John Wayne Gacy

John Wayne Gacy March 17 1942 May 10 1994 was an American serial killer and pederast who raped tortured and murdered at least 33 young men and boys Gacy regularly performed at childrens hospitals and charitable events as Pogo the Clown or Patches the Clown personas he had devised He became known as the Killer Clown due to his public services as a clown prior to the discovery of his crimes Gacy committed all of his murders inside his ranch house near Norridge a village in Norwood Park Township metropolitan Chicago Illinois Typically he would lure a victim to his home and dupe him into donning handcuffs on the pretext of demonstrating a magic trick He would then rape and torture his captive before killing him by either asphyxiation or strangulation with a garrote Twentysix victims were buried in the crawl space of his home and three others were buried elsewhere on his property four were discarded in the Des Plaines River Gacy was convicted of the sodomy of a teenage boy in Waterloo Iowa in 1968 and was sentenced to ten years imprisonment but served eighteen months He murdered his first victim in 1972 had murdered twice more by the end of 1975 and murdered at least thirty subsequent victims after his divorce from his second wife in 1976 The investigation into the disappearance of Des Plaines teenager Robert Piest led to Gacys arrest on December 21 1978 His conviction for thirtythree murders by one individual then covered the most homicides in United States legal history Gacy was sentenced to death on March 13 1980 On death row at Menard Correctional Center he spent much of his time painting He was executed by lethal injection at Stateville Correctional Center on May 10 1994