Authors: Jack Olsen
I (34 page)
Father and Son
Bigger Than O. J.An Oregon detective annoyed Les Jesperson with a series of pointed questions about Keith's claims. First the interviewer warned, “Some of my questions are personal and might hurt you.” Then he asked permission to tape-record the interview.
Permission granted, the detective asked the anguished father if he'd ever beaten his wife. “We had arguments,” Les responded, “like any married couple.” But he'd never used physical force.
The detective wanted to know if Les had ever used Keith “as a punching bag.”
Les replied with heat that he hadn't. Well, had he ever used his belt? “Yes,” Les replied, “as did my father, grandfather, and the schools in those days.” He explained that he didn't hit hard enough to produce cuts but might have left the odd mark on the boy's skin.
The detective asked if Les had seen Keith torture or kill animals. “No,” the father responded. “I never did.” If he'd witnessed such an act, he said, he would have done something about it.
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Les didn't tell his interviewer how distressed he was by his son's behavior, but he explained to a friend: “Keith will do anything for publicity. He wants to be up on that pedestal where everybody sees him. He doesn't care if they applaud or throw rocks, as long as he's noticed. He keeps telling me he'll be bigger than O.J. He argues with judges like they're a couple of high school debatersâno respect, no sense of where he is and how he should behave. Why, he called the governor of Wyoming an asshole! What does that say about his mind?”
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As though to confirm his father's charges, Keith appeared on the network news program
Dateline
and admitted that he was contemptuous of the justice systemâ“It's humorous at times to see the craziness.”
His voice took on a sepulchral tone as he parried his interviewer's comments.
“People don't know whether you're telling the truth, whether you're lying, whether you've killed these people, whether you killed 5 people, 8 people, or 166 people.”
“That's right.”
“Why should we believe anything you say here today?”
“Because I'm telling the truthâ¦. But, see, am I telling the truth this time, or am I lying to you?”
He was asked if it made him feel powerful to embarrass prosecutors. “At times,” he answered. “It makes me feel like I have some type of control on it.”
A chilling exchange near the end of the interview sounded as though it originated in a mausoleum:
Q.
How many murders have you committed?
A.
I've told the number as up to around 166 people.
Q.
A hundred sixty-six people?
A.
Yes.
Q.
You must have been killing a person a month, almost.
A.
Yeah, that's normal.
Q.
Normal to you.
A.
I'd kill 2 or 3 a week.
Q.
How could you have killed 166 people and not get caught?
A.
It's easyâ¦.
After the interview aired, there was a short truce between father and son while they made plans to cash in on the national publicity by coauthoring a book. Keith did the math: “Ten percent of a $6.00 book is 60 cents times 100,000 copies = $60,000âa million copies, $600,000.”
Keith agreed to supply the raw information, and Les, in his late sixties but still busy with poetry and other writings, would cobble up the text. As he explained to a reporter on the Chilliwack
Progress:
“I have four other children who are good. I write as a hobbyâ¦and as therapy. My doctor said writing about Keith would help. Of course, the story is as well a history of the family.”
He told the reporter that he'd written an earlier book about his own life and printed up fifty copies for his family. He'd written a work about life as a snowbird, living in an RV. “I also wrote a prize-winning poem. I write a lot of poems and try to put humor and living into them.”
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The first eighty pages of raw autobiographical material arrived in Les Jesperson's mail, and the old polymath was shocked to read in wordy detail how he'd beaten his son with his belt, punched him in the face, overworked him, cheated him in business dealings, sabotaged his plans for college, and in general transformed a good little boy into a serial killer.
Keith recalled the ensuing blowup. “Dad wrote back right away and complained that I blamed it all on him. Then he burned my manuscript. I told him to write the damn book himself, any way he wanted. He said he couldn't write it without my input. He wrote, âYou can trust me to handle it right. I'm your dad.'
“I sent him more stuff about his style of punishment, and he didn't like that, either. He told me I needed to write the truth. I said, âDad, this
is
the truth.' I told him if we published a book that left out what made me a killer, nobody would read it. And he said nobody would read it if I blamed everything on him and his belt.”
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Members of the extended Jesperson family were dismayed by news of the work-in-progress. The consensus was that the family scandal had been sufficiently publicized.
Les seemed oblivious to his relatives' unease and set to work on
My Son, a Serial Killer?
He decided on a frank, semi-apologetic tone:
I know you have not enjoyed reading some of the gory details of this story, but it has served its purpose in helping me cope with my depression. Time heals with a death and in a lot of ways this is a death. I have lost a son. The only thing wrong here is that there is no positive ending. He will always be in prison and in my mind as a blemish and as a sad spot. He has dragged the proud name of Jesperson through the mudâ¦. Maybe some day he will repent. May the Lord have mercy on his soul!
The manuscript had reached some sixty thousand words before he yielded to family pressure and gave up.
ApologiaInside Oregon State Penitentiary the serial killer penned a book-length counter-draft of his own in the classical protagonist-antagonist form. He wrote about the deaths of cats, alcoholism, his father's belt, dead dogs and horses, electric shocks, family favoritism. He sent the hand-printed text to his father, who demanded an immediate denial in writing.
Keith stewed for a few weeks before he concluded that his father was only trying to save face and probably intended to flash the exculpatory document before old and new cronies, his banker, his barber, and the other members of his family. No harm done. At last Keith complied with the request:
A lot of times I've wanted to sit and write to you and tell everything, to let you know how I feel and to let you know the whole truth. Sometimes I would write it all and just flush it. So much has happened in my life I have been ashamed of. To blame my father for my childhood is crazy. He is a good fatherâ¦.
The long letter again posited the existence of two Keith Hunter Jespersons, one normal and law-abiding, the other a work of the devil:
This man that rides along with me carries out the evil deeds. I try to keep him under control but at times he protects me the only way he knows how.
In any case, he stressed, his childhood was not to blame.
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Swept up by his conciliatory mood, Keith then wrote to his old mine bosses in Elkford, B.C., and apologized for stealing the leather pants and other items. He also reached out to old childhood and family friends. At Christmastime he wrote:
I remember the good times I had with Dad and Mother and the fun we shared. It wasn't always hardships. And I want to make up to my ex-wife Rose. I want to go back to the day we separated and swallow hard. If I had just sat and talked it out instead of rushing out the door to drive another loadâ¦.
Regrets? Damn right. I regret ever leaving my family and not having the balls to swallow my pride and admit I was wrong.
A similar mea culpa arrived at two of Keith's home newspapers, the
Selah Optimist
and
Yakima Herald:
I wish to apologize to the Selah community and the Yakima Valley, along with my friends, coworkers and family for my actions in my crime that brought everyone undue hardships and criticism in their lives.
The problems in my life that caused me to be a serial killer were problems that I brought on myself, not from my childhood. My brothers and sisters are not murderers and yet they had the same parents and lived in the same community as I had. I am not the Green River killer like some people want to believe. All of my crimes happened after I left the Yakima Valley.
All of my friends and relatives are not responsible for my actions. But many people act like they are. I have lied to everyone at one time or another. So please people of Yakima and the surrounding area, don't punish them for my crimes. It is bad enough to lose me to what I've done without dragging everyone I have known through the mud as well.
Sincerely,
Keith Hunter Jesperson, the so-called by the Press âHappy Face Killer.'
A scribbled addendum instructed the editors to “please print this letter in its entirety in your paper.” His letter was ignored.
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When there was no public reaction to his apologies, Keith threatened suicide. He wrote his father:
I miss my kids andâ¦if they visit me in the next five years then we can still come to love each other. If not I will overdose on something to end the misery or stretch my neck to get it over with. I have thrown my life awayâ¦.I will not prolong itâ¦. Death will be a comfort to me.
He still had accounts to settle with Les. He wrote:
Dealing with your antics all of my life it isn't hard to see how I turned out the way I haveâ¦. You are up to your old tricks again in that thing you call a brainâ¦. Thank God for that letter you begged me for. Thank God for the apology you demanded from me. You know why you wanted it and it wasn't to give you peace of mind like you said. It was to discredit me as telling anyone of abusive behavior I was dealt by your hands. Hell Dad!â¦It only shows the world how desperate you are to save face.
Sure we had some good times, but we also had some bad times too. I have always been afraid of you and treated you as my friend to only watch out for the games you were playing on us kidsâ¦always for controlâ¦.
You're screwing with the wrong people Dadâ¦. At least now you admit you used the strapâ¦. You might as well stop writing me and visiting me. I feel like the boy named Sue. I look at you as in the end of that song. You are my Dad because of the gravel in my gut and the spit in my eyesâ¦. You created me to be like you. If you don't like what you see, then leave me and never come back. I can live without you and sometimes I feel better for it. With you, everything is a price tag, well I'm tired of paying youâ¦.
Forget I existâ¦.I do love you Dad! Because you are my Dad.
The patriarch of the Jesperson family wrote a friend that he was “floored” by the outburst.
I now realized I had a very sick son in that prison. I called Brad and read him some of the letter. I felt so depressed that I had to talk to someone. I did not and never have felt guilt for Keith's crimes. I did feel however that by talking to my other son, my grief would be relieved somewhat.
Brad confirmed without hesitation that what Keith wrote was straight bullshit, to put it in his own terms. He advised me to drop the whole thing and forget Keith. He said that Keith was just disturbing the whole family and life was not worth the hassle.
I looked back in my correspondence file and dug out the letter in which Keith told of a normal life as a childâ¦.I took that letter along with the hate letter and had copies madeâ¦.I wanted all to know the truth as Keith was actively spreading this propaganda around in an effort to blame someone for his crimes. This is a hard pill to swallow with all the love I still have for my son.
