BOYS WILL BE BOYS – JOHN WAYNE GACY

On March 17, 1942, a woman named Marion Elaine Robinson/Robertson would give birth to her second child, a boy. Already having picked out a name for the child he would become John Wayne Gacy Jr., named after his father, John Samuel Gacy Sr.

The Gacy’s would go on to have another girl after John making him the middle child being stuck in a house surrounded by girls. This didn‘t bother him. His older sister was Joanne and his younger was Karen. They got along as well as children do. As John grew older he began to notice more and more of his dad’s violent nature. His dad would usually beat up on his mother in front of the kids and say mean things to the children, even calling John a sissy. The family never got used to it, but they learn to live with it. All of the emotional trauma that John went through at home soon drove him into activities away from the house. John had decided to join the boy scouts. He wasn’t very popular with the other children but the teachers and counselors seemed to like him very much. He went to a catholic school as well as his sisters. It was hard on John because he hated the school and just wanted to be with the other kids and be able to do what they were doing. John also got a job early on bagging grocery at the nearest store. He liked being able to have his own money and spend it too. He later got a second job as a newspaper delivery boy. He figured keeping his mind busy would keep him from thinking about what was going on at home.

When Gacy was just 11 years old he was struck in the forehead by a wooden swing. The extreme blow to his head had formed a blood clot inside his brain which went un-noticed until he was about 16 and began to suffer from blackouts. After the diagnosis Gacy was prescribed medicine which soon dissolved the clot.

At the age of 17 Gacy was diagnosed with a non specific heart disorder. He was hospitalized numerous times for this, but it was never considered serious. Being a teenager made Gacy’s life a living hell. He didn’t have any friends his own age and therefore he was either working or at home. He got in trouble many times in high school and even switched schools 4 different times before deciding to drop out and leave town. John had saved up enough money working and he’d always wanted to go to Las Vegas, so he left town. Vegas was difficult for Gacy too, it wasn’t as easy to get a job or start a career here, it all looked so much easier in the magazines. After only a short while in Vegas he was ready to go back home, but he was broke. Job hunting got him a small job as a janitor in a funeral parlor. Once he made up enough he went back home where his mother and sister’s were happily waiting for him.

Upon Gacy’s arrival back home he needed something to do. Sitting around the house with his mother was not enough for him so he decided, without returning back to high school, he would enroll in the Northwestern Business College. He would go on to graduate from this and soon after he got a job with the Nunn-Bush shoe company selling shoes. His job was going well for him. Then in 1964 the company had decided to transfer Gacy to Springfield, Illinois giving him the management position at a men’s clothing outlet. Gacy was very satisfied with this and again took off. But despite all his employment satisfaction, his physical health was beginning to decline rapidly. John had gained a lot of weight and his heart began to hurt more frequently. He was hospitalized numerous times for this condition, and once for a spinal problem due to the extra weight on his back which caused him back problems. But Gacy didn’t let this slow him down, he kept hard at work.

While in Springfield John had soon fallen in love with a woman named Marlynn Myers. In September of 1964 they had decided to get married and settle down. John had everything he could want at this point in his life. He had a beautiful wife, he had a great job and he was also very active in different Springfield Organizations such as joining the Jaycee’s and becoming vice-president of the Springfield Chapter in 1965. Some would have said he took on a lot of responsibility at one time but John liked to stay busy. John loved to dress up like a clown and perform for the children and at small parties. He called himself, Pogo the clown.
Marlynn’s parents purchased a group of KFC franchises’ and had proposed John with a management position in Waterloo, Iowa. After considering the deal John and Marlynn had decided to pick up roots and move. This would mean more money for the two of them and a fresh start away from Springfield.

It didn’t take John and Marlynn very long to settle down in Waterloo and call it home. John was doing well with his management position and Marlynn stayed at home due to the fact she was pregnant. Soon after the first pregnancy came a second and John now had two children in his life, a little boy and a girl. The all American family. John had decided to join organizations again and had re-joined the Jaycee’s, with also joining the Federal Civil Defense and the Chi Rho Club. John was known around town as a hard worker and supporter of the community.  Although some people began to think of him as a homosexual due to all the attention he gave the young boys around town, but that didn’t stop him from becoming an outstanding vice-president of the Waterloo Jaycee’s in 1967.He was hospitalized once again for nervous exhaustion for all his time put into all the different organizations. But that’s not the half of it. John, although well liked around the community had little dark secrets to hide. While Marlynn sat at home with the children, John would leave work and go find prostitutes to sleep with. Mostly consisting of male companions. This went on for quit a while with Marlynn not knowing why her sex life took a turn for the worst. She and John weren’t sleeping together anymore and John kept spending more time away from home. Then John started a club in his basement only for the young boys around Waterloo. He had pornography for them to look at and offered them drugs and alcohol. When he figured the boys had too much to drink or smoke he would begin to fondle them and try to make them fondle him. John was very aroused by this and began to have more and more meetings with the boys. One meeting went a little too far with the boys. In 1968  he had committed an act of sodomy, and although pleased with himself at the time, the boy, Mark Miller, had gone to the police along with another young boy accusing the same acts. Gacy professed his innocence in court accusing the other members of the Jaycee’s of being jealous because he had become vice-president and they were just putting the boys up to it. The case was dismissed at that time until Gacy, making a bad move had decided to hire another young boy, Dwight Anderrson, who was 18 at the time, to go and beat up Mark Miller. Gacy had told Dwight he would pay him $10.00 to do the job and then pay him $300.00 more to help with his car payment once it was done. Dwight had agreed and took off to find Miller. Once Anderrson had found him he talked Miller into taking a walk with him in a near patch of woods, it was there Anderrson began to beat Miller. But it didn’t turn out in Gacy’s favor and Miller broke Anderrson’s nose and ran to the police. Soon after, the police had picked up Anderrson and he spilled everything about Gacy’s plans. This time in court Gacy was convicted of sodomy against Miller and sentenced to 10 years imprisonment. Marlynn filed for divorce in 1969 and Gacy never saw or heard from his family again.

While Gacy was in prison his father had passed away on Christmas Day, 1969 due to liver cirrhosis. John never got to tell his father goodbye or try and make amends with him. This would be something John would always regret. In 1970 after only serving 18 months John was paroled and headed back to Illinois to live with his mother.

After Gacy had made the move from Illinois back to Chicago to live with his mother he soon found work as a chef at a local Chicago restaurant. He saved money to the best of his ability and with his mother’s financial assistance he was able to buy a house of his own in 1971. It was a nice house located at 8213 West Summerdale Avenue in Chicago. It was in an unincorporated area of Norwood Park Township in Cook County, which is surrounded by the Northwest side Chicago neighborhood of Norwood Park. The house had a couple bedrooms, a fairly decent kitchen, a nice bathroom and a small yard. Gacy liked the house a lot; in fact his favorite place in the whole house would soon become the small four foot crawl space under the floor. Although Gacy still had to have his prostitutes and pornography he wound up slipping up again. In February 1971 Gacy was charged with disorderly conduct when a teenage boy had claimed that Gacy picked him up and tried to force him to have sex. The complaint was dropped when the boy didn’t show up for court. The Iowa Board of Parole did not learn of this incident and discharged Gacy from parole in October 1971.

It was January 3, 1972. A boy by the name of Timothy McCoy, age 18 at the time, suddenly disappeared. His parents had contacted police and they began searching surrounding areas. After nothing ever surfaced the police and parents figured this must be a runaway case and dropped the search. All the while Gacy sat at home in his recliner watching whatever episode was on, eating his TV dinner knowing that his sexual desires were fulfilled for that evening and that Timothy was safe and dead inside his hidden crawlspace. This wouldn’t be determined or proven until years later.

On June 22, 1972 Gacy was arrested again and charged with battery after another young man said Gacy had flashed a sheriff’s badge at him and lured him into his car. There he forced the young man into sex. But yet again, the charges were dropped and Gacy walked a free man. Also in June 1972 Gacy had remarried a woman he knew from his childhood, Carole Hoff. Carole already had two daughters from a previous marriage and they all three moved into Gacy’s home with him. This would cause Gacy to better strategize his plans so no one would get suspicious. The marriage seemed to be going fine.

In 1975Gacy had started his own business out of his home. It was called PDM Contractors, a construction company. This would all fall right into his plans and sexual preference as time progressed.

In July of 1975 one of Gacy’s employee’s, John Butkovich had disappeared. Butkovich who was 17, recently left Gacy’s employ after an angry argument over back pay that was owed. Butkovich’s parents urged police to check out Gacy but nothing ever came of it and the young man’s disappearance went unsolved.

At the end of 1975 and the early month’s of 1976 came, Gacy’s marriage began to fall apart. Carole found herself lying in bed alone more nights than with John there with her. He would stay out all night and give Carole the story that he was just working. Carole became very suspicious of John’s stories and while he would leave the house she began going through his things. She would eventually find young men’s wallets with their ID’s inside, gay pornography that John had hidden all over the house. She would also find sex toys such as dildo’s and handcuffs. It was safe to assume that their marriage had completely deteriorated and their sex life came to a halt. In March of 1976 Gacy and Carole had divorced.

Just a month after the Gacy’s divorced another young man went missing from town, Darrell Sampson. In April 1976 he too had just vanished without telling anyone. The police had nothing to go so quickly moved on. No one would discover the body until years later.

Although Gacy being a single man again didn’t stop him from staying active in activities around town. Gacy was very active in the local Democratic Party and first began volunteering to clean offices. Gacy had been active in this for about 4 years now. In 1975 and 1976 Gacy served on the Norwood Park Township street lighting committee. He eventually earned the title of precinct captain. In May of 1976 Gacy was directing the parade that year for the third year in a row. The first lady at the time, Rosalynn Carter was in town for the annual Polish Constitution Day Parade on May 6. Gacy was actually photographed with the first lady and she signed his picture, “To John Gacy. Best wishes. Rosalynn Carter”. In the picture Gacy was wearing an “S” pin, which indicated a person who has received special clearance by the secret service. Later after a search of Gacy’s house after his arrest, this picture would cause a huge embarrassment to the secret service.

May 14, 1976. Two young boys were out playing around on the street. Gacy pulled up beside the boys in his black Oldsmobile and offered the boys a lift. Randall Reffett, 15 and his friend, Sam Stapleton, 14 hesitated but still took the strangers proposal. They got into the car and were never seen again.

In December of 1976 another Gacy employee, Gregory Godzik disappeared.  As with John Butkovich, Gregory’s parents asked police to investigate Gacy because he was the last known person to talk with their son. But with nothing to go on, no evidence of anything, police did not pursue the case. In January of 1977 yet another employee of Gacy’s came up missing. John Sync who was an acquaintance of Butkovich and Godzik and Gacy. Later that same year another one of Gacy’s employee’s was arrested for stealing gasoline from a station. The car he was driving belonged to Sync. Gacy told police that Sync had sold him the car before leaving town. Still with nothing for the police to go on, the dropped the whole matter. But Gacy was looking like a person of interest due to everyone around him seeming to just disappear for no reason. Gacy kept up his wicked ways and sodomized and tortured between 25-30 young boys and murdered them before he finally messed up and left a huge hole for the police to crawl right into.

It was May 22, 1978 when a young man named Jeffrey Rignall had returned from a winter vacation in Florida to his home back in Chicago. He had decided to get reacquainted with the city by visiting New Town, a popular area of Chicago where many popular bars and discos could be found. While Jeffery walked through the area a black Oldsmobile had pulled up and blocked his path to the street. Jeffery then looked inside the vehicle to a heavy-set driver sitting there. John then asked Jeffery if he’d like to share a joint with him and get in the car and away from the cold of the streets. With an invitation that seemed harmless Jeffrey agreed and hopped in the car. John began driving around and joining small talk with the young man while they shared the joint John had lit. Rignall was delighted to escape the cold and share a marijuana cigarette with this stranger. John had complimented Rignall on his out of season tan and he thanked John. As Jeffery inhaled more of the joint John reached over and forced a rag over his face filled with chloroform. Rignall had then lost consciousness and only briefly reawakened a couple times during the car ride. During his wakeful periods Rignall watched in a daze as street signs passed trying to make sense of what it was that was happening to him. Yet before he could understand where he was and what was happening, the stranger driving the car had again covered his face with chloroform and he passed out again. Once he was awake, Rignall remembered being in a house and seeing the heavy-set stranger standing naked in front of him. Rignall also remembered seeing on the floor varying sized dildo’s that the stranger pointed out to him and remarked on how he was going to use them on his unwilling prisoner. That evening Rignall was viciously raped, tortured and drugged repeatedly by the sadistic stranger. Rignall would later only remember bits and pieces of the horrible events. Later the next morning Rignall 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 upon his body. He made his way to his feet and over to his girlfriend’s house where she had taken him to the hospital where he stayed for 6 days. While Rignall was in the hospital he had reported the incident to the police, who were very skeptical about finding Rignall’s rapist due to the little information he had provided. Rignall had said he remembered through a chloroformed haze, a black Oldsmobile, the Kennedy expressway and a few side streets. That was enough though for police to back track and find the Oldsmobile sitting in the driveway at 8213 West Summerdale. Gacy was arrested and taken into custody. But he soon found his way out and back home for awhile. Along with skin lacerations, burns and permanent liver damage due to all the chloroform inhaled, Rignall suffered severe emotional trauma that he still lives with today. Rignall, although in bad shape was one of the few people to have survived Gacy’s grasp and live to tell about it.

In December of 1978 would be the next time police would talk with Gacy. A young boy, Robert Piest who was 15, lived in John’s neighborhood and suddenly disappeared. The boy worked after school at the Des Plaines Pharmacy. Before he vanished Piest had told a co-worker he was going down the street to talk with a contractor about a job. Gacy had in fact been at the pharmacy earlier that night discussing a remodeling job with the owner. Gacy had denied though to the police ever talking with Peist, but the Des Plaines police did what the Chicago police failed to do and checked out Gacy’s previous record. They were shocked to find out he had already done time for sodomy. The police knew they were on to something and went to pick up Gacy at his house. With little to actually go on the police couldn’t hold Gacy in jail for long so they figured they’d get a search warrant and find evidence to convict Gacy. On December 13, 1978 the search of Gacy’s house began. The police found a 1975 high school class ring, numerous driver’s licenses, handcuff’s, a two by four with holes drilled in the ends, a syringe, clothing too small to be Gacy’s and a photo receipt from the pharmacy where Robert Piest worked. The police also couldn’t help but to notice the offensive odor coming from the direction of the crawl space. Further investigation into the items found at Gacy’s would reveal the high school ring belonged to John Szyc who was still missing.

On December 21, 1978, one of Gacy’s employee’s told police that Gacy confessed to him over 30 different murders. The police decided after hearing this information to take out a second search warrant on the Gacy home. This would be the search that would convict Gacy of his murders. Police had found the crawl space along with several skeletal remains. The police then confronted Gacy with the evidence collected and he denied nothing. Instead he confessed to some 25-30 murders in total and even telling investigators that most of the boys were buried in the crawlspace, some were on his property and that the last 5 he killed he threw off the I-55 bridge and into the Des Plaines river, including that of Peist. The police and investigators were shocked to get such a quick and well described confession out of Gacy and he kept telling them more.

Gacy drew the police a diagram of the crawlspace to show where the bodies were buried. He began to tell them how he would pick up male teenagers or male prostitutes off the streets and take them back to his house with either promising them money for sex or sometimes he would force them to go and that he even picked up one victim standing at a bus station. Once he got the boys back to his house he would handcuff them or tie them up in another way. He would use pieces of cloth to shove in their mouths to keep the screaming muffled. After this, he said, he would choke them with a rope or a board as he sexually assaulted them because this made ejaculation much more exciting. After the assault was over and the boys were dead Gacy said he would sometimes keep them with him for days or until the body started to decompose. He loved the boys he said, and they loved the attention.

Over the next four month’s after Gacy’s arrest more and more human remains emerged from the house as reporters, TV news crews and astonished onlookers watched as 29 bodies were found in Gacy’s crawlspace and on the property between December 1978 and March 1979. The youngest identified victims were Samuel Stapleton and Michael Marino, both were 14 years in age. The oldest were Russell Nelson and James Mazzara who were both 21 years of age. 8 of the victims recovered from the crawlspace were so badly decomposed that they were never able to be identified. The body of Robert Peist was found on the banks of the Des Plaines River on April 9, 1979. Gacy’s confessed victim’s were as follows:

Timothy McCoy, 18 (January 3-1972)
John Butkovich, 17 (July 21-1975)
Darrell Sampson, 18 (April 6-1976)
Randall Reffett, 15 (May, 14-1976)
Sam Stapleton, 14 (May, 14-1976)
Michael Bonnin, 17 (June 3-1976)
William Carroll, 16 (June 13-1976)
Rick Johnston, 17 (August 6-1976)
Kenneth Parker, 16 (October 25-1976)
Michael Marino, 14 (October 25-1976)
Gregory Godzick, 17 (December 12-1976)
John Szyc, 19 (January 20-1977)
Jon Prestidge, 20 (March 15-1977)
Matthew Bowman, 19 (July 5-1977)
Robert Gilroy, 18 (September 15-1977)
John Mowery, 19 (September 25-1977)
Russell Nelson, 21 (October 17-1977)
Robert Winch, 16 (November 10-1977)
Tommy Boling, 20 (November 18-1977)
David Talsma, 19 (December 9-1977)
William Kindred, 19 (February 16-1978)
Timothy O’Rourke, 20 (June-1978)
Frank Landingin, 19 (November 4-1978)
James Mazzara, 21 (November 24-1978)
Robert Peist, 15 (December 11-1978)

Gacy’s trial began February 6, 1980. He pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity. The plea was rejected outright. Gacy’s lawyer, Sam Amirante said that Gacy had moments of temporary insanity at the time of each individual murder but would regain his sanity before and after the murders to lure and dispose of the bodies. During the trial Gacy joked that the only thing he was guilty of was running a cemetery without a license. At one point during the trial Gacy’s defense tried to claim that all 33 murders were accidental deaths as part of erotic asphyxia, but the Cook County coroner claimed that after examining the body's accidental death was impossible in this case.
On March 13 Gacy was found guilty and sentenced to death by lethal injection. Gacy’s last words to his lawyer were, “Killing me won’t bring anyone back”. And his last words to the correctional officer was, “Kiss my Ass”. Gacy’s last meal consisted of a Dozen deep fried shrimp, a bucket of original recipe chicken from KFC, a pound of fresh strawberries and French fries. Gacy’s execution was off to a bad start when the lethal chemicals unexpectedly solidified clogging the I.V. tube that led into Gacy’s arm and prevented any further passage. Blinds covering the window through which witnesses observed the execution were drawn and the execution team replaced the clogged tube with a new one. 10 minutes later the blinds were re-opened and the execution resumed. The execution took only 18 minutes to complete. Outside the prison was a minor media sensation and large crowds of people gathered for the execution. There were numerous arrests for public intoxication, open container violations and disorderly conduct. Vendors even sold Gacy t-shirts and other merchandise. The crowd cheered at the moment when Gacy was pronounced dead.

Chief prosecutor at Gacy’s trial, William Knuckle said after Gacy’s execution, “He still got it better than any of his victims ever did”.

After Gacy’s body was removed from the prison, Dr. Helen Morrison who interviewed Gacy and other serial killers, removed Gacy’s brain to check for abnormalities, but there were none found. Morrison still has Gacy’s brain.

While Gacy awaited his death on death row he took up oil painting as a way to pass the time. He got very good at it. Mostly doing paintings of clowns, he had said once he used the clown as his alter ego, saying that a clown can get away with murder. He also did a painting of snow white and the seven dwarfs, Ed Gein, and Jeffrey Dahmer. But after Gacy’s execution his paintings were sold at auction. Some bought Gacy’s paintings just to destroy them. A bon fire in Naperville, Illinois in June 1994 was attended by some 300 people, including family members of 9 victims who watched 25 of the paintings burn.