Honestly, if you look at the old photos of John Wayne Gacy—the ones where he’s not in the "Pogo the Clown" makeup—he looks like every guy’s loud-talking uncle. He’s got that 1970s suburban dad energy. He was a precinct captain, a business owner, and a guy who once shook hands with First Lady Rosalynn Carter. That’s the part that still messes with people's heads. We want our monsters to look like monsters. We don’t want them to be the guy hosting the neighborhood fish fry.
But beneath the floorboards of his ranch house at 8213 West Summerdale Avenue in Norwood Park Township, the reality was different. Way different. Between 1972 and 1978, Gacy systematically murdered at least 33 young men and boys. Most were buried in a cramped, muddy crawl space right under his feet.
Even now, in 2026, we’re still untangling the mess he left behind. Investigators are still using modern DNA tech to put names to the few remaining unidentified victims. It's a grim, slow process.
The Myth of the "Killer Clown"
Whenever people talk about John Wayne Gacy, they immediately jump to the clown thing. It’s a great headline, right? "The Killer Clown." But if you talk to the investigators who actually lived the case, like the late Joseph Kozenczak of the Des Plaines Police, they’ll tell you the clown persona was mostly a distraction.
Gacy didn't kill while dressed as a clown.
He used the Pogo and Patches characters to perform at children’s hospitals and block parties. It gave him a shield of "good guy" social capital. It made him look untouchable. He was a "Jaycee of the Year" in Iowa before his first sodomy conviction in 1968. That's the real terror: he was a high-functioning psychopath who used community service as a camouflage.
Most of his victims weren't lured by a clown; they were lured by a job offer. Gacy ran PDM Contracting. He’d find young guys—teenagers looking for extra cash—and offer them $5.00 or $7.00 an hour, which was decent money back then. He’d get them to his house, talk about a "magic trick" involving handcuffs, and once they were clicked shut, the trap was sprung.
Why 1978 Changed Everything
For years, Gacy slipped through the cracks. He was actually under surveillance multiple times. He even had a previous record in Iowa for sexual assault, but he was paroled after only 18 months. He moved back to Chicago and basically just... started over.
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The end began with a 15-year-old named Robert Piest.
Piest disappeared on December 11, 1978, after telling his mother he was going to talk to a contractor about a job. That contractor was Gacy. Unlike many of Gacy's previous victims—some of whom were runaways or "street kids" the police often ignored in the 70s—Piest was a "straight-A" kid with a family that wouldn't stop pushing.
The Des Plaines police didn't blink. They stayed on Gacy. They sat outside his house 24/7. They followed him to dinner. Gacy, being the arrogant guy he was, actually invited the officers into his house for coffee while they were supposed to be watching him.
Big mistake.
The officers noticed a smell. A thick, sweet, "rotten meat" smell that Gacy claimed was a sewer backup. On December 21, 1978, they came back with a second search warrant and started digging in that crawl space.
The Numbers and the Nameless
Thirty-three. That’s the official count.
- 26 victims were found in the crawl space.
- 3 were buried elsewhere on the property.
- 4 were tossed into the Des Plaines River because he "ran out of room."
The recovery process was a nightmare. Forensic anthropologists had to crawl through mud and lime—Gacy had poured quicklime over the bodies thinking it would speed up decomposition, but it actually helped preserve some of the remains.
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For decades, eight of these victims were just numbers. Victim No. 24. Victim No. 28. In 2011, Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart reopened the cases to use modern DNA. It worked. They identified William George Bundy. They identified James "Jimmie" Haakenson.
As of early 2026, five victims remain unidentified. Think about that. Somewhere, five families might still be wondering where their son went in 1976. The Cook County Sheriff’s office is still actively asking anyone who had a male relative go missing in the Chicago area between 1970 and 1979 to submit a DNA sample.
What Most People Miss: The "Help" Theory
There is a nagging question that true crime junkies and some investigators still debate: Did Gacy act alone?
Gacy was a big guy, but he wasn't a powerhouse. He was often in poor health. Moving 33 bodies into a crawl space with only a few inches of clearance is an incredible physical feat. During his time on death row, Gacy would oscillate between bragging and then claiming his employees—guys from PDM Contracting—did the killings while he was away.
Specifically, names like Robin Gecht have come up. Gecht later became the leader of the "Chicago Ripper Crew," a satanic cult that committed horrific murders in the early 80s. Gecht had worked for Gacy.
While the official police stance is that Gacy acted alone, many people find it hard to believe no one noticed the smell, the digging, or the dozens of young men going into that house and never coming out.
The Trial and the "Insanity" Gambit
When the trial started in February 1980, Gacy’s lawyers tried the "not guilty by reason of insanity" route. They brought in experts to talk about his traumatic childhood—his father was a violent alcoholic who called him "sissy" and "stupid." They talked about the blood clot in his brain from a childhood injury.
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The prosecution wasn't having it.
They argued that Gacy was a calculating predator. He planned the "magic trick." He kept a "killing suit." He managed a business. You don't run a successful contracting firm and a precinct organization if you don't understand reality. The jury agreed. After less than two hours of deliberation, they found him guilty.
Gacy spent 14 years on death row at Menard Correctional Center. He painted. He sold his "clown art" to collectors (a practice that eventually led to "Son of Sam" laws). He never showed a shred of remorse. His final words before execution on May 10, 1994, were "Kiss my ass."
Lessons for Today
The John Wayne Gacy case changed how we look at "nice" neighbors. It forced law enforcement to take runaway reports more seriously and eventually led to better missing persons databases.
If you're looking for "actionable" takeaways from a horror story like this, it’s about the "halo effect." We tend to think that if someone is successful, charming, or "involved in the community," they must be a good person. Gacy proved that’s a lie.
If you want to help close the final chapter of this case, here is what you can actually do:
- Check the unidentified list: The Cook County Sheriff’s website has facial reconstructions of the remaining five victims.
- DNA Databases: If you have a family "cold case" from the 70s, uploading DNA to GEDmatch or similar investigative databases can help investigators link remains to families.
- Support Victim Advocacy: Organizations like the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC) grew out of the failures of the 70s and 80s.
We can't change what happened in that crawl space. But we can make sure the last five guys get their names back.