I was convinced early on that we were dealing with a serial killer
and if we really knew the truth
I believe he's probably killed more people in Oregon than probably anybody else
For a predator to be in in in a pen with all the the victims
who knows how many victims he's got?
He had opportunity, when the opportunity presented itself he took advantage of it
I don't know why. Why? Why?
I guess he didn't need a reason
What are the odds of being a prime suspect in all these murders?
It wasn't until later his first victim that I even found out about, about this woman
and that she was still alive
and saying oh man she's lucky to be alive
He's always been a demon in my life
lurking in the back of my head and I found these words that express it very perfectly
it's called "My Darkness Within"
'Some of my demons left me, some are'
'just asleep, a few always travel with me, others haunt me from the deep'
He was one of those
'The little ones are charming, they're allowed to stay'
'the big ones tear me up inside'
'I just wish they'd go away'
I'm sorry
Beginning in the late 1970s, a sinister presence cast a shadow over an isolated
part of Central Oregon. It lurked in the background, ignored or unnoticed
Women, often vulnerable or marginalized, were disappearing
it wasn't until decades later that a reckoning finally came
My name is Noelle Crombie and I'm a staff writer for The Oregonian. Over the past
two years I've investigated these crimes and the man who is suspected of
committing them. I've read thousands of pages of police reports, travelled
halfway across the country, interviewed dozens of witnesses
and spent countless hours driving the road along which the killings took place
This is a complicated story that jumps around in time, so throughout this video
series you'll hear from people who were present at the events they described
as well as those who investigated them, in some instances, much later
You'll hear tapes of police interviews that were conducted years after some of the events
they address. You'll learn information that has never before been made public
These are the stories of the ghosts of Highway 20
In 1977 Marlene Gabrielsen was 20 years old. She lived in the small city of
Lebanon, along Highway 20, with her husband and their new baby
One night that June, the young couple dropped their daughter off with a friend so they could
spend the night at the Sister's Rodeo
I was underage, shouldn't have been drinking, and I got angry about something
now I can't even remember, so stupid, that I just walked off and said, "Fine, I'm gonna go home"
She asked around for a ride and
eventually a man with a pickup offered to take her home to Lebanon, about 80 miles away
I thought there was nothing wrong, I'd be safe it wasn't that far
from home. I didn't even look around inside the vehicle, all I knew it was
just a beat-up old truck and I was going home to my kid
The man with the old truck was John Arthur Ackroyd
Ackroyd was in his late twenties and lived in Sweet Home
He'd recently returned to the area after getting out of the Army, and
was working for a local welding company, though within a year he'd be employed by
the state as a highway mechanic. That night, he took Marlene west, toward
Lebanon on Highway 20, a road he knew well
I noticed that there was no like covers on the doors
there was no handles, and no roll-you-down thing
I sat in the passenger seat and didn't even think, didn't even faze me
that this was a trap
Highway 20 twists and turns as it winds from Sisters to Lebanon, carving its way
through mountainsides covered in dense evergreen forest. It's a sleepy stretch
of road with little development and few landmarks, and it's dark at night
Exits lead to logging roads or campgrounds, and quickly disappear into the brush
I fell asleep, well, passed out. I woke up with my head banging on the seat and the
edge of the outside of the truck door, he had grabbed me by my ankles and just
yarded me out of there like I was just a rag dolly. And then he picked me up by
by the back of my neck and my hair and threw me up against this like a little
hill, I felt like I was in a hollow, because it was, I remember it was
beautiful because it was all green, and little flowers blooming, little tiny ones
First thing I thought of was how can you be hurt in this kind of beauty?
He grabbed this knife out of a coffee can, that's where he kept his buck knife,
the big knife he held to my throat. He put the knife to my throat, and told me I was
going to do everything he said, and I said, "Yes, I will" and he stuck the knife in the
ground next to me, he grabbed the front of my pants, belt and all, and ripped my pants
straight down all the way down the front of my legs, and then he gets his knife
and starts cutting off my boots. I just kept thinking, just close your eyes, but
I kept, um, and just let it happen
He would grab my face like this and, because I would turn my head and he
would make it, "Open your eyes, look at me"
Yeah, so I had to look at him
And I did. He got done doing what he wanted and he kind of stood over me and
looked at me, all, you know standing over me with a hand on his hip
wiping his sweat away, you get treated like that
and you don't even feel human, I just laid there and kind of wanted just to
seep into the earth, just take my body, and renew, bring new life in, something
that's much happier than I am at this moment
He was gonna, going toward his truck
and getting his keys in his pockets and I said, "Okay, you're just gonna leave
me here buck-ass naked?" I, I didn't want him to stay
but I didn't want to be naked out in the woods. I think he started gathering up my clothes,
what was left there because he didn't want to leave anything, my boots and, and
all that stuff he ripped off of me, I just had my jacket on and a little
t-shirt top. He goes, "Now do I, what do I do with you?"
I go, "You take me home," he goes, "I don't know," and let me tell ya, I was talking real
fast, real low and real sweet
Because evidently I wanted to live
I had a brand-new baby and a new husband
Ackroyd agreed to take Marlene home that night. Her jeans had been torn during the
rape, so he gave her a pair of dirty pants. On the drive she did all she could
to keep him at ease, knowing a rifle and hunting knife were within easy reach
I didn't want to make him angry, and he asked me if I'd be his girlfriend
and I looked down and I see that coffee can with the knife in it and I said yes
I had him take me, take me to my husband's mother's house
got on the porch and just start pounding on the door, he left immediately, just
just left. She goes, "Oh my god, what happened to you?"
I had bushes, twigs in my hair, she goes, "You need to get in the bathtub right now"
and I said, "No, I can't get in the bathtub right now, I've just been raped"
She wanted me to wash him off
No. I wasn't gonna wash him off. I'd hold that shit in until they got him
He will be in trouble once the police come and help me
I did go to the hospital and had a rape kit done
then I took my shower
Marlene's rape kit showed vaginal swelling and bruising and abrasions on
her back and legs. She went to police and showed them her
pants, which had been torn from the crotch to her ankles, her underwear, which
had been cut with a knife, and her slashed boots
Despite this physical evidence, police were skeptical. They interviewed Marlene
several times, focusing on minor inconsistencies in her story. They had
her take a polygraph and concluded she was not telling the truth
Ultimately, they declined to pursue the case
I always thought that
that's why these people get paid, to protect you. They care, that's what I
thought, they care about you. All the system was put in place to protect
people. Not judge them, by who you're married to, what color your skin is
They made me feel like a smelly drunken native. So I just shrank, it's just
another something that I went in my little life, in my young days
I let my guard down and I was so angry, so angry. If they would only had listened to me
and you know I feel guilty sometimes, if they would've just listened to me
it could have all been avoided
all of it
Marlene was a vulnerable young woman whose assault by a stranger should have
provoked outrage and a demand for justice. Instead, her account was
disbelieved, deepening her sense of trauma. The implications of law
enforcement's failure to believe Marlene and aggressively pursue Ackroyd would be
felt along Highway 20 for decades. She was his first known victim
Maybe, if police had listened to her, she would have been his last
They were supposed to put this man somewhere
where he could not hurt anyone else
look what happens
I hear I'm the only freaking survivor