Criminology - The Green River Killer Pt1

Episode Date: April 27, 2019

For many years, beginning in the early 1980s, Washington state had a serial killer on its hands. Sex workers went missing at an alarming rate, most of them were picked up around Pacific Highway South and found later, dumped, in the Green River. This is how the serial killer got his moniker as the Green River Killer. It would be many years later that authorities figured out it was Gary Ridgway. Join Mike and Morf in part 1 of the story of the Green River Killer / Gary Ridgway. We explore his upbringing, his marriages, his first murder, and many more. Ridgway was one of the most prolific serial killers in American history. It will take a couple of episodes to unravel all of his murders. You can help support the show at patreon.com/criminology An Emash Digital production Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Work comes in many forms. Commonwealth Charter Academy works to perfect K to 12 virtual learning and in-person experiences. To us, it's all in a day's work. CCA, how schools should work. Visit cca educate.me. Criminology is a true crime podcast that may contain discussion about violent or disturbing topics. Listener discretion is advised. Hello everyone and welcome to episode 58 of the criminology podcast.

I'm Mike Ferguson. And this is Morf. Wow, Morph, you sound way better than you have in weeks. Yeah, I'm still not 100%, but I am better than I've been, and I'm excited to get through a whole episode. Well, let's just say you sound 99%. I'll put it that way. Yeah, and I appreciate you doing the episode without me.

A lot of people really like that episode, and I saw a lot of good feedback. So good work with that. Yeah, no, it was fun. It was different. Definitely different, but I had fun with it. We also had some great feedback about last week's episode, the Golden State Killer one year later. Now, I do have to put it out there. I goofed when I was setting up the episode instead of putting it out for 10 p.m.

on Saturday, I accidentally hit 10 a.m. So the minute I hit the button, the episode went out. But I realized it and I changed it very quickly. The problem with that is all of the people that were subscribed to the podcast, they got notification that, hey, there's a new episode out, but the episode wouldn't play because I had quickly changed it back to 10 p.m. So there was a lot of confusion there. I know a lot of people reached out to you more. If I had some people reach out to me. So I wanted to put it out there, take ownership for that. That was my fault. Having said that, we,

got some great feedback on that episode. And it was a lot of fun, right, to get those people back together more. If it was almost like a reunion for us. Yeah. And it's hard to believe that it's been a year since we went down that that long road and to see what's happening with the case and with everybody involved, you know, one year later. Yeah, I think anytime you can talk to Paul holds, anytime you can talk to some of these people and especially the sister survived. right and people like Debbie Domingo it's great the listeners loved it so much great feedback about those interviews because of the strength I think I hear that a lot and I feel that when I listen to those interviews the strength of these women it radiates when you hear them talk

it's extremely powerful I'll put it that way yeah it's it's it's very moving to hear some of these stories that they've shared with us on the podcast, and that means a lot that they were willing to do that. And I think listeners appreciated that a lot too. And for those of you that have not listened to that second season of criminology all about the East Area rapist slash Golden State Killer, you know, those episodes are out on Stitcher Premium. And what's great about Stitcher Premium? There's a ton of podcasts, a ton of content, but they also offer a free month trial. So if you, let's say, just wanted to listen to season two of criminology, I think you could get through that in a month for free.

I'll just throw that out there. All right, Morph, we do have some Patreon shoutouts to give. We had Lauren Tahan, Dr. Sue Barrett. So we have a doctor in the house. Got to like that. Ashton Keech and Lauren Schindler. So, you know, great support, new support. And then we have a lot of people that continue to support the podcast month after month. We say it all the time. Or if it goes a long way towards helping us continue to put out this podcast. I mean, it's not cheap.

I don't know if people, you know, realize that. But, you know, as the numbers grow, your expenses grow as well for distributing this content. So it's very much appreciated. Yeah, we say it every week, but it's true every week that it goes a long way and we appreciate it. And if you'd like to help support the show on Patreon, you can do so by visiting patreon.com slash criminology. And you'll get lots of goodies as a Patreon supporter. We're going to put full interviews for some of the shows that we do out there, including all of the Golden State killer material from the last episode. So keep an eye on your Patreon feed for that.

stuff. Time is running out to register for CrimeCon. We'd love to see you in New Orleans, June 7th through June 9th. If you're going to purchase your badge on the CrimeCon website, make sure you use our promo code, Criminology 19. You'll save 10% off your standard badge. All right. That is it. Let's jump into this episode. Morph, this is a very big case, so big that it'll take it, least two episodes to cover, we're talking about the Green River killer, Gary Ridgeway. This man left a trail of bodies in the Pacific Northwest. And by the time he was caught, the number of his victims, as everything came out, it was staggering.

I don't know how it is for you, Mike, but that name Gary Ridgeway and the Green River killer, that's right up there with Ted Bundy and Zodiac for me. as far as infamy and that lore of true crime about some of the monsters that we talk about on the show. Oh, I would agree with you 100%. And then you look at body count. And there are not many people, especially in the United States, that rival Gary Ridgeway in the number of confirmed victims. In 1982, the bodies of five young women were found in or near Washington's Green River. Soon after, more bodies were discovered in different areas of Seattle and Portland, Oregon. Police had a serial killer roaming the streets.

Most of the women were sex workers and ranged in age from 15 to 38 years old. The Green River killer eluded police for two decades until 2001, when Gary Ridgeway, then 52 years old, was arrested for the murders. Until his arrest, the Green River killings ranked as one of the nations of most deadliest serial murder cases. Gary Ridgeway claimed he killed up to 71 women, but was convicted of killing 49 identified victims. Gary Leon Ridgeway was born on February 18th, 1949 in Salt Lake City, Utah, to Thomas and Mary Ridgeway. He was the second of three sons, born to the couple. His brothers are Gregory and Thomas. In 1960, when Gary was 11, the family moved to.

4404 South 175th Street in the McMicken Heights neighborhood. And what is now the city of CETAC, Washington? It's near the CETAC Airport, which is very close to Seattle's Pacific Highway. Gary's father, Thomas, was a bus driver, and his mother, Mary, worked as a sales clerk at a J.C. Penny store in Seattle. But growing up, Gary witnessed. extremely violent arguments between his mother and father. One of Gary's ex-girlfriends later recalled a time when Mary broke a plate over her husband

Thomas's head, but Thomas didn't retaliate. He just got up from the kitchen table and walked away. Up until he was 13, Gary wet his bed and afterwards his mother would wash his genitals. As a teenager, he was sexually attracted. attracted to his mother and often thought of killing her because of his attraction. In junior high, Gary got a thrill from following and stalking his female classmates. He attempted arson a few times, but it didn't give him the same thrill. Later in high school, Gary had no problem getting a date and was considered a nice guy. He started dating Claudia Craig, who became his steady girlfriend.

When he was 16, Gary lured a six-year-old boy into the woods and stabbed him. Afterwards, the boy asked Gary, why did you kill me? Laughing, Gary Ridgway wiped the blood off both sides of the blade on the boy's shirt and replied, I always wanted to know what it felt like to kill somebody. Somehow that young boy survived the knife wound. Incredibly, when the boy made it home and was hospitalized in critical condition, police brushed off his account of Gary Ridgeway trying to kill him. Okay, Morph, there's a lot to unpack here, and I think we've got to take some time to do it. First of all, you have bedwetting to the age of 13. Now, I've talked a lot about bedwetting on a number of different episodes, on a number of

different podcasts. I always get a lot of emails when the topic of bed wedding comes up because there are quite a few kids that wet the bed, you know, where I think most people tend to think it's a sign of maybe a bigger issue is when that bed wedding extends past what most people would consider a normal time frame 13 years old I think for most people again I'm I'm saying most they have stopped wetting the bed by that age again there are exceptions there are people that are going to wet the bed at that age and even past it and not become a serial killer so we've got that but then you have the relationship with his mother. His mom is washing his genitals, which, you know, at that age,

you're old enough to wash your own private parts. Let's just put that out there. That is very strange. It morphs into a sexual attraction on the part of Gary Ridgeway to his mother, which causes him to think about killing her. You have the arson. but I really want to talk about Gary Ridgeway stabbing this very young, six-year-old boy. He's 16 years old, tells this boy that he just always wanted to know what it felt like to kill someone. This is some real deep, dark, sadistic stuff we're talking about on the part of Gary Ridgeway. But then the boy survives and actually tells police who did this to him.

him and it's like nothing ever happens. There's no follow-up. And I'm still trying to wrap my head around how the police didn't do anything when he stabbed that young boy. There's not much information out there about what that result was and why they didn't look at Gary Ridgeway closer. But if you're that young child's family, you have to be wondering why this older boy didn't get in some kind of trouble and get reprimanded for what he did to their son. Well, that plus years later, you know they're going to find out what Gary Ridgeway did. And then you know that for sure it was him. It's just one of those things where, and we don't have all the facts around that situation, but you just can't believe that something more didn't happen. You know, there's so many warning signs already that early on, something was wrong with Gary Ridgeway. Now, two months before he graduated high school, Gary got a job painting trucks at a Kenworth trucking company in Renton, Washington. So he graduated Taii High School in 1969 when he was 20 years old.

For most people, that is older than the normal graduation age. There are some sources that talk about the fact that he was held back due to dyslexia. He may have had some other issues preventing him from doing well in school, but he graduated. On August 15th, 1970, Gary and Claudia got married. And then just three days later, Gary enlisted in the Navy and the couple moved to San Diego. Soon after that, Gary set out on a six-month tour of duty, on a support. supply ship, he eventually landed in Vietnam. He also spent some time in the Philippines, and this is

where he first started paying for the services of sex workers. He later said that he disliked Filipino sex workers because of his interactions with them. On July 23rd, 1971, Gary Ridgeway was honorably discharged from the Navy and returned to San Diego. However, Claudia had moved out of their home and into an apartment she shared with a female friend and a male roommate. At that point, Gary moved back to Seattle where he returned to his job at Kenworth. Claudia followed him a few weeks later, and the couple tried to make the marriage work. They moved in with Gary's parents for a bit before running an apartment near CETAC Airport. But the reunion was short-lived, and in August, Gary filed for divorce.

The divorce was finalized on January 14, 1972. Afterwards, Claudia returned to San Diego and moved in with a boyfriend she would later marry. The only contested piece of property was a 1963 Ford Fairlane that Gary ended up getting. So this divorce left Gary bitter and it really caused him to despise his ex-wife, Claudia. Later, he would claim that she moved in with several men and became a sex worker herself, following their divorce. So when you think about this, it really seems as if Gary Ridgeway started looking at his wife in the same light as he did

the sex workers that he visited. This is something that would continue throughout the years. In 1972, Gary met a woman named Marsha Winslow. She had been driving along the rent and lose. this is a popular driving route in Renton, Washington, Gary saw her driving and actually pulled her over and what she described as a police like stop. And I don't know how you could describe it any other way. If you're not a police officer and you're pulling someone over, that's strange. It is a police like stop. But incredibly, the pair began dating not long after.

they lived together for about a year before marrying in December of 1973. Gary and Marcia had one child together, a boy named Matthew, who was born in 1975. On the surface, it seemed like Gary and Marcia had a somewhat traditional relationship, but it wasn't long before some of Gary's unusual desires came to light. Gary often took Marsha to all of his favorite outdoor areas of King County, where the couple would have sex. He enjoyed having sex outside and in the woods. Gary was a scavenger, and many times while the couple was out and about,

he would pick through a refuse at dump sites, searching for items he could sell. Gary turned this into a hobby that continued for many years after. After their son Matthew was born in 1975, Gary and Marcia joined a couple of churches and became very religious. In fact, Marsha later told detectives that Gary became fanatical. about religion. He would cry frequently during church services and at night watch television with a Bible in his lap. But despite this newfound religion, Gary and Marsha's marriage began deteriorating. And Gary started getting violent. In one incident, the couple returned home from a party

where they had both been drinking. When Marcia got out of the van, someone came up behind her and started choking her. It turned out to be Gary. And apparently this was something that he did. He liked to sneak up behind her and scare her. Probably not too hard to figure out that this was something that was troubling for Marcia. I think it would be troubling for anyone,

especially a woman whose husband liked to sneak up behind them, not only scare them, but act like he's going to choke them. I don't know about you, Morph, but my wife's not, she's not having that. Yeah, my wife doesn't go for those kind of games. And I think Marcia was a little bit unsettled by that. So by 1978, Gary and Marcia were living in a ranch style house in federal way near Dashpoint State Park. They weren't attending church as much as they had before. Gary started coming home late from work with no explanation, often coming home.

wet and dirty. He wouldn't explain where he had been or what he had been up to while he was out. Marsha finally had enough and on July 4th, 1980, the couple separated and she moved to Kent, Washington. She filed for divorce on July 21st and got a restraining order against Gary, who countered with one of his own in August. Both feared the other would become violent. The divorce was finalized in May 1981 and Marsha got custody of Matthew. Gary began paying $275 a month in child support and saw Matthew every other weekend. In early 1981, Gary joined a parents without partner support group, and a few months later, he began dating other women. He moved in with one of them in May 1981, but the relationship was mostly a physical one, and she kicked Gary out of her house in December.

So, Morf, one thing that strikes me at this point in the story is Gary Ridgeway, didn't seem to have a problem meeting women. And that's different, right, than a lot of serial killers that, you know, I've covered over the years. I think you've covered as well. And he wasn't Brad Pitt. I mean, this was not a great looking guy, but he obviously had no problem meeting and, and getting women to go out with him. He was not the same as Ted Bundy who used his looks to.

make women feel at ease. I think Gary Ridgway was a pretty normal guy that didn't have anything special going for him, but you're right, he didn't have any trouble picking up women or meeting women. Well, he must have been a smooth talker. That's the only thing I can figure out. After Gary and Marcia's split was final, Gary bought a house and got a new girlfriend. Again, morph like I said, this guy has no problem picking up women, getting them to go out with him, and not just go on dates. He's able to establish actual relationships with these women. So, you know, there's something to Gary Ridgeway. And like I said, it's not his looks. I don't know if it's his charisma. I don't know if it's the way he's able to talk to women because it's not just this,

this woman that turns out to be his girlfriend. He starts seeing another woman at the same time. And when his girlfriend found out, she ended the relationship. So I think this is important, right? I don't want to sound like I'm harping on it, but the fact that he is constantly searching for women, having some type of relationship with women, it's almost as if he is, I don't know if the word is hypersexual morph, but there's something like that going on. I think later on that's going to come into play. And to touch on your point, I think maybe Gary didn't come across as a threat, which is why so many of these women opened up to him.

And I think later on, as he becomes a serial killer, that non-threatening presence that he puts off is going to help him to get more victims. No, I think it's a great point. So we've said he's not the Ted Bundy. He's more like the benign neighbor next door, maybe, is an apt description. No need to fear Gary Ridgeway because he's just this affable guy next door. It was around April of 1982. Gary started having financial problems. As a result of that, he rented his home out to a couple and he actually moved into the garage.

A month later, Gary was arrested on suspicion of soliciting what was termed a John patrol. I think more if this is a sting operation, right, an undercover female King County Sheriff's Deputy out on the street posing as a sex worker. And in this sting operation, they nabbed, I'm sure, a bunch of people. But one of those individuals was Gary Ridgeway. And I think it's important. Gary frequented the strip in Seattle, you know, section of the former Pacific Highway South in what is now the city of C-Tac. And back then, you know, this is the area where the strip clubs were, it's where they thrive.

It's where the sex workers walk to streets at night. But it's just two months after this that Gary Ridgeway started murdering women and would become one of the most prolific serial. killers in U.S. history. In the suburbs of D.C., a woman fails to show up for work and is found brutally murdered. I wonder what's emergency. We just walked in the door and there's blood in the foyer. For the next two decades, the case remained unsolved until new technology allowed investigators to do what had once been impossible.

A new series from ABC Audio in 2020, blood and water. Listen now, wherever you get your podcasts. On July 15, 1982, 15-year-old Galen Hershey and a friend were riding bikes on Peck Bridge near Kent Washington. It's when they noticed something floating in the water below. The bridge sits above the Green River. As they were looking towards the river, the object looked like a mannequin floating in the water. They moved closer, and Galen spotted tennis shoes and hair floating under the water. This wasn't a mannequin.

It was a human body. Police recovered the body and the cause of death was strangulation with ligature. The killer used the victim's blue jeans to strangler. The body was later identified as 16-year-old Wendy Lee Caulfield. She was last seen on July 8, 1982, and had been living in a foster home. Over the next two months, four more bodies were found along the Green River. 23-year-old Deborah Lynn Bonner was last seen in late July, 1982, near the same. the Three Bears Motel. This was located at South 216th Street on Pacific Highway South. Deborah,

who was nicknamed Dub, grew up in Tacoma, Washington. Her family described her as fun-loving, kind-hearted. She had a wide circle of friends. But Deborah dropped out of high school. After she started hanging out with the wrong crowd, she began abusing alcohol. and met a man who became both her boyfriend and her pimp. Deborah traveled around the western part of the U.S. with this man. They lived in hotel rooms and were picked up several times for prostitution. But despite her troubles, Deborah was close to her family and she called home once or twice a week just to stay in touch with her mother, Shirley Bonner. On August 12th, a man named Frank Leonard found Deborah's body floating in the Green River,

just south of the Peck Bridge and 100 yards from the Kent Slaughterhouse where he worked. Frank was putting gas in his truck when he noticed what looked like a dead animal floating in the river. Like Wendy Lee Caulfield, Deborah had also been strangled. Just a week and a half earlier, a 31-year-old woman named Marcia Faye Chapman vanished. She was last seen leaving her home on August 1st. At the time, she lived in the Porta Villa apartments near Cetac Airport. She had three young children ages 11, 9, and 3. Her neighbors called her tiny.

She was only 5'2 and weighed 100 pounds. They said she was cheerful, outgoing, and someone who could take care of herself. Her neighbor, Don Moore, told the Seattle Times in 1982, she was a nice girl. She would speak to you, stand, and talk to you. If she was a prostitute, she was a hell of a nice girl. kid. On August 2nd, just one day after she disappeared, Marcia's mother reported her missing. Her mom said in the missing person report that Marcia told the kids she was going to the store, but she never returned. She also said that Marcia had never done anything like this.

She was a good mother. Two months prior to her disappearance, Marcia was arrested for prostitution, in South King County, she worked on Pacific Highway South and usually started working around 5 p.m. It was noted that she often wore a t-shirt, blue jeans, and a cap. And Debra went by several names, Marcia Faye, Bradford, Belinda Jean Chapman, and Marcy Woodies. Marcia Chapman's remains were found in the Green River on August 15, 1982. The same day Marsha Faith Chapman's body was found, the bodies of Opal Charmaine Mills and Cynthia Jean Hines were found in the Green River. Cynthia's body was found next to Marshes. Robert Williams last saw his 17-year-old daughter, Cynthia, August 10, 1982.

Robert was a cook at a South Seattle barbecue restaurant. That day, Cynthia visited. him at work and asked for $10. Sometime after that, a neighbor saw Cynthia leaving her home in a red Cadillac. A few days later, she was seen getting into a similar car and then a black Jeep near the C-Tac Airport. That was the last time anyone saw Cynthia Hines alive. Cynthia was described as a friendly, loving girl.

She was nicknamed Cookie by her family. She lived in an apartment in Rainier Valley and was friends with Opel Mills. The two worked together painting apartments, and they often hitchhiked together. Cynthia was a troubled teenager. She fell into the wrong crowd at a young age. She dropped out of Nathan Hale High School in North Seattle in the late 70s and early 80s. Police questioned her on Seattle's First Avenue and Pacific Highway South, both areas known for prostitution. Cynthia's mother confirmed that she had been a sex worker for about three years prior to her disappearance.

And it was on August 15, 1982, that a man looking for bottles in the Green River found Cynthia's body beside the body of Marsha Chapman. Both were strangled and their decomposing bodies were held underwater with rocks. Only three days before Cynthia's body was found, 16-year-old Opel Charmine Mills went missing on August 12th. Family members described Opel as very loving. She loved her loss of Opsodog, Muffy. She was extremely close to her brother Garrett, and the two were inseparable. Born to a white mother and black father, the siblings grew up in Kent Washington, which at the time was a mostly white community.

The two were sometimes bullied by other schoolchildren because of their heritage. Opal was very outspoken and teachers considered her a challenge. One time, she walked into a classroom to prevent a teacher from spanking Garrett. After Opel completed junior high, she became engaged and even picked out her wedding dress. Although she was very young, her mother, Kathy Mills, approved of her fiancé. Kathy felt there were worse things than marrying young, like frequent hitchhiking, for example, which is something Opel often did. her last phone call was to Garrett asking for a ride.

She was supposed to do a painting job with Cynthia Hines. But Garrett had worked the night before and was asleep when the phone rang. He asked Opel if she could find another ride. On the same day, the bodies of Marsha Chapman and Cynthia Hines were found, Opel's body was found nearby. She too had been strangled. Now, it's not known if Opel was hitchhiking the day that she was killed, but there's a very good possibility that she was.

Police noticed several similarities between all five victims. For one thing, all of the victims were sex workers, according to police. The victim's bodies were nude. They were weighted down with rocks in their clothes. They also had rocks inserted into their body cavities. And then finally, the victims were all strangled, often with pieces of their own clothing. So police believe that these murders were connected and that they were the work of a serial killer that they began dubbing the Green River killer. But despite police saying that all the victims were sex workers, Opal Mills family and friends, they were adamant that she was not a sex worker.

They did not understand why police labeled her as one. After these murders, police knew that they had a serious problem in their hands. And King County Police set up the biggest police task force since the Ted Bundy murders in the 1970s. Between August and September of 1982, more girls disappeared. 16-year-old Case-Anne Lee went missing on August 28th. Despite being 16, Case was already married. Her husband was Anthony Lee, who was known on the streets as Pretty Tony, and he also was her pimp. The day she went missing, Case left the home she shared with Pretty Tony and walked to a nearby store for dinner supplies.

She was last seen around 1130 p.m. near the CETAC International Airport. She has never been found, but police suspect she is a Green River victim. The pace of missing girls and discarded bodies was alarming. on August 20th, 1982, police arrested their first suspect in the Green River killings. This is a man that they didn't name. But while they had this man in custody, another girl disappeared. 16-year-old Terry Renee Milligan was an intelligent girl who had dreamed of going to Yale. But that dream was cut short.

Terry became pregnant at a young age and moved into a motel room with her boyfriend. She was last seen on August 29th, 1982, near South 144th Street and Pacific Highway South. But her body would not be found until April 1st, 1984. It was found off Star Lake Road in South King County. so the suspect that police had in custody was released. And I think that was a big letdown for the police. They have this burgeoning serial killer who has murdered a number of women. They think they have the guy in custody.

They've arrested this person. Well, obviously when this next murder occurs, they know he's not the guy. He couldn't have killed Terry Mill again because he's in police custody. At around 1.15 a.m. on August 29, 1982, Port Seattle Police spotted a man driving on a dead-end road near South 190 Second Street and the Alaska Airlines warehouse. This was an area known to be frequented by sex workers. And due to the time of the incident, police thought that the driver was suspicious enough

to pull over. The driver was identified as Gary Ridgeway. Unfortunately, records provide no further details about this particular incident, and he was released by police without being arrested. This may have been a huge missed opportunity for police. In September 1982, Charles Clinton Kark was arrested and accused of raping two prostitutes. He confessed to the rapes. Police thought he might be the Green River killer. However, while he was in jail, another young female disappeared, and police let Clark go.

The woman that vanished while Clark was in custody was 18-year-old Mary Bridget Meehan. She went missing on September 15th. She was last seen near the Western Six Motel. But her remains would not be found until November of 1983. They were found in a wooded area. But on September 20th, this is just five days after Mary Meehan went missing, 15-year-old. girl Deborah Lorraine Estes vanished. Deborah was one of three siblings. Her brother Luther was killed in a car accident, but the siblings came from a good family. Their parents ran a trucking

company business from their home on the C-TAC strip. Deborah ran away numerous times and one time came home with a girl named Rebecca Marrero, who would later become a Green River victim herself. Rebecca actually disappeared just a little bit later, December 3rd, 1982, but her remains would not be found for 28 years, not until December of 2010. Rebecca and Deborah were good friends, although Rebecca was a little older than Deborah and had a three-year-old child. Deborah asked her parents if Rebecca could stay with them for a while, but her parents flat out refused. This angered Deborah, so she stole money from her mother's purse. and left home again. It's unknown where Deborah went after this. She may have stayed with Rebecca

at the Marrero family home in White Center. Not long after, Deborah started associating with older men and was soon working the strip as a sex worker. Her boyfriend, Sammy White, was also her pimp. The night she vanished, Deborah was wearing a sweater with glittering gold or silver threads and dark pants. She had recently dyed her hair black. A man picked her up on the strip, and she was never seen alive again. Her remains were not found until June of 1988, and they were only found by accident. An apartment complex worker was digging holes for a fence post when he struck a human bone. Dabra was identified by her unusual stainless steel tooth filling and through forensic test. For police, it seemed as if there was no end in sight. But besides police and the families of

these missing and murdered girls, there were not many people paying attention or for that matter even knew what was going on. The sad part was that since many of these victims were involved in dangerous lifestyles or living on the edge of society, these murders were not generating the kind of news buzz that were used to seeing now with murder victims. And it wasn't a long before more body started showing up. On September 25th, 1982, a biker found the nude body of 17-year-old Giselle Ann Lovorn near some abandoned houses south of the C-Tac International Airport. Giselle was last seen on July 17, 1982 in Normandy Park, a small waterfront community along Puget Sound.

Jazeel had blonde hair prior to her disappearance, but she was found dead with dyed black hair. Her cause of death was listed as strangulation. The killer used a pair of men's black socks to strangle her. Jizel grew up in California and had a happy childhood. But as a teenager, she isolated herself from her family and she started running. running away from home at the age of 14. She loved the Grateful Dead and became what is known as a deadhead following the band all over the country to attend their concerts. True crime author Anne Ruhl mentioned in her 2004 book titled Green River Running Red that Giselle became involved with a taxi

driver named James Tyndall. The two moved into a small apartment together. Tindal said that Giselle turned a prostitution to earn enough money to bail him out of jail. He was in jail on credit card fraud, and this was later confirmed in David Reichert's 2005 book, Chasing the Devil, my 20-year request to capture the Green River killer. Reichert began investigating the Green River murders in 1982 when he was only 32 years old. It was James Tyndall that reported Giselle missing days after she disappeared, and he supplied police with a photo of her. At first, police were skeptical of his story.

but then they discovered he was also involved with other teenage girls who had run away from home. Reichert and another investigator Earl Tripp interviewed Tyndall. And Tyndall relayed to the investigators that he had spent a better part of a month playing amateur detective. He had shown Giselle's picture around, reminding people that she had a tattoo of a bird on her breast and wore a ring shaped like a snake. He told a wild story about a stranger. He described only as a black man who had threatened to harm him if he continued to look into Giselle's disappearance. That stranger was allegedly Anthony Pretty Tony Lee, who was Case Ann Lee's husband and

Pimp. So we have some tie in here more. Remember, Case Ann Lee had vanished in August 82. when the men questioned Pretty Tony. He told them that he was not involved with Giselle, nor were any of the other pimps on the strip. But despite Tyndall opening up to them, Rikert and Tripp called him a possible suspect.

But they didn't have any real evidence against him. On October 7th and 8th, two more victims disappeared. Shonda Lee Simmons, who was 17, and 23-year-old Denise Darsel Bush. Both girls vanished in the area of South 144th Street and Pacific Highway South. On June 14, 1985, the girls' remains were found together in Tiger to Oregon. Although only part of Denise's remains were found that day, the rest wouldn't be recovered until February 1990.

In early September, 1982, a 43-year-old taxi driver named Melvin Wayne Foster called King County Police. Foster wanted to give police some information about the Green River murders. He believed that another fellow taxi driver might be the killer. The other taxi driver's name was Dan Smith, and he drove for a company in federal way. According to Foster, Smith was not a good guy and talked about killing the women found in the Green River. But Foster's good deed backfired on him, and he officially became the third Green River suspect. On the same day, Mary Bridget Meehan vanished. September 15th, police placed Foster under 24-hour surveillance.

For one thing, they believed he fit the FBI profile of the killer. Police searched his house in Lacey twice over a two-month period. They took hair and blood samples from him both times. They administered a polygraph test, which Foster failed. And one of the questions that he was asked was whether or not he knew the first five victims. He answered no. And then he turned around and said that he did know the victims. So the results of the polygraph showed that he might have been lying.

He claimed he failed the polygraph because he had a nervous condition. On October 4, 1982, Foster was fed up with the cops constantly watching him. So he retaliated by calling reporters and told them police for harassing him. Foster wanted police to, quote, lay an egg or get off the nest. However, by going public, this only made Foster look worse to police and convinced them that he was the Green River killer, challenging police as a psychological trait of serial offenders. Police continued their surveillance of Foster in November of 1982. During the time, police were watching him, Mary Meehan, Deborah Estes,

Shonda Summers and Denise Bush all vanished. Missing person reports were filed on Mary and Denise within two days of their disappearances. Deborah was actually going by the name Betty Jones before she went missing. She had worked with the county's sex crimes detectives and the prosecutor's office as a witness in an unrelated rape case when she vanished. Police did not make any of these latest disappearances known to the public. It wasn't until September 29 when they were.

finally announced that Case Lee and Terry Milligan were missing. But the disappearances of Mary, Denise, and Deborah were kept from the public. Had police made those public and shown photographs of the women, they would have learned that Deborah's family had been searching for her for months. Police would also have been made aware about a date Denise made with a man in a great green pickup truck the night before she was last seen. But as it was, this information didn't get relayed to police until her body was found. So more if I think you can make the argument that by not putting this information out there, the police missed out on some pretty good information about these victims that maybe they could have used earlier on. Now, I think the flip side are you.

of that is there's always things that police hold back. They have to, you know, make decisions on that stuff. But I don't know. The fact that somebody's missing, I'm not sure what holding that back does. And I think especially with these kinds of victims that might be sex workers, they live off the grid to a certain extent. And for someone to have information about them and share that with police seems like something that's invaluable, because a lot of times people don't know what some of these people might be up to or where they're at. And to have that information but not be able to use it just seems like a big letdown here. On November 9, 1982, 19-year-old Rebecca Gwai was working as a sex worker on Pacific Highway

when Gary Ridgeway pulled up in his 1980 maroon pickup truck. He showed her his ID and flashed the $20 bill. Gary never directly picked up a sex worker. He made sure there was never any witnesses around and would only choose sex workers working alone. Most of the time, he would use a false name and show a picture of his son to gain their trust. Rebecca got into Gary's truck.

They drove to an isolated spot in the woods close to a mobile home park in near south to 204th Street. Gary wanted to have sex outside in the woods, and so they did. But during the encounter, Gary became violent, got on top of her, and smothered her face into the ground. Rebecca tried talking to him, but that didn't work. The two began rolling over on the ground, and she managed to flip him over and ran to a nearby trailer for help. The resident was able to calm her down and drove her home.

Rebecca was so terrified of the encounter that she didn't take her to. go to the police right away. This is yet another time when Gary Ridgeway managed to slip through the cracks and escaped a close call. Meanwhile, police were still watching Melvin Foster, even though women were disappearing during this period. So you have to ask the question, how could Foster have been responsible for these crimes if he was constantly under surveillance? was Foster said in 1984, quote, ubiquity being a physical impossibility, I could not be where those girls were. I could not set foot out of my residence without being in direct and clear sight of two King County policemen. So he has somewhat of a good point. But despite this,

police continued to focus on Foster as a suspect, even when another, you know, young woman disappeared during this time. It was 20-year-old Shirley Cheryl. She was last seen in October 1982 when she had lunch with a friend. Her remains were found with Shonda Summers and Denise Bush on June 14, 1985. David Reichert wanted to interview Melvin Foster against the advice of the FBI. The FBI felt that the county should use an older detective. because Foster was 43, 11 years older than Reichert. However, the county let Riker interview him, and it wasn't long before there was friction between investigator and suspect.

Foster later said in an interview that Rikert wanted to, quote, get me in hand-to-hand combat. I sent a message back. Anytime, punk, you ain't old enough to be that bad. He doesn't want to fool with this old bear. So you've got a couple of guys here being macho, So I think the question for me, Morp, is did this 11 year age difference, right, between Melvin Foster and Agent Reichert have anything to do with the animosity? As the FBI thought maybe it would, I think it's very possible.

If Foster is saying, you don't want to mess with this old bear, I get the impression from that that, you know, he's saying this young buck is coming after me. We're just not on the same wavelength. We're in two different generations. But maybe this guy's just confrontational, and maybe it would have happened with a detective that was closer to his age anyway. I don't know. And I think sometimes more thought should be put into who's going to interview a suspect and how they're going to present themselves because it seems like you don't want to be

confrontational, but you want to be in control and you have to walk a fine line there. And that may have been what happened here that those rules went out the window. By the end of 1982, King County Sheriff Bernard Winkowski's 25-member task force had disbanded. And he himself resigned in January 1983. For the next three months, the investigation was under the acting supervision of Chief of operations, Jim Nicol, the county's vice unit returned to normal, and police mistakenly believed that the killings had stopped. But from March 83 until late June, Gary Ridgeway murdered at least 10 more victims, dumping their remains from south of the airport to east of Enum Claw. Between 1983 and 1987, Gary Ridgeway cruised the strip and picked up more sex workers.

He drove different vehicles, including his maroon pickup, and an aquacolored truck owned by his younger brother. On February 23, 1983, county police officers spotted Gary with a sex worker named Kelly McGinnis, who was 18 years old. They were spotted on South 140th Street and 22nd Avenue, and the pair was pulled over. Ridgeway told officers that he and Kelly were on a date and police let them go. Somehow, Ridgeway's luck held up yet again, and he got away without being arrested. On April 30th, 1983, 17-year-old Marie Malvar was last seen by her boyfriend, Robert Woods, getting into a man's pickup truck at a bus stop on South 216th and Pacific Highway South. Marie and the man in the pickup were seen arguing.

And then the truck sped away with Marie still inside. That was the last time Marie was seen alive. Her boyfriend Robert got into his vehicle and chased after the truck. The truck headed north, pulled into a motel parking lot and then headed south. And Robert lost sight of them when the truck turned east on. South 216th Street. Beginning the next day, Robert and Marie's father, Jose Malvar, they drove around the neighborhood looking for this truck and they finally found it on May 4th parked in front of Gary Ridgeway's

home in Des Moines. That same day, Des Moines Police spoke with Gary about the disappearance of Marie Malvar. He denied knowing her. and police let him go. It seems like Gary Ridgway has nine lives when it comes to being let go for all these instances where he's caught in bad situation. Yeah, and I think you see this in quite a few cases where serial killers are able to operate for long periods of time and kill a large number of people.

Gary Ridgeway had to get lucky at points. because he was on radar at different points in time, but either police discounted him, they didn't have enough to, you know, move forward with him, he was able to continue doing what he wanted to do. On June 28, 1983, Kelly McGinnis, who was in Gary Ridgeway's truck a few months earlier when he was pulled over by police, also disappeared. Kelly's parents divorced when she was very young, and she was raised by her mother and stepfather.

At the age of 13, Kelly ran away from home and met her pimp for the first time. Soon after, she began having sex for money. Kelly was last seen leaving the Three Bears Motel in Seattle, located at Interstate 216 and Pacific Highway. Kelly planned to work the area near South 216th Street that night, but she never showed. Her pimp reported her missing two days. days later. Police initially thought Kelly left on her own. She earned a lot of money through her work

and often talked about getting off the streets to live a more respectable life. She told her mother, if she ever left, she would never return. But Kelly had a baby girl who she loved and was devoted to. Before her disappearance, she was arrested and serving a short jail sentence for a prostitution. She had placed her child in foster care temporarily while in jail, but she was looking forward to picking her daughter up after she got out. The baby girl was later adopted by another family. Detectives believed Kelly may have been the victim of the Green River killer, although her body has never been found.

In 1984, 12 more bodies of women were found. That year, Rebecca Gwai finally went to police about her 1982 ordeal. She waited two years because she didn't think anyone would believe her. She named Gary Ridgeway to police specifically. But again, we've talked about it. He is already on police radar and had been since his prostitution arrest in 1982. But even with all that, police were still focused on Melvin Foster. They continued to surveil Melvin Foster well into 1985.

You know, that year Foster put his car up for sale. A plain closed officer from the task force answered Foster's ad and bought the car for $1,200. Detectives inspected every inch of that car for trace evidence, but they didn't find anything. And eventually, after I don't know how many years, morph, Melvin Foster was finally ruled out as a suspect in. And the murders. By January 1986, the total official Green River victim count was 34, but police were optimistic that they would find and arrest the Green River killer. At that time, the Green River Task Force was comprised of 42 local law enforcement officers and 10 additional FBI agents. Additionally, a $200,000 supercomputer started analyzing massive collection of evidence.

Two years prior, Captain Frank Adamson of the King County Sheriff's Office had compiled a list of 45 missing young women from the Seattle area, who detectives believed were possible Green River victims. One of those victims was 16-year-old Mary Exeter West. She was last seen on February 6, 1984. Her remains were found in September, 1985, when hikers unearthed their bones in Seward Park. A few months later, the remains of Denise Bates. Bush and Shirley Cheryl were found. And their names were taken off the missing persons list. By the end of 1986, only 11 women remained on the list. In March 1986, the partial remains of 19-year-old Tracy Winston were found at the base of a tree in Kent Washington's Cottonwood Grove

Park. The park is near the Green River and about a quarter of a mile from Peck Bridge. This is where Wendy Caulfield was found in 1982, Tracy was last seen on September 12, 1983. Her skull was not recovered until November of 2005. This is when a hiker found it near a logging road off highway 18. Then in May of 86, a set of bones was found in a wooded area. The victim was identified as Maureen Sufini, 19 years old, was last seen on September 28, 1983. She was reported missing two days later. She became the Green River killer's 35th confirmed victim. And just a month before her disappearance, Maureen had moved out of her family's home

and into a Seattle apartment. So we've got 35 victims, Morph. And by now, the mainstream news was taking notice. This is a large number of bodies piling up in Washington State. This is the Green River near Seattle, which gave its name to the worst string of unsolved serial murders in U.S. history. Female victims, most prostitutes, all believed killed by the same person. The five bodies of women pulled from the Green River starting in 1982 were only the beginning. With growing disbelief, police in Seattle's King County

eventually tied the murders of 41 women and the disappearance of seven others to the same killer. A serial killer they have never caught. The hardest thing to come to grips with for a lot of us is that this could have occurred here in our community for such a period of time. And as we sit here, that person responsible is yet to be brought to justice. And may be responsible for a lot more murders.

Certainly if someone could kill 40 people, you could kill 60, and I just don't know where it ends. Two sex workers named Don White and Paige Miley told detectives about Gary Ridgeway's strange behavior in 1983, and he was now rising to the top of the Green River suspect list, and it would only be a matter of time before police would close in on him. And we'll get into more of that in the next episode. Yeah, I think we have a lot more, morph to get into in episode two. you know, Gary Ridgeway, and I think we said it up front early on, the number of victims is staggering. You know, when you think about, and what is really a pretty short amount of time, he murdered just an unbelievable number of women. It seemed that sometimes the pace just jumped up and there would be a couple here or a couple there.

and they say that killers get that urge to kill more often. And with Gary Ridgeway, that definitely seem to be the case. And obviously, like we said, there are a number of additional victims to talk about in the next episode, not nearly as many as we've talked about in this episode, but what we will get into, you know, is more of the investigation, the arrest, but more of the mindset of, Gary Ridgeway because, you know, obviously once he's caught, once he's behind bars and starts to talk, additional information comes out. And when we look back at the end of all of these murders, I wonder how many could have been prevented had someone stopped Ridgeway earlier or questioned

him or arrested him if any of these murders could have been prevented. Yeah, that's always a great question. I think you and I will definitely get into that. in this next episode. Thanks for writing and research assistance in this episode. Goes out to Debbie Buck at TruecrimeDiva.com and Kate Morris. If you like the show, go out, take a minute, give us a five-star rating. We appreciate that. It helps people find the show.

And if you want to find us on social media, you can find us on Twitter with the handle at Criminology Pod or look on Facebook. You'll find us by searching for Criminology Podcast. You can also join our Facebook discussion group, Criminology Podcasts, Discussion and Fans. Right. So that is it for part one of the Green River Killer, Gary Ridgeway. We'll be back with you next Saturday night to wrap it up with what we believe would be

the wrap up, right? More of part two. Yeah, I think we'll be able to conclude the coverage and see where the case winds up. So until next Saturday, this is. is Mike Ferguson and Mike Morford talk to you then take care of everyone