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The Name You Don't Know: How Gary Ridgway Killed for Two Decades
Audio is available on Spreaker — see link below.
Gary Ridgway murdered more women than Ted Bundy — in the same state, at the same time — and went home to dinner for nearly twenty years. This is where it started: the Green River, the bodies, and the suspect investigators found in 1983 and let walk away.
Audio is available on Spreaker — see link below.
He murdered more women than Ted Bundy. He operated in the same state, at the same time, targeting the same highways.
On July fifteenth, nineteen eighty-two, a sixteen-year-old named Wendy Lee Coffield was pulled from the Green River in south King County, Washington. She was the first.
The key point here is what investigators had in nineteen eighty-three versus what they needed. They had a witness.
Ridgway wasn't random in his selection. He was deliberate.
In nineteen eighty-four, investigators brought Ridgway in again. By this point the killings attributed to the Green River Killer numbered in the dozens.
Three years later, in nineteen eighty-seven, investigators came back to Ridgway with more force. They obtained a search warrant for his home and vehicle.
In two thousand and one, the King County Sheriff's office partnered with a forensic laboratory to apply advanced DNA analysis to evidence collected back in nineteen eighty-seven. The technology had advanced to a point where the saliva sample taken from Ridgway all those years ago could now be compared against biological evidence recovered from victims.
On June thirteenth, two thousand and three, prosecutors made a decision that divided opinion then and still does. They offered Ridgway a deal.
The official count is forty-eight guilty pleas. The confirmed minimum is forty-nine.
Ted Bundy is taught in criminology courses. He's been the subject of films, documentaries, books, and cultural fascination for forty years.
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