After finishing up the Jeffrey Dahmer series on Netflix, I had more unanswered questions about one of the serial killers that was brought up in the series. John Wayne Gacy, one of America’s most notorious serial killers. I knew about Gacy and what he had done, but I wanted to do more research about him. So, for my week 5 passion blog, I am doing it about him.

John Wayne Gacy was born on March 17th, 1942 in Chicago, Illinois. While growing up, Gacy was close to his mother and two sisters, but not with his father. His father was an alcoholic who was physically abusive to his family.

To many people in the community, Gacy was a friendly man who loved to entertain young children. Gacy earned his name “the Killer Clown” because he would dress up as an alter ego, Pogo the Clown, for parties that he hosted for his neighborhood.

The first warning sign was in 1964. Gacy was found guilty of sodomizing two young boys. He was arrested and spent 18 months in prison. When he was released, Gacy decided to move to Chicago for a new start. While in Chicago, Gacy founded a construction business which would later turn successful, he attended church, re-married, and volunteered at the Democratic Precinct Captain in his neighborhood.

During July, 1995, a teenager who worked for Gacy had disappeared. The teenager’s parents suspected that Gacy had done something to their child and begged for police to investigate him. The police ignored their pleas because someone with Gacy’s status “could never do anything bad.”

After Gacy’s second divorce he had felt as if he had more “freedom” to do as he pleased. This is when he would begin to rape and kill young men. Over a small period of just a few years, Gacy had murdered 33 people. 29 of the victims were found underneath Gacy’s house, 26 under the crawlspace and 3 other bodies found elsewhere beneath his home.

In 1977, a young man went to the Chicago police for help claiming he had just been kidnapped and molested by John Wayne Gacy. A report was made, but once again, officers had failed to follow up on the claim. A year later, another one of his victims who had gone to Gacy’s home with questions for a construction job he had offered was murdered. He was only 15 years old. This time, the Des Plaines police got involved and searched Gacy’s home. They found suspicious items including a class ring, and clothing for teenagers/children. The class ring belonged to one of Gacy’s victims leading police to be suspicious of him. Because of this police were able to get a search warrant on Gacy’s home, leading them to uncover the truth.

Gacy was arrested and used the insanity plea in hopes to not get a guilty verdict. This however, didn’t happen and Gacy was found guilty for 33 counts of murder. On May 10th, 1994, John Wayne Gacy was executed by lethal injection.

My Review: 

John Wayne Gacy sort of reminds me of Ted Bundy in some ways. Gacy was seen as an upstanding citizen, so people turned a blind eye when it came to him being suspicious. Ted Bundy was sort of the same, it was just that he was very well kept and he gave off “no way this dude could be a serial killer” vibes. I just don’t understand how some police can turn a blind eye when there is so much evidence to be directed towards an individual. There could have been fewer deaths if they were to look into Gacy. Cases like these upset me because of how obvious some things were.

Photos:

Schager, N. (2021, March 25). The real-life ‘Killer clown’ that Terrorized America. The Daily Beast. Retrieved October 20, 2022, from https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-real-life-killer-clown-that-terrorized-america

Wikimedia Foundation. (2022, October 15). John Wayne Gacy. Wikipedia. Retrieved October 20, 2022, from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Wayne_Gacy