throats, as he raped them. Gacy admitted to sometimes keeping the dead bodies under his bed or in the attic for several hours before eventually burying them in the crawl space.

On the first day that the police began their digging, they found two bodies. One of the bodies was that of John Butkovich who was buried under the garage. The other body was the one found in the crawl space. As the days passed, the body count grew higher. Some of the victims were found with their underwear still lodged deep in their throats. Other victims were buried so close together that police believed they were probably killed or buried at the same time. Gacy did confirm to police that he had on several occasions killed more than one person in a day. However, the reason he gave for them being buried so close together was that he was running out of room and needed to conserve space.

On the 28th of December, police had removed a total of twenty-seven bodies from Gacys house. There was also another body found weeks earlier, yet it was not in the crawl space. The naked corpse of Frank Wayne "Dale" Landingin was found in the Des Plaines River. At the time of the discovery police were not yet aware of Gacys horrible crimes and the case was still under investigation. But, investigators found Landingins drivers license in Gacys home and connected him to the young mans murder. Landingin was not the only one of Gacys victims to be found in the river.

Also, on December 28th, police removed from the Des Plaines River the body of James "Mojo" Mazzara, who still had his underwear lodged in his throat. The coroner said that the underwear stuffed down the victim's throat had caused Mazzara to suffocate. Gacy told police that the reason he disposed of the bodies in the river was because he ran out of room in his crawl space and because he had been experiencing back problems from digging the graves. Mazzara was the twenty-ninth victim of Gacys to be found, yet it would not be the last.

By the end of February, police were still digging up Gacys property. They had already gutted the house and were unable to find anymore bodies in the crawl space. It had taken investigators longer than expected to resume the search due to bad winter storms that froze the ground and the long process of obtaining proper search warrants. However, they believed there were still more bodies to be found and they were right. While workmen were breaking up the concrete of Gacys patio, they came across another horrific discovery. They found the body of a man still in good condition preserved in the concrete. The man wore a pair of blue jeans shorts and a wedding ring. Gacys victims no longer included just young boys or suspected homosexuals, but now also married men. The following week another body was discovered.

The thirty-first body to be found linked to Gacy was in the Illinois River. Investigators were able to discover the identity of the young man by a "Tim Lee" tattoo on one of his arms. A friend of the victim's father had recognized the "Tim Lee" tattoo while reading a newspaper story about the discovery of a body in the river. The victim's name was Timothy ORourke, who was said to be such a fan of Bruce Lees that he took the Kung Fu master's last name and added it to his own name in his tattoo. It is possible that Gacy had become aquatinted with the young man in one of the gay bars in New Town.

Yet, another body was found on Gacys property around the time ORourke was discovered and pulled from the river. The body was located beneath the recreation room of Gacys house. It would be the last body to be found on Gacys property. Soon after the discovery, the house was destroyed and reduced to rubble. Unfortunately, among the thirty-two bodies that were discovered that of Robert Piest was still unaccounted for. Piest was still missing.

Finally in April 1979, the remains of Robert Piest were discovered in the Illinois River. His body had supposedly been lodged somewhere along the river making it difficult to find his body. However, strong winds must have dislodged the corpse and carried it to the locks at Dresden Dam where it was eventually discovered. Autopsy reports on Piest determined that he had suffocated from paper towels being lodged down his throat. The family soon after filed a $85-million suit against Gacy for murder and the Iowa Board of Parole, the Department of Corrections and the Chicago Police Department for negligence. Police investigators continued to match dental records and other clues to help identify the remaining victims who were found on Gacys property. All but nine of the victims were finally identified. Although the search for the dead had finally come to an end, Gacys trial was just beginning.

Trial

On Wednesday, February 6, 1980, John Wayne Gacys murder trial began in the Cook County Criminal Courts Building in Chicago, Illinois. Jury members, who consisted of five women and seven men, listened as prosecutor Bob Egan talked about Robert Piests life and his gruesome death and how Gacy was responsible for his murder thirty-two other young men. Egan told them about the investigation into Gacy, the discovery of bodies beneath his house and how Gacys actions were premeditated and rational. In Sullivan and Maikens book, Killer Clown: The John Wayne Gacy Murders, it is said that Egans statement," left a stunning impression on the jurors and the courtroom spectators, who were learning some of the details of Gacys killing for the first time." Egans opening statement was followed by one of Gacys defense lawyers, Robert Motta. He opposed Egans statement by claiming Gacys actions were indeed, irrational and impulsive, but asserting that he was insane and no longer in control of his conduct.

If had been found insane, Gacy would have become a ward of the state mental health system. Furthermore, there are no time limits on the incarceration of such a person and in many cases they are set free when they are deemed mentally stable enough to re-enter society. This is what Robert Motta believed was best for his client. Yet, an insanity plea is usually a very difficult one to prove. Although prosecutors were stung by Gacys insanity plea, it was something they had expected and were well prepared for. When the opening statements had concluded, the prosecution brought its first witness to the stand, Marko Butkovich, the father of Gacys victim John Butkovich. He was the first witness of many that included the family and friends of the murdered victims. Some of the witnesses broke down in tears on the bench, while others sadly recounted their last goodbyes to their loved ones.

Following the friends and family of the victims came the testimony of those who worked for Gacy who survived sexual and usually violent encounters with their boss. Some of his ex-employees told of his mood swings and how he would trick them into being handcuffed. Others told of how he constantly made passes at them while at work. The testimony continued for the next several weeks, including that of friends and neighbors of Gacy, police officers involved in the investigation and arrest of Gacy, and psychologists who found Gacy sane during the killings. Before the state rested. it had called some sixty witnesses to the bench.

On February 24th, the defense began its proceedings and to the surprise of many in the courtroom, the first witness they had called was Jeffrey Ringall. It was expected that Ringall would testify in behalf of the prosecution. However, Ringall had previously mentioned his encounter with Gacy in a book and the prosecution believed that would damage their case if they took him on as a witness. Therefore, the prosecution did not call him as a witness because they believed his testimony would better help their case during cross-examination. Gacys other defense lawyer, Amirante, asked Ringall if he thought Gacy was able to control himself. Ringall didn't believe so, considering the savagery of Gacy's attack. Testimony of Ringall did not last very long because he broke down while telling the court the details of his rape. Ringall was so stressed that he began to vomit and cry hysterically. He was eventually removed from the courtroom as Gacy sat by exhibiting no signs of emotion.

In an effort to prove Gacys insanity, Amirante and Motta called to the stand the friends and family of the accused killer. Gacys mother told of how her husband abused Gacy on several occasions, at one time whipping him with a leather strap. Gacys sister told a similar story of how she repeatedly witnessed he brother being verbally abused by their father. Others who testified for the defense told of how Gacy was a good and generous man, who helped those in need and always had a smile on his face. Lillie Grexa took the stand and told of how wonderful a neighbor he was. However, Mrs. Grexa did say something that would prove damaging to Gacys case. She refused to say that he was crazy, instead she said she believed Gacy to be a "very brilliant man." That statement would conflict with the defense's story that he was unable to control his actions and was insane.

The defense then called Thomas Eliseo, a psychologist who interviewed Gacy before the trial. He found Gacy to be extremely intelligent, yet believed that he suffered from borderline schizophrenia. Other medical experts that testified on behalf of the defense gave similar testimony stating that Gacy was schizophrenic, suffered from multiple personality disorder or had antisocial behaviour. They further stated that Gacys mental disorder impaired his ability to understand the magnitude of his criminal acts. In conclusion, they all found him to have been insane during the times he committed murder. After the testimony of the medical experts, the defense rested its case.

Both sides emotionally argued their cases to the jury that sat before them. Each side recalled previous witnesses and experts who had testified. The prosecution reminded the jury of the heinous crimes committed by Gacy, talked of his manipulative behavior, his rape and torture of the victims and how his crimes were premeditated and planned. The defense insisted that Gacy was insane and out of control at the time of the killings and pointed to the testimony given by experts during the trial. After the closing arguments and the testimony of over a hundred witnesses over a period of five weeks, the jury was left to make their decision.

It took only two hours of deliberation before the jury came back with its verdict. The courtroom was filled with silence and everyone within stood at attention when the jury marched in with its verdict. The silence was broken when the court clerk read, "We, the jury, find the defendant, John Wayne Gacy, guilty..." Gacy was found guilty in the deaths of thirty-three young men and as Sullivan said, he had the "singular notoriety of having been convicted of more murders than anyone else in American history." Gacy received the death penalty and was sent to Menard Correctional Center where, after years of appeals, he eventually was killed by lethal injection.

Bibliography

This feature story is primarily drawn from the Chicago Tribune and the Chicago Sun-Times, plus the following books:

Cahill, Tim, Buried Dreams: Inside the Mind of a Serial Killer (1986).

Linedecker, Clifford L., Man Who Killed Boys (St. Martin's Paperbacks, 1994).

Mendenhall, Harlan, Fall of the House of Gacy (Mass Market Paperbacks, 1998).

Sullivan, Terry and Peter T. Maiken, Killer Clown (Mass Market Paperback, 1997)

Charles Nemo

JOHNNY, WE HARDLY KNEW YE! (Four Visits to Serial Killer John Wayne Gacy) by Charles Nemo.

Introduction

Just after midnight on May 10, 1994, American serial killer (1) John Wayne Gacy was executed by lethal injection at the Stateville Prison in Joliet, Illinois. Published accounts indicate that Gacy went stoically to his death. (2) Although he generally denied responsibility for the gruesome murders of 29 young men buried in the crawl space of his home (and at least four more dumped into a nearby river) just outside Chicago, he did make revealing comments during various audio and video interviews that allow reasonable inference of more than passing knowledge of the young lads untimely demise.

I visited Gacy four times on Death Row at Menard Correctional Center in Chester, Illinois in 1993 and 1994. I also received dozens of letters, postcards and collect calls from him. (3) These events turned out to be the end of my long journey into "the heart of darkness", that mid-life passage that all of us must make if we wish to evolve and mature, or at least come to understand how things really are and adjust to them. It had begun almost 10 years earlier with the break-up of my long-term marriage and some severe career disappointments in the form of encounters with sociopathic clients and colleagues. (4) I survived those challenges and managed to preserve some small hope for the human race until my encounters with John Wayne Gacy and the criminal so-called "justice" system. Then I could no longer ignore the truly grim realities of life.

Let me tell you how I approached this article. I began with the dry historical information about Gacys life and alleged (5) crimes and the details of how I came to visit him in the first place in order to get in the mood for more brutal thinking. Then I wrote my conclusions. I had to hit the key lessons from the encounter. Lastly I filled in the blanks with my explanations of everything I felt I had learned. Ive always worked that way, believing that if you cant state your conclusions succinctly, then you really dont understand the subject. Ill leave it to my readers to judge both my approach and the substance of my work.

Four Trips to Hell

I had the opportunity in to visit Gacy on Death Row (6) four times during the last year of his life. I had had many sociopathic clients and colleagues, but I was interested in meeting a real "bad ass" in order to test my perceptive capabilities to the maximum. I was dating a so-called "Riot Grrrl" (an ardent female fan of heavy metal music, who often dressed in black clothes and combat boots) during that time who had come to regard Gacy as a father figure (7) during several years of letters and phone calls. She had the contact, and I had the cash, so we went together for the first two visits in 1993. (8) We broke up in January, 1994, and I traveled with two other women for the last two visits in 1994. All the women were luridly good-looking and eager for action, which delighted Gacy and his inmate "bodyguard" (who always shared in the visits), as well as the redneck prison guards. (9)

The drill was the same each time. My companion(s) and I would fly to St. Louis on Saturday morning, shack up at the Embassy Suites on the waterfront and "party hearty" on Saturday night. A nightclub called Mississippi Nights across the street from the hotel always had good beer and decent bands, some of them well-known groups such as Gwar. I always drove a Cadillac, and after several hours at the club, wed cruise the dark night on both sides of the Mississippi River. We made a number of side trips to such places as heavily-black East St. Louis, where we saw running mobs in the streets, and dozens of hookers linked up along the curb outside seedy roadhouses (with apt names such as the Discreet Hotel) waiting for anyone stupid enough to pick them up for an AIDS-ridden grope. The slaughterhouses just across the river from St. Louis were also a grim attraction. Anything dealing with death and urban decay was an object of fascination, but we were always safe from the real lessons inside our locked luxury car. We typically ended our Saturday-night fun with pizza and beer back at the hotel anywhere from 4 AM to 6 AM on Sunday morning. Sometimes there was hot, sweaty sex, and wed fall asleep exhausted.

Rising on Sunday afternoon, wed play some more and then drive two hours south to the gritty rural redneck town of Chester, Illinois. Its only claims to fame are a statue honoring the creator of the Popeye cartoon, a grim fortress for the criminally insane, and the Menard Correctional Center. Motels were terrible during the first two visits, but a new Best Western was completed in early 1994, and we were among its first guests in its finest room, priced at a reasonable sixty dollars and complete with a Jacuzzi hot tub. There was nothing really remarkable about our stays in Chester, except that my Riot Grrrl companion nearly got me killed on the second trip when she got drunk and tried to provoke a fight in Chesters lone biker bar, but I was able to talk both of us out of that. Cute little waitresses desperate for action and attention would ask why we were in town and perk right up when we told them. Women indeed love "bad boys", as I observed in an earlier footnote.

The Menard Correctional Center is a century-old brick maximum-security monstrosity on the banks of the Mississippi River. Menard serves as one of two Illinois death rows and is also a maximum-security prison for several hundred other felons. We had to be there early Monday morning and could stay until 2:30 PM. Visitors pass through a guardhouse where they must remove all metal items and store them in lockers. Shoes are x-rayed and a quick patdown done before a guard accompanies the visitors through a half dozen gates and iron doors to a cafeteria. A guard watches closely while visitors buy food, cigarettes and snacks from vending machines. The goodies are stacked on trays which visitors carry through another half dozen barriers to the death row visiting area, an air-conditioned series of small rooms furnished with metal tables and chairs on either side of a short corridor. There are no windows. An ominous sense of loss hits you like a fist in the gut when you pass through so many barriers and are told all the things you cant do. (10) Even chewing gum is forbidden.

Altogether I met with Gacy for almost 20 hours, at least half of it being just the two of us in a room while the women met with Gacys unofficial "bodyguard" (another death row inmate) in another room across the hall. Unlike many prison meeting areas, there were no bars or windows between Gacy and his visitors, although he was always in handcuffs. A camera in one ceiling corner allowed guards in a room on the other side of a barred gate to watch us. I never worried about Gacy doing anything dangerous, although he once made the comment (as he walked behind me and noticed me watching him very carefully) that he could have broken my neck before guards would have been able to get through the gate from their room down the hall where they watched the television monitors. (11)

Gacy always brought documents from his legal proceedings and explained them, together with the thick log book in which he had been tracking his daily activities and visitors since his incarceration in late 1978. He also brought small gifts such as prison-made cigarettes. I particularly waited with eager anticipation for the paintings, which he had done for me at nominal cost. I eventually ended up with four (12) of my own, plus several (13) which I gave to women friends. Much of each meeting was taken up with mundane conversations about life and philosophy, and we always had lunch brought to us by guards -- a decent salad, bread and butter, milk, and overcooked meat or fish. Gacy would always "pig out" on the snacks we brought; he had a real sweet tooth, and the snacks were things he didnt get elsewhere. Wed stay until about 2 PM, have one of the guards take some Polaroid photos at a dollar apiece (one of each pose for us and one for Gacy), and then dash madly for the St. Louis airport for a late afternoon flight back home.

This gives you an idea of the structure of our trips. The last of the four trips was the most remarkable. We saw him on Monday a week before his execution and were his last visitors other than family and appellate attorneys. Hed called and written more frequently in the last few weeks and was plainly nervous, but still full of the old braggadocio. (14) He talked vaguely about an unnamed donor who was going to give him half a million dollars to fund another round of appeals. It all sounded possible, but I when I saw him in person I knew he was just blowing smoke. Ever the con artist, he almost had me convinced, but his unhealthy, beet red complexion and copious sweating even in air conditioning gave it all away. It was and always had been bullshit. He was going down and damn well knew it. He knew I knew it too. I almost felt sorry for him, but the looming image in my mind of his lifetime of lies wouldnt allow it. I listened quietly, shook his clammy hand when it was time to leave, and said that it had been interesting to know him. I said I wished him well, but both he and I sensed the insincerity of everything. He called later in the week for a short chat, cocky as always but definitely edgy, and then once more the weekend before his execution to say good-bye, but luckily I wasnt home to take the call.

Gacys Life (15)

In the few years before his December, 1978 arrest, John Wayne Gacy killed at least 33 boys and young men and buried most of them in the crawl space under his home near Chicago, Illinois. Gacy, a building contractor, lured them to his home with prospects of employment and sex, and then tortured them before killing them. He had an abusive father, but there was little else in his background to portend such infamy. (16)

Born on March 17, 1942, he claimed his father was alcoholic and frequently beat both him and his mother. John had an effeminate side and could never seem to earn his fathers approval regardless of the efforts he made. He dropped out of high school in his senior year and left home for a short time, working in a mortuary in Las Vegas. He returned home to attend a local business college and began selling shoes. At the age of 22, he married a woman whose father owned a chain of Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurants in Waterloo, Iowa. Gacy became a successful manager of his father-in-laws business and a socially-active citizen. He joined the local Jaycees (17) and held key offices and received numerous honors as a Jaycee.

In 1968 he began a tortuous ten-year downward journey of criminality that would culminate in his arrest as a serial killer. Although he claimed to have been framed, he was sentenced to prison after pleading guilty to molesting a teenager employed in the restaurant he managed. His wife divorced him. Gacy was an exemplary prisoner and was paroled after only 18 months, returning to Chicago to become a cook and later to open a construction and remodeling business and become a small-time local politician.

His next arrest in 1971 involved a teenagers accusation that Gacy had tried to force him to engage in sex, but the charge was dismissed when the youth failed to appear in court. He remarried but soon ceased sexual relations with his wife. Gacy had become active in community affairs as a Democratic precinct captain and as a clown ("Pogo" or "Patches") at childrens parties and hospitals. He hosted large parties at his home for local dignitaries and neighbors. Gacy answered comments by his wife and others about the peculiar smell in the home by saying that there was a lot of dampness in the crawl space. In fact, he had employed teenagers in his business and had them dig trenches in the crawl space underneath his home. Gacy had been sexually torturing to death some of the young men who worked for him and others that he picked up in downtown Chicago. He lured them by promising them money or employment. One of his favorite routines was to persuade them to participate in his "handcuff trick" in order to incapacitate them. He would then chloroform them and sodomize them. This was followed by his "rope trick" in which he would insert a rope around the victims neck, insert a stick in the loop, and twist it slowly like a tourniquet until the victim strangled to death. Gacy liked to read passages from the Bible while doing this.

He buried most of his sexual victims in shallow graves in the crawl space under the house, covered them with lime, and left them to decompose. One potential victim was lured into Gacys black Oldsmobile (complete with spotlight to look like an unmarked police car) on the pretense of police questioning, handcuffed, abused sexually and then released for unknown reasons. Enraged by liver damage caused by the chloroform, the victim staked out freeway entrances until he spotted Gacys car and then demanded action by authorities. Authorities declined to prosecute Gacy because of lack of evidence.

Gacys undoing came in December, 1978 when he visited a pharmacy to do a remodeling estimate, and lured away a 15-year-old boy whose mother had dropped him off at the pharmacy to file a job application. Police learned that Gacy had been there just before the boys disappearance and began watching Gacy closely, especially after learning about his previous molestation conviction. A detective asked to use the bathroom during a visit to Gacys home and smelled the telltale odor of decomposition when the furnace fan kicked on. A search warrant led promptly to the discovery of rotting corpses in the crawl space. Nationally televised news reports showed heavily-garbed police workers as they went about the grim task of collecting the remains.

Gacy is alleged to have confessed his crimes during interrogation and even to have drawn a map of the bodies placement, but Gacy signed nothing. He was convicted of murder and all appeals denied. Execution at just after midnight on May 10, 1994 was greeted by a large, enthusiastic crowd outside the prison, tempered by a small number of death penalty protesters. Audio interviews recorded just after his arrest and aired after his death were extremely incriminating, and video interviews in the years just before his death showed him to be extremely callous.

Gacy the Man

Above all I was struck by the ordinariness of the man. He could be anybody -- your neighbor, co-worker or friend, or even your father (he had two children by two wives). He was somewhat short (58") and fat (well over 200 lb.) with oily skin and greasy, dishwater hair streaked with gray. He was jolly and likable -- perfect for the role he assumed in clown suit and makeup as Pogo or Patches for entertaining at childrens parties and visits to childrens hospital wards. His demeanor was good enough to get him voted Jaycees Man of the Year, and a minor role in Chicago politics that eventually led to his infamous photo shaking hands with the wife of President Jimmy Carter.

Yet he was a habitual liar. (18) He steadfastly denied any guilt during our early visits and was quite convincing in his many claims, always presenting himself as a victim of one kind or another. (19) He was extremely garrulous, though, and not nearly as intelligent as he liked others to believe (20), which led inevitably to his being caught in at least some of his lies. His average intelligence was reflected in his art, which was colorful but as two-dimensional as he was. He was crude and brutal about his bisexuality and other matters, and enjoyed trying to shock people that he thought might disapprove of his preference for boys and young men to satisfy his sexual appetites. (21) His lack of sensitivity became particularly evident in a videotaped interview that I saw after his death in which he made the claim, "The only thing Im guilty of is running an unlicensed cemetery" (referring to the 29 bodies buried in the crawl space under his home and in his yard).

These characteristics were not all immediately evident, and even after listening and watching carefully for hours, I never would have guessed he was a serial killer without being told.

Conclusions

In my younger years, untouched by the hard realities of life, I was in favor of capital punishment -- "an eye for an eye" and all that sort of thing. Four visits to John Wayne Gacy, coupled with extensive reading about so-called criminal "justice", have changed my views. Why?

1. It costs much less on average to house, feed and clothe a murderer for life than it does to go through the extended legal appeals. (22)

2. So why not just shortcut the appeals process? The answer is that many innocent people are sent to Death Row. (23)

3. America seems to be producing more and more serial murderers and other major felons. (24) Why not promise these people life in prison under reasonable conditions in return for a promise of continued co-operation as better tests for genetic and other defects are developed? Lets study the criminal profile scientifically (25) and do what we can to prevent the development of serial killers, i.e., deal with the cause of the problem to save much misery later on.

4. Capital punishment just doesnt prevent crime. Most murderers and serial killers in particular act in the heat of passion and/or honestly believe they wont get caught. (26) The thought of execution doesnt even enter their minds let alone worry them.

5. America claims to be a Christian nation. What happened to the forgiveness we preach to others? Is our religion just another of Americas many hypocrisies? (27)

Theres an old maxim about not judging a book by its cover. While usually applied as an admonition against drawing unfavorable conclusions too quickly, it has its dark flipside too. One need only note the appalling daily media reports to realize the folly of being too trusting. Perhaps any trust is too much, and parents groan as they destroy their young childrens innocence by cautioning them with tales of evil strangers. Ultimately we all become strangers to each other, and the social fabric of trust that binds us together first frays and then falls apart.

Gacy confirmed my lessons in the corporate world and life generally that real evil usually is not flamboyant; it does its very best to hide under a cover of respectability. (28) There are many actual and potential Gacys, and we must always be on guard against them. (29) We cant like our neighbors if we cant trust them; therefore, we have no reason to do them good, and ultimately only a reason to hurt them as our hardness deadens our sensitivity to pain.

This is the bitter, black legacy from John Wayne Gacy, and most of all from our leaders who created the conditions that that spawned Gacy and others like him. Our business, political, religious and military leaders have failed us abysmally. (30) I no longer believe in anything but the inevitability of death and the need to have as much pleasure as possible beforehand, with the proviso that I absolutely will not take advantage of others along the way, and will help the truly helpless when I can. The latter proviso is at least a matter of expedience, since I have no desire to end up as Gacy did. Its my own private moral standard, but its the best I can manage. I dont know if Hell exists, but if it does then John Wayne Gacy surely must be there.

REFERENCES

Fox, James Alan et al. Overkill -- Mass Murder & Serial Killing Exposed (1994). Plenum Press, 233 Spring Street, New York, NY 10013-1578.

Gacy, John Wayne. A Question of Doubt (1991). Craig Bowley Consultants, P.O. Box 225, Times Square Station, New York, NY 10108-0225. This 216-page tome is Gacys version of events. It was scheduled for publication in a limited edition of 500 copies at $250.00 each complete with deluxe binding, color photo of Gacy, and Gacys autograph, but I do not know if it was ever published. I obtained a proof copy from Gacy himself.

Hickey, Eric W. Serial Murderers and Their Victims (1991). Wadsworth Publishing Company, 10 Davis Drive, Belmont, CA 94002.

Holmes, Ronald M. et al. Serial Murder (1988). Sage Publications, Inc., 2111 West Hillcrest Drive, Newbury Park, CA 91320.

Kozenczak, Joseph et al. A Passing Acquaintance (1992). Carlton Press, Inc., New York, NY. $12.95. Kozenczak was the chief of police in Gacys home town of Des Plaines, Illinois and the man responsible for bringing Gacy to justice.

Lester, Harold. Serial Killers - The Insatiable Passion (1995). The Charles Press, P.O. Box 15715, Philadelphia, PA 19105.

Moore, W. John, "The Death Penaltys Marathon Man". The National Journal, December 18, 1993, p. 51.

Ressler, Robert K. et al. Whoever Fights Monsters (1992). $22.95. St, Martins Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010.

Sparks, James Arthur. A Case Study on John Wayne Gacy (1996). The University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, AL. Thesis submitted for M.S. in Criminal Justice.

Staton, Rick, ed. More Letters to Mr. Gacy (1992). Myco Associates, P.O. Box 45888, Baton Rouge, IL 70895. $20.00. A sequel to They Call Him Mr. Gacy, this book captures photocopies of several hundred of the more interesting of thousands of letters to and from Gacy.

Sullivan, Terry. Killer Clown (1983). Windsor Publishing Group, 475 Park Avenue South, New York, NY 10016. $4.99. Gacy hated this book with a passion.

Taylor, Gary, "Fake Evidence Becomes Real Problem". National Law Journal, October 9, 1995, p. A1.

Wallis, Claudia, "Medicine for the Soul". Time, July 11, 1994. p. 64.

Wertz, Marianna, "How Many Innocents Have Been Executed in the United States?" The New Federalist, March 3, 1997, p. 11.

Wilkinson, Alec, "Conversations with a Killer". The New Yorker, April 18, 1994, p. 58.

FOOTNOTES

1. A serial killer can be defined as someone who kills three or more people with a "cooling off period" between killings. One definition of the cooling off period is more than 30 days between the first and last killing. Lester, p. 16.

2. Cable News Network, May 10, 1994.

3. Gacy was a prolific writer, painter and raconteur. He claimed to have written more than 10,000 letters during his 14 years on Death Row, as well as completed more than 2,000 oil paintings, entertained hundreds of visitors, made thousands of phone calls, and fielded dozens of interviews.

4. The only differences between white-collar criminals and other kinds are that the former are richer and better educated. Its been estimated that 3% of all U.S. adult males are sociopaths. Fox et al, p. 19. Im convinced that a substantial number of these twisted people become key executives by virtue of their enormous drive for power and wealth. See footnote 16 for further definition of the term "sociopath".

5. Attorneys use the word "alleged" a lot even when the evidence of their clients guilt is overwhelming, which exposes attorneys to the ridicule and contempt of the general public, who have little use for the concept of "innocent until proven guilty". One only need watch the grotesque litany of endless American talk shows and sports broadcasts to understand that the American equivalents of Roman bread and circuses are welfare and mindless entertainment. Americans dont care much about ideas or ideals -- we just want to see blood!

6. August and October, 1993, and February and May, 1994. In fact, Gacy told me when he called to say good-bye two days before his execution that we were his last outside visitors except for his family and lawyers.

7. It has truly amazed me to see the number of young (teens to late 20s) Americans who have sought paternal approval and affection from John Wayne Gacy, Richard Ramirez and other well-known sociopaths and psychopaths. Understandably, the criminals themselves groove on it totally. One of our four visits to Gacy was shared with a small, skinny man in his mid-20s who had come all the way from California with his girlfriend to visit Gacy because the visitor had never had any relationship with his real father. Gacy had offered the young man advice and fatherly concern (and gotten a blow job from him in a visiting room with a broken camera as his girlfriend watched; we were visiting Gacys inmate "bodyguard" in another room down the hall at the time). The young man confided in me because I was dressed in black from head to toe, including a black linen shirt, slacks and boots, and he believed that I was a priest because of my dress -- in spite of my pierced ear and shoulder length hair! Gacy later told me the same story without being asked, so it was probably true, especially in view of the notoriously lax conditions in Illinois prisons (see footnote 14).

8. Gacy required that a biographical questionnaire be sent to him by every prospective visitor, and he had one of his own that he sent as an example. Gacy liked to write letters and make collect phone calls, and I received several dozen of each during the year that I knew him. He was always brusquely optimistic and chatty. At Christmas, 1993 he sent Christmas cards with a color photo of him as Pogo or Patches the Clown, roles he had assumed as an entertainer at childrens parties and in childrens hospital wards during the years before he was tagged as Americas most prolific serial killer. The letters and cards are now valuable collectors items, and there was a scandal in the months before his death as it became widely known that large sums of money were being sent to private accounts for his paintings, other collectibles and even a John Wayne Gacy $1.99/minute telephone "hot line". Ostensibly, the money was used for his legal defense fund, but Gacys defense team was provided at public expense.

9. It also delighted the women. Let me put it bluntly: "bad boys" make women wet! See, for example, Sheila Eisenbergs Men Who Kill & the Women Who Love Them. Sure, there are some women such as fundamentalist Christians who want to castrate anything male, but these are the exception rather than the rule.

10. Anyone who thinks seriously of committing a crime, and not committing suicide if caught, should visit a real prison. I was thinking recently about Charles Manson who was convicted of conspiracy and sentenced to death (later commuted to life in prison) for the Tate/LaBianca slayings shortly after I married my first wife. In the quarter of a century since then, Ive had several wives and well over a hundred lovers, traveled and lived well, and generally done what I pleased. Charlie has rotted in a small cell, been the subject of several assassination attempts, and been deprived of almost everything the rest of us take for granted, even his guitar. Can any of us really conceive what that kind of misery must be like???

11. I thought of Robert Resslers spooky anecdote about his visit to infamous 69" 300 lb. California serial killer Edmund Kemper. Ressler reported that after conclusion of his interview, he rang for the guard, who did not come for a good 20 minutes because it was shift change time. Kemper commented that he could have screwed Resslers head off and placed it on the table to greet the guard. Ressler et al, p. 47.

12. He sold me a graphic rendition of Wisconsin serial killer Ed Gein (model for Robert Blochs Psycho) complete with realistic red paint splatters resembling blood, and a colorful Charles Manson portrait. Gacy gave me a Hitler caricature, and I bought a beautifully framed skull with bloody teeth (captioned "Dahmer Skull") on black matte background at an exhibition of serial killer art.

13. These included a one-of-a-kind depiction of Russian serial killer Andrei Chikatilo, as well as several of the Pogo oils for which Gacy is best known, and a one-of-a-kind portrayal of cartoon character Fred Flintstone.

14. "Hey, death rows great -- death rows a fucking blast. I get cable t.v., I get phone access any time I want, I get to paint, I get all these privileges and nobody fucks with me. On the other hand, the general population [of the prison], thats for fools and animals. Its a jungle out there, so youre at the mercy of being killed at any moment for anything, and some people just have time to kill, they get petty." Letter from John Wayne Gacy. I had some doubt as to the veracity of this claim at the time, but the infamous Richard Speck video changed my mind. Speck, a Chicago mass murderer of eight nurses, died in prison of a heart attack at the age of 50 in 1990. Five years later a video made secretly while he was on death row was released. It showed Speck, with pockmarked face and hormonally-enlarged breasts, dressed in womens panties and cavorting with a black inmate. The two snorted what appeared to be cocaine through a rolled $100 bill and engaged in various sex acts, all the while bragging about what a good time they had been having. Subsequent public outrage led to a significant crackdown on Illinois inmate freedom.

15. See the REFERENCES at the end of this article for a detailed bibliography.

16. Suprisingly to laymen, the term "sociopath" is usually applied to serial murderers like Gacy rather than a term such as "psychopath" that would indicate less responsibility for their actions. Sociopathy is an "antisocial character disorder" in which a person has a complete lack of empathy for others. "Yet they are otherwise rational, logical, appropriate, competent, even charming and persuasive." Holmes et al, p.66. Sociopaths do exactly what they want to do without conscience or respect for the rights of others. They can rise high in careers requiring ambition and drive, such as business, the military, government or even religion. See also footnotes 4 and 18.

17. In Gacys day, the Jaycees were a charitable and social group of young men in their 20s and 30s, typically ambitious, smooth-talking self-promoters climbing fast in the business world. They organized "smokers" at which they played cards, drank and smoked, watched porn videos, and planned their charitable activities. Its been claimed that theyve "cleaned up their act" following unfavorable publicity about their social activities.

18. Sociopaths often are intelligent and charming. A number of my clients and colleagues have been quite convincing in their folksy, "Hi! How are ya?" approaches. It may take years before one becomes aware of the evil underneath the pleasant mask, especially when its further cloaked in the rectitude of fundamentalist Christianity. In general, hypocrites and other crooks "wear" religions like shit "wears" stink!!!

19. Gacy had many plaintive woes that he described at great length to anyone who would listen. For example, he claimed to have a congenital "bottleneck" heart defect, but there is no such medical condition. He particularly liked to say, "Im the 34th victim." It was a mark of his lack of imagination that he never changed his stories about such obvious fallacies as the "bottleneck" heart even after he had been exposed in various newspaper articles and books as a liar.

20. His claim of two college degrees was also a lie.

21. He liked to say, "Im a pitcher, not a catcher." This meant that he took the dominant "top" role in his homosexual encounters.

22. "Millions Misspent, a 1992 report, said that Texas has spent three times more on each death penalty case than it spends to keep a convict in prison for 40 years." Moore, p. 51.

23. "With 313 executions in the United States between 1970 and the end of 1995, ... one Death Row inmate is released because of innocence for every five inmates executed." Wertz, p. 11. This fact, caused at least in part by badly contaminated evidence (such as the unreliable lab reports and Detective Mark Fuhrmans perjury in the O.J. Simpson murder trial), is just the tip of the iceberg of the flawed American criminal "justice" system. See the detailed discussion of fake evidence in Taylor, p. A1.

24. Holmes et al, p. 21. Hickey, p. 131.

25. "According to a recent report in Science, researchers have found discrete locations in the brain of an intricate system that serves, among other things, as the human moral compass. ... It is quite possible that some of historys greatest villains harbored an unseen wound...in the prefrontal cortex. Such may be the condition of all psychopaths. ... And now...scientists will know where to search for that hole. It is surely where they will look when studying the brain -- donated to science -- of serial killer John Wayne Gacy executed last May in Illinois. Suppose a...defect is found? Will it seem fair to have executed the man if he was physically incapable of moral judgment? ... If moral judgment can be broken, surely the next step is to fix it." Time, July 11, 1994, p. 64.

26. Holmes et al, p. 67.