America’s Serial Killers – How Many Are There?

by Diane Dimond

It was a small but horrifying item in the Los Angeles Times. “Police are asking for the public’s help in identifying what they call a ‘serious, dangerous serial killer operating in Orange County. Police believe one person is responsible for stabbing three middle-aged homeless men. He is (considered) extremely dangerous to the public.”

Another serial killer, I thought. And then the question: How many serial killers are out there in America?

John Douglas, a former Chief of the FBI’s Elite Serial Crime Unit and author of “Mind Hunter” says, “A very conservative estimate is that there are between 35-50 active serial killers in the United States” at any given time. Often, Douglas told me, they will, “kill 2-3 victims and then have a “cooling-off” period between kills.”

That period can be days and in some cases (such as the BTK Strangler, Dennis Rader, convicted of killing 10 people from 1974 to 1991) even years.”

But others who study serial killers (defined as someone who kills 3 or more people) think there are many more of these demented predators out there than the FBI admits to – maybe as many as a hundred of them actively operating right now.

Why don’t we know the exact figure? Because serial killers are a secretive and often nomadic bunch.

Right before his execution in January 1989 the widely traveled Ted Bundy, described as a charismatic killer, admitted to 30 murders across half a dozen states – from Washington to Florida.

Andrew Cunanan killed at least five people during his wanderings through Minnesota, Illinois, New Jersey and Florida, including fashion designer Gianni Versace in Miami.

The FBI knows death travels and five years ago it set up the Highway Serial Killings Initiative. The bureau reveals it has “a matrix of more than 600 victims and potential suspects in excess of 275.” Since the bodies were found off major highways top suspects are long-haul truckers who may pick up prey in one state and dump the body several states away.

I know this is disturbing to read and you may wonder, “Why should I care? I’m not going to hitchhike at a truck stop!”

Well, realize lots of serial killers stay close to home and their victims are random. The aforementioned Dennis Rader (left) found all his victims in Kansas not far from the Wichita home he shared with his wife and two kids. Rader, the president of his local church, knocked on his victim’s doors and they simply let him in.

John Wayne Gacy, met many of his 33 victims (all young men and boys) at charity events where he appeared dressed a clown. After luring them to his house and murdering them he stuffed them under his Cook County, Illinois home.

Gary Leon Ridgway, the so-called Green River Killer, was convicted of strangling 49 random women he met in Washington. He confessed to killing 71 but authorities believe the number of victims could be over 90.

Jeffrey Dahmer of Milwaukee admitted to killing and cannibalizing 17 young men and boys before he was arrested. Dahmer’s mother, Joyce, once told me her son wished doctors would come study him in prison to help figure out what drove him to do it.

We who write about crime are told that law enforcement nationwide is doing a better job of communicating with each other about suspected serial killers. Indeed, the item I read about the homeless murders was a milestone. In the past, detectives were loath to tell the public about a serial killer on the loose for fear of spooking people. Now, they’ve come to realize that knowledge is power and citizen’s information can be a huge help in solving crimes.

Hardly a state in the union hasn’t had a serial killer. California, Texas and Florida seem to have more than their fair share. And mass graves have been found all around the country. Two examples: The 11 bodies of young women and an infant found on the isolated West Mesa outside Albuquerque. And, an eerily similar case thousands of miles away in Long Island, New York where authorities unearthed 10 bodies – eight women and a toddler along with a man dressed in women’s clothes.

These are among the serial killer dumping grounds that have been found. Many others may go undetected forever.

The best thing we can do is be vigilant. Know that many victims of serial killers put themselves in harm’s way. Most are women who have some contact with the sex trade or illegal drug underworld and if they have children they are in grave danger too.

Dr. Maurice Godwin has studied serial killers for years and one in-depth analysis of 107 of them revealed important information. Godwin found 55% of serial killers began having trouble in childhood and had criminal juvenile records. 45% had been convicted for a previous sex crime. As with so many criminals it goes back to their early formative years and the best lesson we can learn is that when we find a troubled child we best help them. Failure to do so could result in another serial killer walking among us.

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Murder By Numbers

By Susan Murphy-Milano

Over the summer of 1976, friends and acquaintances from the neighborhood gathered one last time before returning for our final year of high school. Several of us sat around a bonfire talking about our plans for the future. I was working as a cashier at a drug store in the neighborhood trying to save money for college and my first apartment. Greg Godzik, who was 17 at the time, spoke of what he was going to do with great conviction. “I’m going to go into the Navy and then apply to aviation school. I want to work on airplanes.” Then Greg boasted that he'd landed a job at a construction outfit called PDM Contractors because he didn't mind doing the odd jobs that his boss required such as heavy lifting and cleaning work. The money was good, and he needed parts for his rusted-out 1966 Pontiac.


Greg had grown up and matured into a responsible young adult. I would see him in the hallway at school every so often , or he would stop in by the drug store where I worked as a cashier from time to time with his employer, John Wayne Gacy, for cans of soda and chips. Greg looked fantastic.

After the Thanksgiving holiday a group including Greg made plans to ring in the New Year in the basement of a friend’s house.


Fourteen days before Christmas there was a small blurb in the neighborhood newspaper that Greg had disappeared and police found his car abandoned in a nearby Chicago suburb. Something was terribly wrong. Greg lived and breathed for that car. He treated like it was his baby. There was no way in hell he would have just left it. News of Greg’s disappearance was all anyone could talk about at school. Detectives interviewed kids, asking if they knew where he could have gone. I learned a month earlier Greg had taken the exam for the Navy and planned to go immediately after graduation.


Months passed without a word. From time to time a story would be written offering a reward and asking the public’s help with any information that could direct authorities to the missing young man.


 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 Chicago police detectives 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 or asphyxiated them.

On December 30, 1978, a dozen of us from the neighborhood gathered across the street from the home of serial killer John Wayne Gacy. One by one we each began to cry, silently. I wanted to ask if anyone knew what number they marked Greg’s body, but I was paralyzed by the horror of the makeshift grave markers. The police marked each body recovered by number (photo left).  A total of 29 bodies were unearthed on the property. Four more were discovered in a nearby river.


Greg Godzik's murder will be forever associated with the worst serial killer in history. But for those of us who knew Greg, the image we will always remember is of him driving his 1966 rusted-out Pontiac around the neighborhood or racing on a Saturday night against someone from another part of town on an old dirt road.


John Wayne Gacy was convicted of 33 murders of mostly teenage boys. He was sentenced to death for only 12 of the murders (12 proved to have been committed after Illinois had passed post-Furman death penalty), and he was sentenced to natural life in prison for the others.
 

Gacy was executed May 10, 1994 by lethal injection.

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