John Wayne Gacy Junior

John Wayne Gacy Junior was no ordinary man. He was born in Chicago, Illinois he was the second of three children (Amirante). He was married twice during his lifetime and divorced both times. He had two kids with his first wife that he never saw again after the divorce. He started his own company and was a clown as a side job, which was part of his numerous clubs that he was in (Amirante). During a three year time period, he viciously murdered and raped over thirty boys and hid them under his house and in the local river. This is the life of John Wayne Gacy Junior John was born on St. Patrick’s Day in 1942, two years after his older sister, Joanne. John Jr. and his family grew up with an abusive father, John Stanly Gacy (Amirante). He watched his father continuously abuse his mother, Marion Elaine Gacy and two sisters Joanne and Karen. He also got physically abused along with verbally. His father would often tell him that he was a “sissy” or a “mama’s boy” and that he was a failure.

Throughout John’s childhood he sought for his father’s approval, but seldom did he get it (Amirante). Him and his two sisters attended Catholic schools in the north side of Chicago; at this time John worked a series of jobs. Among his jobs were newspaper routs and a grocery store bag boy positions (Mills). Plus he was part of the boy scouts throughout grade school. John attended four different high schools in his adolescence and dropped out of everyone (Amirante). In school John never got along with the other kids but his teachers and coworkers always seemed to favor him (Belle). When John was eleven he was hit in the head with a swing by one of his classmates; after the incident he started to suffer blackouts. His father thought it was a way to get attention and never had much sympathy towards John (Amirante). Finally at the age of sixteen John got the help he was searching for; the doctor figured it was a blood clot and prescribed him medicine to dissolve the clot. But that was not the end of his medical problems (Belle). When he was seventeen, Gacy was diagnosed with non-specific heart ailment. He often experienced chest pains that throughout his life hospitalized him but he eventually learned how to carry on his life just fine. (Belle). At the age of twenty, after an argument with his father, John left home, dropping out of high school and went to Los Vegas (Amirante). In Los Vegan he worked as a janitor in a mortuary for three years, but was always disappointed that he could not get a more decent job.

He eventually saved up enough money to leave Los Vegas and move back to Chicago to his awaiting mother and sisters (Belle). His father had died while he was in Los Vegas and although John was abused by him as a kid he regretted never being able to attain a close relationship (Amirante). He finally completed school at Northwestern Business College. After graduation he got a management trainee position with the Nunn-Bush Shoe Company. He did so well the company transferred him to Springfield, Illinois in 1964 to work as a salesman in a men’s clothing outlet (Mills). That same year he met and married his wife, Marlynn Myers (Amirante). Shortly after his marriage he was promoted to manager of his department. At this time Gacy started to get more involved in local Springfield organizations: 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, Chi Rho Club where he was membership chairman, the Holy Name Society where he was named an officer and the Jaycees (The United States Junior Chamber) where Gacy devoted most of his time.

It was obvious to everyone that Gacy took his involvement in the community very seriously and many saw him as an ambitious man eager to make a name for himself (Belle). He eventually became first vice-president and “Man of the Year” (Gacy). In 1965 his father-in-law, Fred W. Myers, offered him a position at one of his Kentucky Fried Chicken franchises in Waterloo, Iowa. John accepted the poison and him and his wife Marlynn moved to Iowa. Gacy was heavily involved with work and it was not rare for him to work twelve to fourteen hour days. He was always enthusiastic and eager to learn with hopes of one day taking over one of his father-in-law’s chains (Mills). When John was not working he spent his time preforming volunteer work for his community through the Jaycees (Belle). It was there John devoted all of his free time and made most of his friends. To some people it seemed that this club was Gacy’s whole life. Shortly after John and Marlynn’s move to Iowa Marlynn gave birth to a baby boy, Michael (Belle). About a year later was the birth of their daughter, Christine. Their family had every reason to be happy those first couple years in Iowa, with their new baby, Marlynn as a stay at home mother and John keeping busy with work. Everything seemed to be going well until John got too involved with the local Jaycees and started his second life (Belle).

There was a more corrupt side to Jaycees that not a lot of people were aware of; it involved prostitution, drugs, wife swapping and pornography (Belle). John became extremely involved with these activities and regularly cheated on his wife (Gacy). Rumors started to spread around town about John’s sexuality. There were multiple rumors spreading about Gacy being a homosexual (Mills). He was always surrounded by young boys through work and Jaycees. There said to be a “club” that Gacy opened in the basement where he allowed boys working under him to come and drink alcohol (Mills). He would then make sexual passes at them. These rumors were all just gossip until May of 1968 (Taylor). Mark Miller was the first boy to speak out against Gacy. Mark claimed that Gacy had tricked him into being tied up and preformed statutory sodomy (Gacy). Gacy denied all charges against him and said that Miller willingly had sex with him for money. He also claimed that he was set up by the Jaycee members that opposed of him becoming president (Mills). The case was dropped due to lack of evidence. Gacy was off the hook for now, but this still did not stop his homosexual acts (Belle). In 1968 two local boys accused Gacy of sexually assaulting them.

Gacy continued to plead his innocence; he offered three hundred dollars to a local youth to physically assault one of his accusers in an effort to try to discourage them from testifying against him. He had the youth spray mace in his accuser’s eyes before beating him (Mills). The accuser fought back and ran to safety. The youth was caught and confessed about Gacy’s offer (Belle). Gacy was arrested and ordered to undergo psychiatric evaluation. Upon evaluation, he was found to be mentally capable but an antisocial person. The doctors determined that there would be no beneficial medical treatment and that he was mentally competent to stand trial (Amirante). At age twenty-six in December of 1968, Gacy was convicted of sodomy and sentenced to ten years in the Anamosa State Penitentiary, the whole time pleading guilty (Belle). After the sentence his wife filed for divorce on the grounds that he had broken his wedding vows. Gacy never saw his first wife or children again (Amirante). In prison Gacy rose to the position head chef and supervised several projects done by an all inmate Jaycee group.

He completed sixteen high school courses and oversaw the instillation of a miniature golf course in the recreational center (Amirante). Overall Gacy was an ideal prisoner and applied for early release twice and on the second try it was accepted (Belle). He was let out June 1970 with a twelve month parole, having only completed eighteen months of his ten year sentence (Taylor). After he got out he moved back to his home town, Chicago, to live with his mother (Gacy). Gacy immediately began to put his life back together; he got a job at a local restaurant and after four months he saved up enough money to move out. He moved right outside of Chicago in a two bedroom home in Norwood Park. He only paid for half of the home, the other half his mother and sisters paid for (Amirante). Gacy had no problem making new friends around the neighborhood. He often invited his closest neighbors over for drinks or games of poker, them never suspecting anything from his past (Mills). Although his neighbors did often complain of the stench that always came from Gacy’s home Gacy always reassured them that it was just mold (Belle). Everything seemed to be going well until Gacy was charged with disorderly conduct.

The boy charging him said Gacy picked him up from a bus station and had attempted to force him into sex (Amirante). All charges were dropped when the boy failed to show up to court. This incident would have violated conditions of his parole but the Iowa Bored of Parole was never updated about this event (Taylor). June 1972 John married Carole Hoff, who was aware of all his crimes but believed he had changed. After the marriage his new wife and two new step daughters moved into Gacy’s home. Gacy quit his job and started up a new company called the PMD (Painting, decorating, and maintenance) Contractors. His company did really well for itself and eventually the annual turnover would gross over 200,000 dollars (Amirante). All of John’s employees were young teenage boys but he justified it by saying it helped keep the cost down. However, Gacy was always trying to get with the boys and his homosexual desire made his marriage drift (Gacy).

At one point Gacy told his wife that he no longer wanted to have sexual relations with her because he was bisexual (Mills). Gacy started to spend most nights away from home coming home at early hours of the morning and his excuse was work based. He starting spending numerous amounts of hours in the garage or he would be fixing something on the outside of the house (Amirante). Carole became more suspicious of his actions and started to keep a closer eye on him. She noticed John bringing young boys into the garage and found magazines of young boys around the house (Belle). When she confronted him about it he acted nonchalantly and told her he preferred boys to women (Mills). By 1975 Gacy and his wife were no longer having sexual relations and Gacy’s mood change conflicted with their lives (Gacy). He often threw furniture out of anger and his lack of sleep seemed to make problems worse. Carole filed for divorce by mutual consent in March 1976 (Mills). Gacy’s marital problems did not keep him down, politics was his next big interest and he hoped to one day run for public office (Amirante). He became more active in his community; he joined the local Moose Club where he became aware of the Jolly Joker Clown Club. The member of the club dressed as clowns and would perform at fundraising events and volunteer at local hospitals. His character was called “Pogo the Clown” he designed his own costume and learned how to apply clown makeup on himself (Gacy). His rise in politics was short lived after rumors started to spread about his homosexual interest in young boys (Amirante).

A young boy named Tony was one of Gacy’s victims that worked for him. Tony was one of the few that made it out alive after a sexual encounter with Gacy. He fought his way free with a chair and when Gacy told him to put on handcuffs he put them on loose enough so that his hands could slide free (Mills). After Gacy thought they were on Tony took off the cuffs, wrestled Gacy to the ground and out the cuffs on him. Tony took the handcuffs off after Gacy promised to leave him alone. Gacy never touched him again and Tony continued to work for him up to a year after the incident (Amirante). January 1972 Gacy picked up a fifteen year old boy name Timothy, from the Greyhound bus terminal in Chicago. Gacy promised the boy a sightseeing tour of Chicago, a place to stay for the night and to be driven back to the station in time to catch his bus. Timothy accepted his offer and hopped into Gacy’s car. Gacy did was he promised and took him on a tour of Chicago and then brought him back to his home where he spent the night (Amirante).

Gacy later explained that he woke up to Timothy standing in the doorway holding up a kitchen knife, Gacy claimed he mistakenly took it as a threat and to defend himself he twisted the knife from Timothy’s wrist and banged his head against the wall. Timothy tried to fight back so Gacy repeatedly stabbed him in the stomach. After it was too late Gacy realized Timothy was only making breakfast for them and the knife was meant to be no threat (Amirante). Gacy buried Timothy in his crawl place and later on covered the area with concrete. Timothy was definitely not the only boy to be buried under Gacy’s home (Taylor). Seventeen year old Johnny Butkovich worked for Gacy and did not mind doing the odd tasks Gacy asked of him. Gacy and Butkovich had a very close, nonsexual, relationship. But that ended suddenly when Gacy refused to pay Butkovich two weeks of work. Gacy often did this to his employees to save him money (Mills). Butkovich later went over to Gacy’s with two of his friends in hope to get his paycheck.

But still Gacy refused to give in and shortly after Butkovich and his two friends realized Gacy was not going to give in they left. Butkovich dropped his two friends off at their homes and drove away to never be seen alive again. This was not uncommon for Gacy to kill his young employees he often would rape and torture them before he killed them. He started to kill more rapidly and carelessly which caused him problems down the road (Taylor). The first link was Gregory Godzik. He worked for Gacy only three weeks before he became missing in action. Before Gregory disappeared he told his family about the kind of work he did with Gacy. He told them about the trenches Gacy would have him dig for some kind of drain system under his house in the crawl space. After Gregory’s disappearance his family contacted Gacy in hope of any information about their missing son (Belle). Gacy suggested that Gregory simply ran away from home (Amirante). The family always suspected Gacy had something to do with it but could not prove it was him until later. Incidents like these happened over twenty times until Gacy really messed up on keeping his second life a secret (Belle).

Robert Piest was fifteen when Gacy offered him a job. Robert was at the pharmacy and told his mom he would be right back after talking to a contractor who offered him a job (Belle). After some time passed Robert’s mother began to worry, she began searching outside and around the pharmacy but Robert was nowhere to be found. Ms. Piest filed a missing person report to the Des Plaines Police Department. Lieutenant Joseph Kozenczak was lead on the investigation. They found out the name of the contractor who lured Robert outside in promise of a job (Amirante). The Lieutenant went to Gacy’s house and asked him to come with him to the police department (Belle). Gacy said he was unable to leave his home at that time and showed up at the police station several hours later (Cox). Kozenczak ran a background check on Gacy and found out what he had served time for in prison. He obtained a search warrant for Gacy’s home and it was December 1978 when police entered (Amirante).

There they found a drivers license and a class ring that belonged to the missing boys. They found drugs, sex toys, rope, handcuffs and many more abnormal objects. It was upon further investigation that they found the dead bodies in his crawl space and had solid proof of what Gacy had done. Most of the bodies had nylon rope around their necks from Gacy strangling them, this would cause them to convulse on the ground for over two hours before they finally died (Taylor). Gacy eventually confessed to police that since 1972 he had committed over twenty murders (Cox). He was brought to trial February 1980 where he pled not guilty by reason of insanity. But over three hundred hours spent with doctors proved him sane and fully in control with his actions. Gacy was taken to the Menard Correctional Center in Chester, Illinois, where he spent a total of fourteen years on death row.

In prison Gacy started to paint and read numerous amounts of books on law (Amirante). In the summer of 1984 his execution date was set (Cox). He was to get the lethal injection on the morning of May ninth 1994. Gacy got to spend his last day with his family at a private picnic surrounded by guards. Gacy was taken to execution room where he sat for eighteen minutes before he drew his last breath. There were over one thousand people gathered outside to witness his execution. In the end Gacy was not sorry for the crimes that he committed and showed no remorse towards the families that he damaged forever. Gacy Wayne Gacy Junior died on May 10, 1994 at 12:58 in the morning. His final words were “kiss my ass.”