Running Head: The Capture of the Green River Killer
Marie Sturm
The Capture of the Green River Killer
PSY 2300 – Abnormal Psychology
Spring 2012
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Movie summary
The movie “The Capture of the Green River Killer” was based on the true story of Sheriff
David Reichert’s almost twenty year long search for the man responsible for the rash of killings
in Washington State starting in 1982.
The story was told through the eyes of a young girl. It depicted her struggles at home
with her single mother, her leaving home, her life on the streets, and how she became a victim of
the Green River killer. She poses the question of whether it is fate, luck or choices that shape our
lives. Was it fate for David Reichert to get this case? He had been told he had to sit at the desk
and answer the phone and that he would only get a case if he answered the call, but not to count
on it because the phones had been pretty slow.
When a call came in on August 12, 1982 reporting that a body had been found in the
Green River, David was the officer that answered. While he was at the crime scene, he heard
someone say it was, “Just like the other one last month down by Peck Bridge.” The victims were
both prostitutes. Then on August 15 the bodies of three more prostitutes were found in the river.
There was no doubt now. They were after a serial killer.
The movie followed the investigation as the bodies piled up and leads fell through. Men
were hauled in, questioned and let go. Men were given polygraph tests and let go. Gary
Ridgeway was looked at several times. He even passed the polygraph test. They could not find
anything to tie anyone to the murders.
In 1984 an anonymous letter came in giving clues about the killer and information about
the murders that had not been made public. David Reichert thought it was written by the killer,
but the FBI said it was just someone trying to get attention and was not really connected to the
murders.
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Ted Bundy offered to give them some help. They interviewed him on November 16,
1984. The FBI had a profile that they thought the killer should fit, but Ted Bundy said to throw
the profile out. The killer was able to keep killing because he did not fit the profile. The FBI
thought the killer wanted to get caught, but Ted Bundy said he doesn’t want to get caught, it was
personal to him, he needed to be able to kill.
In June 1985 bones from two different bodies were found in Oregon, so they thought the
killer was moving, and the FBI took over the case. Soon the FBI thought they had found the
killer. He fit the profile to a tee. They brought in Albert Greenwall. They told all the newspapers
that they had caught the killer. They had a big celebration party. It turned out not to be him, and
he sued. It cost the county so much that they had to cut down the size of the task force.
In February 1985 Joe Jakes, one of their suspects, hanged himself surrounded by nude
photos, so they assumed that he was the killer. David Reichert did not believe he was the killer
and kept looking. When they found a body that they could prove was killed after Joe Jakes death
he knew he was right.
In December 1988 they did a TV show asking people to call in to a live call line if they
knew anything. They got thousands of leads that led nowhere. The killings seemed to have
stopped, and they had nothing to go on, so the task force was reduced to just two officers in June
1987.
David had always believed there must have been one girl who got away. While going
back through tips, he found an interview of a girl who said she had gotten away and scratched
the killer’s forearm. She had been attacked just before David had gone to Gary Ridgeway’s
house following a lead. David remembered Gary rolling down his sleeves to cover his arms. At
the time he didn’t think anything of it. Now David pulled Gary’s medical records and found
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Gary had gone to the emergency room right after they had left him, saying he had accidently
spilled battery acid on his forearm.
David found Gary’s second ex-wife, who told of Gary coming home late all wet and
muddy, but would not say what he had been doing. She did know that he had been picking up
prostitutes. She divorced him in 1980. In 1982 he was picked up for soliciting, which made him
mad. That was also about the time the killings started. Reichert checked Gary’s phone records.
Gary had called Reichert’s home the night of the TV program when they asked people to call
into a live call in line. All of it fit, but they still did not have any evidence that could tie Gary to
any of the bodies. Until they did, they couldn’t charge him.
In March 1990 David was taken off of the task force because he was promoted. In 2001
DNA testing had finally advanced enough to be accurate. They ran tests on samples found on
three of the victim’s bodies, and compared it to Gary’s DNA, they were a perfect match.
On November 30, 2001, when Gary was arrested, he was emotionless, like it was an
everyday occurrence. His Lawyer mounted a credible defense saying that the DNA was too old
and disintegrated. David was worried that Gary would walk. He did more research, and found
that they could identify brands of paint just like fingerprints. They matched paint specks found
on the clothes of three of the victims to the spray paint that Gary used in his job. They had him.
In June 2003 an agreement was made between Gary and King County giving Gary life
without parole in exchange for giving a full disclosure of his crimes, information on how he did
it and got away with it, who he killed and where the bodies were hidden. Gary was sentenced to
48 life sentences to be served consecutively.
DSM-IV-TR Diagnosis
Gary Ridgway
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AXIS I
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Code: v61.21; v61.21; v62.83; v62.83; 302.9
Physical Abuse of a Child, Sexual Abuse of a Child; Physical Abuse of an
Adult; Sexual Abuse of an Adult; Paraphilia Not Otherwise Specified
(necrophilia)
AXIS II Code: 301.7
Antisocial Personality Disorder (principle diagnosis)
AXIS III Code: None
AXIS IV Code: None
AXIS V GAF: 5
Justification of Diagnosis
I will talk about the principle diagnosis, Antisocial Personality Disorder, first. The
defining feature of antisocial is the pervasive disregard for and violation of the rights of others.
Clearly anyone who murders someone has disregarded for and violated that person’s rights. Gary
showed this in the movie as well. When they interviewed him, they asked how he got away with
it. He said, “It was easy, my appearance was different than what I was.” He laughed and said, “ It
was like candy in a dish. They’re trash, just trash, they didn’t mean nothing to me.” When he was
asked if he ever had sex with them after they were dead, he said, “Only ten or so,” then
shrugged, “it was free! Why not?” This shows that he had no regard for them and thought
nothing of violating their rights. He did not even think about them even having rights.
He clearly failed to conform to social norms with respect to lawful behaviors by
repeatedly picking up prostitutes and by repeatedly killing the prostitutes.
He was deceitful. Hiding dead bodies is certainly deceitful. He also was deceitful to the
girls in order to get them to go with him. In the interview he said about a body he had staged, “I
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put the trout and stuff on that one girl to throw you guys off.” He laughed and added, “Your
expert said it was the last supper, that you were looking for a deeply religious guy. I had you all
fooled.” That sounds pretty deceitful. When asked about the women, he said he especially had
them all fooled saying, “I never picked them up at the curb where they worked. Too many
witnesses. I waited for them to approach me. Sometimes they would ask me if I was the Green
River killer. ‘Do I look like the Green River killer to you?’ I would ask. I always tried to put the
women at ease. I would offer them a beer, a job, money, and if that didn’t work, I would show
them a picture of my son. That always worked. One time I even took him with me.” I would say
he spent a lot of time deceiving others for his personal pleasure and profit.
He wasn’t very impulsive, and he did lots of planning. If he had not planned so well, he
would not have been able to get away with it for so long.
In his everyday life he wasn’t irritable or aggressive, but it was very aggressive to kill so
many women.
By killing all of those women he showed reckless disregard for the safety of others.
He did not show any consistent irresponsibility. This is where he did not fit the profile
that the FBI thought he would. He held the same job for thirty years. He was married and had a
son. He met all of his financial obligations. Most antisocials tend to smoke, drink and/or use
drugs, and are often loners. Gary did none of these.
He showed no remorse. He was very indifferent. At one point in the interview he started
to cry. He was asked why was he crying now, all these years after killing those women. He said,
“Because of how I screwed up. I screwed up killing them, leaving too much evidence.” He
showed no remorse for killing them, just remorse that he did not do a better job of getting away
with it.
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He was well over 18. As for having Conduct Disorder, the movie did not show enough to
be able to say. It did show him stabbing a boy when he was 16. It also showed a scene of him
still wetting the bed at age 13, which is not part of the criteria for Conduct Disorder, but it does
violate the age-appropriate social norms. Many of these kids do wet and poop their pants for
many years, because they just do not care to be responsible in that way, and they do not care
what others think about them. They are lazy. They do not want to get up and go to the bathroom.
It is easier to lay there and wet themselves and make mom take care of it later.
The occurrence of antisocial behavior in Gary was not during the course of Schizophrenia
or a Manic Episode. He did not have any of those.
On AXIS I, I have Physical Abuse of a Child, because some of the girls were as young as
13 and possibly as young as 10. Killing them is about as abusive as you can get. I have Sexual
Abuse of a Child, because he had sex with most of the girls before he killed them and some after
he killed them. Sex with any child is sex abuse. I put Physical Abuse of Adult, because killing
these women is about as abusive as you can get. As for Sexual Abuse of Adult, we don’t know
for sure if he coerced all of these women. He said he tried to put them at ease and make them
comfortable. They were prostitutes, so they may have agreed to the sex, but I got the idea that
not all of them did, and those who didn’t he forced. Concerning the Paraphilia Not Otherwise
Specified, he did admit to having sex with at least 10 or so of his victims after they were dead,
but it wasn’t because dead bodies turned him on, or that he was looking and wanting to have sex
with dead bodies. It was more of why not? They are there, and it was free!
I did not find anything in AXIS III or AXIS IV. I gave him a GAF score of 5, because he
is an extreme risk to the safety of others, after all, he did admit to the killing of 70 or more
women. He does not remember for sure how many.
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Film Accuracy
I believe the film did a very good job of portraying the disorder. The actor did a great job
of showing the very matter-of-fact way people with antisocial act about their crimes and the way
they really don’t see what is wrong with what they did. He thought he was doing us all a big
favor by getting rid of all those prostitutes. The film did a good job of showing how antisocials
will go to great lengths to keep from getting caught, like Gary pouring battery acid on his arm to
hide the scratches from the girl that got away. I thought the interview with Gary was very well
done. The movie did an excellent job of showing the antisocial attitude with the lack of remorse,
except for getting caught and doing such a bad job that he left too much evidence for others to
find. You can be told about people like this and read the criteria in the DSM, but until you really
see someone like this, you don’t really understand. It is so hard to imagine that people can really
be like this, that even when you see it, you do not want to believe it, so you find some way to
explain it away. This film did an excellent job of showing what an antisocial is really like.