Serial Killers

By Jenny Sychamore

This book portrays few of the most notorious serial killer's the world has ever seen. If you are a fan of real mystery, thriller crime stories then this is the book for you.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Jan 16, 2014
• ISBN: 9781304811325

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Serial Killers

Serial Killers

Jenny Sychamore

Copyrights 2013 Author

All rights reserved

ISBN: 978-1-304-81132-5

Lulu edition, License notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Green River Killer: River of Death

On August 15, 1982, Robert Ainsworth, 41, stepped into his rubber raft and began his descent south down the Green River toward the outer edge of Seattle's city limits. It was a trip he had made on many occasions, yet this time it would be different. As he drifted slowly downstream, he noticed a middle-aged balding man standing by the riverbank and a second, younger man sitting in a nearby pickup truck. Ainsworth suspected that the men were out for a day's fishing.

He asked the older man if he had caught anything. The man replied that he had not. According to Smith and Guillen's book, The Search for the Green River Killer, the man standing then asked Ainsworth if he found anything, to which Ainsworth replied, Just this old singletree. Soon after, the two men left in the old pick-up truck and Ainsworth continued to float down the river. Moments later he found himself surrounded by death.

As he peered into the clear waters his gaze was met by staring eyes. A young black woman's face was floating just beneath the surface of the water, her body swaying beneath her with the current. Believing it might be a mannequin, Ainsworth attempted to snag the figure with a pole. Accidentally, the raft overturned as he tried to dislodge the figure from a rock and Ainsworth fell into the river. To his horror, he realized that the figure was not a mannequin, but a dead woman. Seconds later he saw another floating corpse of a half nude black woman, partially submerged in the water.

Quickly, Ainsworth swam toward the riverbank where the truck stood earlier. In shock, he sat down and waited for help to arrive. Within a half hour, he noticed a man with two children on bicycles. He stopped them, told them of his gruesome discovery and asked them to get the police. Before long, a policeman arrived at the scene and questioned Ainsworth about his find. The officer disbelievingly walked into the shallow river and reached out toward the ghostly form. The officer immediately called for backup.

Soon after reinforcement arrived at the scene, detectives sealed off the area and began a search for evidence. During the search, a detective made another macabre discovery. He found a third body, that of a young girl who was partially clothed. Unlike the other two girls, this one was found in a grassy area less than 30 feet from where the other victims lay in the water. It was obvious that she had died from asphyxiation. The girl had a pair of blue pants knotted around her neck. She also showed signs of a struggle, because she had bruises on her arms and legs. She was later identified as Opal Mills, 16. It was believed that she had been murdered within 24 hours of her discovery.

Following an examination of the bodies at the scene, Chief Medical Examiner Donald Reay determined that all three girls died of strangulation. The two girls found in the water, later identified as Marcia Chapman, 31, and Cynthia Hinds, 17, were both found to have pyramid-shaped rocks lodged in their vaginal cavities. They were both held down by rocks in the water.

Reay further determined that Chapman, a mother of two who had gone missing two weeks earlier, had been dead for over a week. She had shown advanced signs of decomposition. However, Hinds was believed to have been in the river for a period of only several days. 

The three bodies were not the only ones to be found in and around Washington state's Green River. Several days earlier, the body of a woman named Deborah Bonner was discovered. Her nude body had been found slumped over a log in the Green River. She too had been strangled to death.

Just a month earlier, another young girl, identified as Wendy Lee Coffield, was found strangled and floating in the Green River. Moreover, six months prior to Coffield's discovery, the body of her friend Leanne Wilcox was found several miles from the river in an empty lot. It was not believed that the Green River Killer murdered Wilcox, but the opinion of the investigators has been recently challenged.

Within the space of six months, six bodies had been discovered in or near the river. The police detectives at the scene quickly realized that there was a serial killer on the loose. They knew that they had to find and catch him as soon as possible before any more women disappeared.

A special task force was assembled of King County detectives to investigate the Green River murders. According to The Seattle Times, it was the largest police task force ever assembled since the Ted Bundy murders less than a decade earlier. Major Richard Kraske, the head of the Criminal Investigation Division; and Detective Dave Reichert of the King County Major Crime Squad led the team. They enlisted the help of FBI serial killer profiler John Douglas and criminal investigator Bob Keppel, who was known for his unique and successful approach of compiling evidence in the Ted Bundy case eight years earlier.

The investigation got off to a shaky start because a massive influx of information swamped the police force within a relatively short period of time. They simply did not have the means to process the ever-increasing amount of data and evidence and much of it was lost, misplaced or overlooked entirely. In fact, the situation got so bad that at one point they enlisted the help of volunteers to assist the police in the ongoing investigation.

During their investigation, detectives learned that the many of the murdered girls knew each other and shared a similar history of prostitution. Investigators decided to begin their search for the killer in the area where the girls were known to frequent. They conducted hundreds of interviews with many prostitutes who worked the main strip in Seattle, stretching from South 139th Street to South 272nd Street. Investigators tried to obtain information on any suspicious characters they might have encountered. However, many of the girls were reluctant to talk because of their blatant mistrust for the police.     

One of the prostitutes who worked the strip filed a report with police, stating that a man who raped her made reference to the Green River murders. Soon after the report, the task force began to search for the assailant. On August 20, 1982, the police announced that they had him in custody as a potential suspect in the Green River murders. However, they were unable to find any plausible evidence connecting him with the crime. He was eventually released and the search resumed for the killer.

There were other prostitutes who filed reports with the police that were of special concern to the task force. It was believed that the reports could be related to the Green River murders. Interviews taken by two separate prostitutes claimed that a man in a blue and white truck abducted them and attempted to kill them.

According to one account by Susan Widmark, 21, a middle-aged man in a blue and white truck solicited her. Once Widmark was in his truck, he pointed a pistol to her head and sped off toward the highway. He took her to a desolate road, turned off the engine and proceeded to violently rape her.

Following the rape, he allowed her to dress while he began to drive away from the scene with her still in the car. While driving, he made reference to the recent river murders, while continuing to hold a gun to her head. Fearing for her life, she managed to escape from the vehicle while at a stoplight. Widmark was able to make out part of the registration number of the truck before the man sped away.

A similar incident happened to Debra Estes, 15, who filed a report with police in late August 1982, concerning a rape. Estes told police that she was walking down the highway when a man in a blue and white pick-up truck approached her and offered her a ride. She accepted and climbed into the vehicle. To her amazement, the man pulled a pistol out and pointed it at her head. He violently forced her to give him oral sex before releasing her into the woods, handcuffed and driving off. She immediately fled the scene looking for help.

Seeing an emerging pattern that could have been related to the Green River murders, the task force decided to follow the lead and search for the truck and driver. They hoped that new information concerning the man would lead them to a break in the case.

That September, a meat butcher named Charles Clinton Clark was pulled over in his blue and white truck while driving along Seattle's main strip. After a background check was conducted, it was learned that Clark owned two handguns. Investigators believed that Clark might be the man they were looking for. They obtained his driver's license photo and showed it to both Widmark and   Estes. Both women positively identified Clark as their attacker.

Clark was arrested and his house and vehicle were searched. The police found the two handguns that were allegedly used in the assaults. After interrogation by police, Clark admitted to attacking the women. However, there was speculation as to whether he was the Green River Killer because he was known to release his victims following an attack. Moreover, Clark had a solid alibi during the time many of the Green River victims disappeared.

When Clark was being booked with the rape of Widmark and Estes, 19-year-old Mary Bridgett Meehan disappeared during a walk. Meehan was more than eight months pregnant and went missing near the Western Six Motel. The motel was located on the strip and was a frequent hangout and workplace for many of the prostitutes that fell victim to the Green River Killer.

Based on a hunch, Detective Reichert began to suspect that one of the volunteer civilians working on the case might be the Green River Killer. A 44-year-old out-of-work taxi driver became the focus of the investigation and was vigorously interviewed by the police. They were concerned because two weeks prior to Meehan's disappearance, two 16-year-old girls, Kase Ann Lee and Terri Rene Milligan, mysteriously disappeared. They too were thought to have had a history of prostitution. It was suspected that they had fallen victim to the Green River Killer. The taxi driver seemed to fit the profile of the killer devised by FBI agent John Douglas.

According to Douglas, the Green River Killer was a confident, yet impulsive middle-aged man who would most likely frequent the murder scenes, in order to reenact the crimes in his mind. The killer was probably familiar with the area and was likely to have deep religious convictions. Moreover, Douglas believed that he might have an active interest in police work, especially the investigation into the recent murders. The killer might even contact the police in an effort to assist in the ongoing investigation.

During most of the winter of 1982, police heavily monitored the taxi driver's movements, although he continuously denied having anything to do with the Green River murders. The taxi driver eventually became the primary suspect in the killings. He was arrested for unpaid parking tickets, because investigators had no solid evidence connecting him to the murders, except that he knew five of the victims.

On September 26, 1982, the decomposing remains of a 17-year-old prostitute named Gisele A. Lovvorn were discovered. She had gone missing for more than two months before a biker found her nude body near abandoned houses south of the Sea-Tac International Airport. She had been strangled to death by a pair of men's black socks. Intriguingly, at the time of her disappearance, she was blonde. Yet, when her body was discovered her hair was dyed black. Although her body was not found in the direct vicinity of the now infamous river, police believed that she was a victim of the Green River Killer.

Between September 1982 and April 1983, approximately 14 girls disappeared. Those missing included Mary Meehan, Debra Estes, Denise Bush, Shawnda Summers, Shirley Sherrill, Rebecca Marrero, Colleen Brockman, Alma Smith, Delores Williams, Gail Matthews, Andrea Childers, Sandra Gabbert, Kimi-Kai Pitsor and Marie Malvar. Most of the girls, ages ranging from between 15 and 23 years old, were known prostitutes who frequented the strip.

The Green River Task Force's attention was temporarily drawn to one possible suspect, allegedly involved in the disappearance of the last girl to go missing, Marie Malvar. On April 30, 1983, Malvar's boyfriend saw her talking with a potential customer in a dark-colored truck as she was soliciting on the strip. The boyfriend claimed that he saw Malvar get into the truck before it sped away. According to Smith and Guillen, Malvar's boyfriend stated that Malvar and the unknown man seemed to be engaged in an argument.

Suspicious of the driver of the truck, the boyfriend followed them. Before long, the truck with his girlfriend in it gave chase and eventually disappeared when the boyfriend was held up by a stoplight. It was the last time he ever saw his girlfriend. He later notified the police of Malvar's disappearance.

Less than a week after the incident, he, along with Malvar's father and brother, spotted the suspicious truck near the place where he initially lost sight of it days earlier. They followed the truck to a house located on South 348th Street and called the police. The police eventually arrived at the house and spoke with the owner, Gary Ridgway, who denied having ever seen Malvar. Satisfied, the police left the residence and failed to pursue the matter any further.

A similar truck to that owned by Ridgway was also involved in the April disappearance of a young prostitute named Kimi Kai Pitsor. While in the process of turning a trick, Pitsor's pimp saw her getting into a dark green pick-up truck with an attached camper. He described the driver of the vehicle as having a pockmarked face. He watched as the two drove off and he never saw Pitsor again. He later informed police, but the information concerning Pitsor's disappearance and Malvar's