“Twenty-seven people.
They were boys, with their cars, summer jobs.
Oh my God...Are you one of them?
He dressed up like a clown for them, with his face paint white and red.
And on his best behavior, in a dark room on the bed, he’d kill them all, with the sleight
of his hand.
Running far, running fast, to the dead.”
Those are lyrics from a song titled “John Wayne Gacy Jr.” by Sufjan Stevens (His first
name is pronounced like Suff-Yan), and it is just one of the countless pieces of art
that was inspired by this terrifying serial killer.
John Wayne Gacy was a businessman and politician.
To everyone around him, he was a sweet, charming man.
No one in his life could have guessed that he dressed up like “Pogo the Clown”, and
murdered teenage boys after dark.
The Chicago police department found 27 bodies buried in his basement.
They knew that his kill count was at least 33, and there could possibly be more victims
that were never found.
This story became front page news, and immediately captivated the nation.
The fact that a killer clown truly existed in the world struck fear into the hearts of
people everywhere, believing that they could no longer trust circus performers around their
children.
The story of John Wayne Gacy has inspired writers to create their own versions of a
killer clown, including Pennywise from Stephen King’s It, as well as Twisty the Clown in
American Horror Story.
And in the upcoming 2019 DC comics film JOKER, Joaquin Phoenix portrays his character by
copying Pogo the Clown’s menacing makeup.
So, who was the real man behind the face paint?
How did he get this way, and why did he go on a murderous rampage?
Early Life John Wayne Gacy Jr. was born in Chicago on
March 17th, 1942.
His father, John Stanley Gacy, was a factory worker.
John’s father was very much a “man’s man” who enjoyed playing sports and drinking
beer.
He really wanted a son, and he imagined having a boy to do all of the traditional father-son-activities
together.
His mother, Marion, was a housewife who was very sweet and loving to her children.
John and Marion named their baby boy John Jr., and gave him the middle named “Wayne”,
so that he could be named after the manly cowboy actor, John Wayne.
Growing up, the family called him “Johnny”.
John Sr. was a very strict disciplinarian, and a raging alcoholic.
Because of his outbursts, Johnny spent more time with his mother and sisters.
John Sr. tried to play sports with him in the back yard and go on weekend fishing trips,
but the boy was never very interested.
He preferred to plant flowers, cook, and do traditionally feminine activities.
His father was extremely disappointed in Johnny, so he constantly called him a sissy.
He asked him if he was trying to be a girl, and forbid him from doing the hobbies he actually
enjoyed.
Johnny’s mother would spoil him with food in an attempt to make up for his father’s
abuse, and he became overweight.
His parents were constantly arguing, and it would often escalate into fights.
When his father drank, he would beat Johnny and his sisters with a leather and metal razor
strap.
For years, the children would cry out in pain.
But one day, during a particularly bad whipping, it was like a switch flipped in Johnny’s
brain.
He stopped crying, and hardly flinched.
This only make his father more angry, and he proceeded to beat him even harder.
One day, Johnny passed out when playing with his friends.
He was taken to the hospital, where they diagnosed him with a heart condition.
It was official.
John Wayne Gacy would never be an athlete.
No matter how much his father pushed him to play sports, he could not physically handle
running without his heart giving out.
In 1954, Johnny joined the boy scouts, and he became good friends with a boy named Barry
Boschelli.
Johnny felt that he could trust Barry with his biggest secret.
He stole a pair of panties and a bra from his mother’s bedroom.
When he was alone, he would dress up as as woman and stare at himself in the mirror.
Sometimes, he would put on lipstick, and wonder if he really should have been born a girl.
It was clear that Johnny was questioning his gender identity and sexuality.
It must have been obvious to the rest of his family, too, because John Sr. would often
say that he would rather his son be dead than find out that he was a homosexual.
Even though his father was clearly abusive, Johnny was still desperate to be the son his
father always wanted.
He started to date girls, and tried to have a normal life, but he was still bullied in
school for being overweight, and having a heart condition.
It would seem that no matter how hard he tried to suppress it, John Wayne Gacy could never
fit into the world he was born into.
Climbing the Social Ladder As soon as he graduated from High School,
John Wayne Gacy was 18 years old, and he wanted to get far away from his hometown as he possibly
could.
He moved to the city of Springfield, where he became a shoe salesman in a department
store.
After work, he became the assistant precinct captain for the Democratic Party.
He started dating one of his co-workers, Marlynn Myers.
Her father was wealthy and well-connected in Springfield politics.
Gacy told his friends and family that some day, he wanted to become governor of Illinois,
and maybe even President of the United States.
A few years later, he married Marlynn Myers, but he was far from being a faithful partner.
On the day Marlynn was in the hospital giving birth to their first child, John Wayne Gacy
was at the bar with one of his male co-workers.
They got drunk, and went back to Gacy’s house to have sex.
Just a few hours later, his first child was born.
John Sr. came to see his new grandchild, and for the first time in John Wayne Gacy’s
life, his father said that he was proud of him.
John’s new father-in-law owned several KFC restaurant franchises.
At 24, he left his job selling shoes to become the manager of one of the restaurants.
According to his best friend Barry, Gacy wanted this job very badly, because “He wanted
to be able to control people.”
John Wayne Gacy continued to climb the ladder with local politics.
He was always studying people around him and trying to figure out how he could make everyone
like him.
He built a full-service bar in the living room of his house, and he convinced his wife
that they needed to throw swinger parties together.
If you’re not aware, this is where couples would show up and switch spouses for the night
to go home and have sex with one another.
This was popular back in the 1960’s, since everyone was raving about this new free love
movement.
The Gacy’s were also known to host massive orgies in their home.
These sex parties made John Wayne Gacy popular almost immediately, and he became the Vice
President of the local counsel.
They also voted him as “Man of the Year”.
At the time, homosexual men usually lead double lives.
Whenever they wanted to have gay sex, they would start “cruising”.
Men would take a walk in a park or down a road late at night, waiting for another man
to approach him.
They would have sex, and often never see one another again.
However, since he was a public figure, it’s possible that John Wayne Gacy thought that
it would be too risky to have sex with any adult who might know who he is.
He decided to go after people who he believed he could easily control.
He invited a 15-year old boy named Donald Voorhees over to his house.
He knew Donald because he worked with his father, who was a local Senator.
Donald looked up to John like a cool older brother, and he offered to let Donald drink
alcohol and see his porn collection.
After getting the boy drunk, he forced Donald to have oral sex with him.
When it was over, Gacy threatened the boy by saying that he had connections with the
mob.
If he ever told anyone, he would send someone to kill him and his family.
When Gacy dropped Donald Voorhees off at home, he gave him $50 in exchange for the boy’s
silence.
Donald Voorhees kept that night a secret for a long time, but he was never the same again.
In 1968, he broke down and told his family what had happened when he was 15.
John Wayne Gacy was arrested for Sodomy.
He swore that he did not do it, and asked for a lie detector test.
He was so convinced that he could fool the test, but he obviously failed.
When he was called out on this lie, he tried to claim that the sex with Donald Voorhees
was consensual.
Several other teenage boys came forward to claim that they had been raped by Gacy, as
well.
He was found guilty, and sentenced to ten years in prison.
His wife divorced him, and she did not want their children to see him again.
This could have been the end of it all, but unfortunately, Gacy used his charm to schmooze
his way into the hearts of everyone in the prison.
Once he was behind bars, he made friends with other inmates and the guards.
Since he had experience working at KFC, he was able to become the Head Chef in the kitchen.
He received a lot of praise for knowing how to properly spice food, and he was even interviewed
for a local television program called “Christmas at Anamosa”.
All of his father’s fears had come true.
John Sr. died soon after his son was put in prison.
John Wayne Gacy believed that his father died from the shame.
He became so angry, that he lashed out his anger on any gay man he came in contact with.
While in prison, he spotted two men having oral sex, so he bashed one of the men’s
faces in until it was bloody.
Despite being found guilty for raping multiple boys, John Wayne Gacy was released after just
16 months, on good behavior.
He returned to Cook County, where he lived with his mom.
People in his hometown didn’t know about his conviction, but they remembered him as
being young, innocent Johnny- the fat kid with the heart condition.
So it was easy for him to get a fresh start in life.
He found a job as a short-order cook, and he saved up his money by working overtime.
Once he had enough money, he started a construction company called PDM Contractors.
He also jumped back into local politics.
Newly divorced, Gacy started dating a woman he knew from High School named Carol Hoff.
She was a divorcee with two daughters, and she was struggling to make it by on welfare.
John Wayne Gacy was great around kids, he had a steady job, and he was ambitious.
From Carol’s perspective, he was a catch, and his daughters started to call him “daddy”
right away.
He admitted to Carol that he was bisexual, but he never told her about his time in jail.
She accepted him for who he was.
In that moment, he had everything.
But he was never satisfied.
In fact, he felt that he had been in prison so long, his craving to have sex with teenage
boys had only been amplified.
Send in the Clowns One night, John Wayne Gacy was hanging out
at the Greyhound bus station.
He spotted a 16 year old named Tim McCoy, who was traveling during Christmas time, and
had a brief layover in Chicago.
Gacy started flirting with him, and offered to show him around the city.
Tim must have assumed that this was just a typical “cruising” fling.
They had sex, but Gacy became so angry at himself for giving in to his homosexuality,
he could not control the range.
He impulsively grabbed a kitchen knife, and stabbed Tim in the chest multiple times.
He buried the boy in the dirt basement crawl space underneath his house.
Tim’s parents never saw him for Christmas.
It would be years before they found out the fate of their son.
John Wayne Gacy got married to Carol 7 months later, and she moved into the house with her
daughters.
His new wife would have no idea that she was moving into a house where the remains of a
young boy where buried below her feet.
John Wayne Gacy continued to suppress this homosexual urges.
Instead of putting on lipstick, he began to paint his face in clown makeup.
Normally, clowns have friendly, curved features, but Gacy painted on sharp, harsh edges.
He called himself “Pogo the Clown”, and started showing up at the local hospital to
do magic tricks for the children who were sick.
When he was Pogo, he could do all of the things that John was not allowed to do.
This escalated to giving into his indulgences again, burying his victims in the basement.
John’s wife Carol was concerned, because she could tell that his personality had drastically
changed after he began to play Pogo the Clown.
John refused to have sex with her, and he made her feel worthless.
They filed for divorce in 1975, when he was 33 years old.
After that, he was free to hunt teenage boys as often as he wanted.
He would drive around town dressed in his full clown makeup.
If he saw a boy walking alone at night, he would hold up a gun, and force them into the
car.
He would rape and stab them, before burying them in the basement.
Burying all of those bodies was hard work, so he brought in one of his new employees,
David Cram, to dig holes in his basement.
He claimed that he needed to add new piping under the house, but he was under strict orders
to avoid certain areas of the basement.
David had no idea that John Wayne Gacy was forcing him to dig his own grave.
Cram was from out of town, and he told Gacy that he was also looking for a new apartment.
Gacy offered to rent him one of the bedrooms of his house in exchange for labor.
One night, Pogo the Clown walked through the door, and David Cram was very confused.
John was already drunk, and his makeup was sliding off his face.
He wasn’t acting like John anymore.
He spoke in a nasally, high-pitched character voice of a clown, and asked David if he wanted
a mai tai.
David laughed, and assumed this was some kind of joke, so he agreed to drinks.
Pogo asked if he would like to see a magic trick, and he put handcuffs on David’s wrists.
He dangled the key in front of him, giggling like a child.
Pogo the Clown started poking David, saying, “Does this get you mad?
What about this?
Huh?
Huh?”
David threatened to punch him if he didn’t stop, but Gacy never broke character.
In the middle of a sentence, Pogo started growling and barking like a dog.
Then, he started saying (in a sing-songy voice), “I’m going to rape you!” over and over.
He tried to force David down to the floor, attempting to rip off his pants.
David kicked Gacy as hard as he could, and the clown fell to the floor, dropping the
key to the handcuffs.
David was able to escape from the house, but never spoke a word of this incident to anyone,
until years later.
Others would not be so lucky.
Caught John Wayne Gacy’s last known victim was
a 15-year old named Robert Piest, who worked at the Des Plaines pharmacy.
Gacy had spotted the boy on a previous shopping trip.
So he showed up to the pharmacy, asking to speak to the owner.
He offered to renovate their pharmacy, and casually asked if he knew of any teenage boys
who were looking for a job, because he was willing to pay $5 per hour for construction
work.
Robert Piest took the bait.
This was double what he made at the pharmacy, so he called up Gacy’s company to apply.
Later, as he left his house, Piest’s mother asked where he was going.
He said, “Some contractor wants to talk to me about a job,” and he left.
His mother never saw her son again.
At this point, Gacy had run of out room in his basement.
There were already 27 corpses beneath his house.
So Pogo the Clown had to dump Robert’s body in the river.
When the police found Robert’s body, it was easy for them to take the testimonies
and connect the dots.
They approached John Wayne Gacy, but he was confident that he would not be caught.
He even invited the investigators over to his house for dinner and drinks.
One of the officers could smell the stench of the rotting corpses coming through the
air vents.
They came back with another warrant, and uncovered the bodies of the teenage boys in the basement.
When John Wayne Gacy was brought into custody, the police were preparing to take his mugshot.
They were asking him basic information, like his name and birthdate.
An officer asked him, “Where were you born?”
Gacy replied, “Out of chaos.”
He started to laugh at his own joke.
The camera flashed at that very moment, capturing the image of a murderer who was truly pleased
with himself.
When they found the bodies, Gacy knew he was caught.
He quickly claimed that he had multiple personality disorder, and that he had no control over
what Pogo the Clown did.
But, clearly, he had planned Robert Piest’s murder for a long time.
After a psychological evaluation, it was obvious to everyone that he was just trying to plea
insanity, but that he seemed to be fully aware of what he was doing.
During his trial, Gacy had the best defense team anyone could ask for, because of his
ties in local government.
When he received the death penalty, he actually congratulated his team, as if this was the
result he wanted all along.
While in prison, John Wayne Gacy began to draw pictures of clowns, and sold his artwork.
During every interview he did behind bars, Gacy claimed that he was innocent, and refused
to take blame for any of his actions.
At one point, he even decided to write a book, where he claimed that the bodies in his basement
were a setup to ruin his political career.
May 10, 1994 was the day of his execution.
Crowds of people stood outside of the prison, chanting, “Kill him!”
while holding up signs.
When it was announced that he had died of a lethal injection, the crowds cheered.
Immediately following his death, forensic psychologists dissected Gacy’s body, and
removed his brain.
They wanted to see if there were any abnormalities that might give them some kind of clue as
to why he had become a serial killer, but there was nothing to be found.
Even to this day, experts are still debating on how to diagnose John Wayne Gacy.
He has been called a sociopath, psychopath, paranoid schizophrenic, and some have agreed
with his self-diagnosis of dissociative identity disorder.
What we do know for sure, though, is that if it were not for the shame he endured all
his life, these killings may have never happened in
the first place.