Serial Killers and Mass Murderers Project

SERIAL KILLERS AND MASS MURDERERS PROJECT 1
Serial Killers and Mass Murderers Project
Student’s Name
Institution Affiliate
Date

SERIAL KILLERS AND MASS MURDERERS PROJECT 2
Describe the killer’s background, methods, and Area of operations.
Summarize the case: period, location, number of victims, etc
The Background of Gary Ridgway
Gary Ridgway was also known as the Green River Killer. He was involved in the unusual
killing for 20-years.He therefore became one of the individuals who murdered numerous people
across the world in the history of US (Wiest, 2016). The DNA evidence made Ridgway to be
caught and convicted in the long run. In his childhood, he had sexual attraction to his mother.
While in schooling, Ridgway always came last in class .It can be concluded therefore that he had
a low I.Q which was below average of 8.2. At his younger age of 16, he took a 6-year- old boy
into the woods where he stabbed him. After completion of high school at the age of 20, he made
an effort to join the Navy. During his military service, Ridgway had an insatiable sex desire, and
this drove him to have more sexual intercourse with many prostitutes.
He began killing people in 1982 where the first victim body was located in Green River
in King County. The body of the victim was found to be Wendy Lee, whom he made to suffer
before he took the body and tossed into the river. He therefore ended the boy’s life even before
he enjoyed much of life. Her murder remained unsolved because there was insufficient evidence
to give weight to the case (Moulton, 2016). Most of the victims were the prostitutes who were
murdered brutally in the hotels and bars. This was the most wonderful place for Gray Ridgway to
solve his problem of insatiable sex. The most murders done by Ridgway occurred in 1982 to
1984.
During that time there was a continuing report of women and young girls disappearing.
Around Sea-Tac Airport and woods along the river was regular for the discovery of skeletons.
The most victims were found necked having been, sexually abused .Such victims were of the age

SERIAL KILLERS AND MASS MURDERERS PROJECT 3
ranging 12 to 31. This led to the formation of the Green River Task Force to investigate the
murders, and the suspect list grew. The task force relied on the old-fashioned police work to
piece together a profile since DNA, and sophisticated computer systems were not around during
the early 1980s (Earle, 2017).
The case was different in 2001 when the task force which was made up of detectives who were
young knowledge of computers as well as the knowledge about DNA research. The previous task
force had preserved DNA evidence which was inadequate enough to arrest the killer. Ridgway
was arrested later in 2001 and charged for murdering a 20 year old boy. The evidence was found
to be the DNA which matched that of Gary Ridgway and other victims (Murray, 2017). Gary
Ridgway confessed killing 61 women and other 71 women, but he could only 48 victims of
which he admitted to have done in King County.
Determine which of the theories from Week 2 relate to this killer and show why you made this
determination.
The MacDonald Triad theory
The theory states that there are typically three common characters depicted among
children which is associated with murder. The theory categorizes them as bed wetting past the
age of five, five setting and animal cruelty. Such behaviors were observed to be frequent in most
aggressive and sadistic patients. It is usually under rare occasion that the offenders exhibit all of
the three behaviors in their past. In the case of Gary Ridgway, it is true to relate him to this
theory of MacDonald Triad since in his childhood, Gary had formed a habit of being attracted
sexually attracted to the mother. Again while at the age of 16 years, he captured a young boy of 6
years old whom he later killed by stabbing him. MacDonald Triad theory which states the
characters of bed wetting and animal cruelty.