John Wayne Gacy - The Killer Clown

Forget Pennywise, this guy is for real. John Wayne Gacy (1942-1994) was an American serial killer who targeted young men and boys during the 1970s.

John was born in 1942 in Illinois and was the second child to John (1900-1976) a mechanic and Marion (1908-1989) a housewife. As a young boy Gacy was overweight, and had a difficult relationship with his father whom repeatadly abused him. In 1949 Gacy was caught sexually abusing a young girl, also this same year Gacy was being sexually abused himself by a famiy friend.

In the early 60s Gacy landed himself a job as a mortuary assistant, he would regularly climb into the coffins and abuse the bodies. Gacy lasted three months in the job before he went back to the family home. While he was dating his first wife Marlynn,Gacy joined the Jaycees, a training organisation for people between the ages of 18 and 40 to work in business, there he got a male college drunk and made him preform oral sex.

Gacy married Marlynn after 9 months of dating in 1964 and produced two children. Four years later Gacy committed his first known sexual assault against a teenager, a 15 year old boy. Gacy enticed the child to his home with the promise of viewing pornographic material, and piled him with alcohol, before sexually abusing him. In the months that followed Gacy continued to abused you boys under the pretence that it was research into homosexuality and paid them $50 each.

Gacy's 15 year old victim reported his abuse to his father in 1968, whereupon Gacy was arrested and charged with sodomy. Gacy persuaded one of his employees (At one of the three KFC'S gifted to him by his father in law) to attack and threaten the 15 year old into not testifying against him. Gacy promised his employee $300 to go ahead with the attack, the employee lured the 15 year old boy into the woods, maced him and brutally attacked him.

Luckily the young boy managed to escape and inform the police about his attacker. The employee was arrested and subsequently fingered Gacy as the man who ordered the attack. Gacy was then also charged with hiring his employee to intimidate his victim. Later on Gacy was ordered to undergo a psychiatric evaluation, the results stated that Gacy had an antisocial personality disorder, and that he would not benefit from therapy or medicine. However the doctors concluded that he was mentally fit to stand trial.

Gacy pleaded guilty to only one of his charges, however the jury found him guilty on all counts and he was sentenced to 10 years in prision. On his day of conviction Marlynn filed for divorce, the house and custody of their two children. Gacy never saw his first wife or his kids ever again. Gacy was freed from jail in 1970 after serving only 18 months of his 10 year sentence, barely a year later in 1971 he was charged with sexually assaulting a teenage boy. The boy claimed Gacy enticed him into his car, then was driven to Gacy's home, before Gacy attempted to rape him.

The charge against Gacy was dropped when the boy failed to turn up at court. Towards the end of 1971 Gacy became engaged to Carole Hoff, a divorcee with two young daughters. Carole and Gacy briefly had dated at school and she was friends with his sister. Carole and Gacy married in 1972, however a week before the wedding Gacy was arrested and charged with aggravated battery and reckless conduct.

A young man, who made this complaint against him, who informed the policed that Gacy was attempting to impersonate a police officer, lured him into his car, forcing him to preform oral sex. All these charges against Gacy were dropped after it was discovered that the young man attempted to blackmail Gacy in order for the charges to be dropped. Gacy set up his own construction business and hired many young men, in 1973 Gacy travelled with one of his young employees to view a recently purchased property, and raped his young employee in a hotel room.

On return back to Chicago where Gacy was living at the time, the young man whom Gacy had just attacked, proceeded to Gacy's home an attacked him in his yard. Gacy explained to his wife that the young man was refused payment for poor work. In 1975 Gacy became a member of the local clown club and took on the persona of Pogo The Clown also this year Gacy informed his wife that he was bisexual and so began his second divorce.

Unbeknown to the rest of the world and his wife in 1972 Gacy had committed his first murder, the murder of Timothy McCoy, a 16 year old boy whom he abducted from a bus terminal. Timothy was stabbed to death by Gacy and hidden under the crawlspace of the house. In 1974 Gacy murdered his second known victim, estimated to be between the ages of 14 and 18, Gacy stated he strangled this victim.

Around 1975 an 18 year old boy, one of Gacy's employees at the time, John Butkovich disappeared. Previously Gacy had been threatened by John over pay, Gacy admitted strangling John to death and burying beneath the garage. The years 1976 to 1978 is when Gacy was at the peak of his murder spree against young boys, Gacy is estimated to have murdered at least 33 young boys and men before his arrest in 1978. Gacy was tried for his crimes in 1980 and was found guilty on all charges, he was sentenced to death.

Gacy remained on death row for 14 years before he was finally executed in 1994 by lethal injection. Many of Gacy's victims remain unknown and he is estimated to have been responsible for many more unsolved murders. Gacy's sister claimed in later years that her brothers crimes were all to do with bad events in his early life.