John Wayne Gacy (48 page)

Did John Wayne Gacy deserve my efforts? Yeah, he did. Every human being deserves counsel in a free society, no matter what the charge, no matter what the cost, no matter what. That was his right, and he had acquired that right from a place far above my pay grade, and yours.

Only one other person on this planet could share the once-in-a-lifetime emotion that was haunting that day: Bob Motta. Like me, he fought tooth and nail for the life of a hated man. Like me, today he too had finally lost that battle.

So, no, I wasn’t celebrating, not today.

I called Bob. I hadn’t seen him very much during the ensuing fourteen years since the jury’s verdict. Oh, I’d bump into him from time to time, of course. We were both lawyers, and there are always functions and chance meetings in courthouses. But we had both moved on, him with his practice and me with mine. I had partnered with Jim Etchingham and had a thriving practice for a time, still in Park Ridge, 200 S. Prospect, right next door to my first office in the 222 building, where Gacy had first confessed his nightmare. Then in 1985, I was appointed to the bench as an associate judge of the Circuit Court of Cook County. I was now dispensing justice instead of fighting for it.

It was good to hear his voice. We made plans to meet at a local bar, a bar where many of my old marine buddies sometimes hung out. The bar, the Northwood, was tucked into the corner of a tiny strip mall where Summerdale Street meets Cumberland Avenue, just a block and a half from where Gacy’s house once stood.

I walked into the bar around seven o’clock and looked around. This was a place where men drank draught beer or shots of whiskey and watched sports. A tavern. There were no disco balls or bright lights. The primary color scheme was brown.

There they were, many of my closest friends.

They were all smiling, but not really—Etchingham, Hussey, Joey Etch, Kinahan, what a motley crew. If you knew me, you knew this
was no celebration. Of course, it was no wake either. Bob Motta was sitting at the bar eating a beef sandwich. I walked over to him. “I gotta go pick up Sammy in a little while. How are you doing?”

“I think you know,” he said.

We talked for a while. I talked to everybody there.

When I left to pick up my son from a school function, I really intended to come back to the bar. Somehow, that idea left me once I got home with my family.

My wife was surprised. I was usually the center of attention. I usually liked crowds.

We all just went for a hot dog. I didn’t feel like doing much else.

When I walked into the Plush Pup, a local hot dog stand, the guy behind the counter was smiling at me. “How are you going to celebrate the Gacy execution?” he asked, slapping onions on the dogs.

I chuckled a little. “I am probably one of the only people in this town that is not celebrating,” I said, thinking of Bob. “I was the guy who defended him in court. I was his lawyer.”

The guy’s swarthy, ethnic face went blank. He almost dropped his onion spoon.

“You’re kidding!”

“No … no, I’m not.”

When I got home, my wife and I turned on the TV. There was Bill Kunkle arguing with Walter Jacobson, Chicago’s answer to Walter Cronkite.

They were in the throes of an earnest discussion about whether Gacy had been given drugs to ease the tension before he was taken to the gurney.

Jacobson was sure he had taken some kind of drug because he had seen a flutter in Gacy’s eye.

A flutter in his eye! A flutter in his eye! I had seen that flutter before. If they only knew, I thought. Gacy wasn’t even there. He
wasn’t even present. He had already gone to that dark place he had been so many times before.

Gacy didn’t need drugs. His brain was broken.

I thought about the guy at the hot dog stand. “I was his lawyer,” I had said.

I thought about a telephone call that I received fifteen years ago.

“Sam, could you do me a favor?”

Epilogue

T
HIRTEEN PSYCHOLOGISTS AND
psychiatrists testified during the trial of John Wayne Gacy. Each was a noted expert. Most were published authors and professors at this country’s most prestigious institutions of higher learning. Yet, after hours of interviews, study and contemplation, none of these learned men and women diagnosed Mr. Gacy in exactly the same manner.

Gacy was an enigma.

After reading the Gacy story, it doesn’t take a psychologist or a psychiatrist to see the tormented soul that haunted Gacy’s sickly frame. Once he confessed his crimes on that eerie night in Sam’s office, he began admitting his horrific deeds to almost anyone who asked. But, there was one thing that he would never admit. This one perceived transgression he took with him to his grave. He would admit to the most heinous string of brutal murders the world had ever seen; but he would never admit that which he considered his most horrendous and well-guarded secret … he was homosexual.

Gacy grew up with a father who berated him daily for not living up to preconceived notions of what a “man” should be, school kids and neighbors who bullied and tormented him, and a society that struggled with acceptance of a lifestyle it did not understand. As a result, no one hated John Gacy more than John Gacy.

During the trial, we had a discussion in Judge Garippo’s chamber. The issue was whether or not a witness would be allowed
to take the Fifth Amendment if he were asked if he had engaged in homosexual acts with John Gacy. The judge never had to rule on the issue. The question was never posed. But, the fact that the issue had been debated at all, even for a minute, says something about the attitude of the time. Homosexuality is not a crime. The Fifth Amendment to the Constitution protects against self-
incrimination
… not self-embarrassment. Therefore, the issue should never have come up. Nonetheless, it was the subject of some debate and consideration.

Thankfully, times have changed somewhat. A lawyer concerned with such a question would get laughed out of most judges’ chambers.

This country has taken great strides to eradicate the scourge of the many misplaced prejudices from which we have suffered as a nation over the years. The sad results of some of our history’s mistakes—slavery, racism, sexism, McCarthyism—are slowly becoming memories of troubled days gone by. Isn’t it finally time to assign our most glaring leftover active prejudice, homophobia, to the pages of a history book?

_______________________

A
RE YOU GOOD
with dates? There is one date in this book that kind of jumps off the page: December 11, 1978. Do you remember what happened on that date? John Wayne Gacy brutally murdered Rob Piest, his
last
victim, on that date.

What was supposed to happen on that very same date in that very same year?

John Wayne Gacy was supposed to be released from the Iowa Men’s Reformatory in Anamosa. John Wayne Gacy was sentenced to ten years in prison by the State of Iowa pursuant to an order signed by Judge Peter Van Metre on December 11, 1968. If he had served his full term, if he had stayed in that prison for his full sentence, Mr. Gacy’s release date would have been December 11, 1978.

Maybe we should stop putting pot smokers, prostitutes, and petty thieves in prison and leave some room for the John Wayne Gacys of the world.

Enough said?

____________________

I
T IS HARD
to imagine that this story could ever have anything akin to a silver lining. However, you know what they say, whenever a door is closed, a window opens.

Sam L. Amirante, my coauthor and friend, may have done the one thing that could possibly qualify as a right to this terrible wrong, as something good coming from this horrible tragedy. In 1984, inspired by his involvement in the
Gacy
case, he personally authored procedures adopted by the Illinois General Assembly as the Missing Child Recovery Act of 1984 (I-SEARCH), which eliminated the seventy-two-hour waiting period to initiate a search for lost children, and he is credited with helping to locate countless thousands of missing children in our state and reuniting them with their parents.

For the first time in Illinois history, the report of a missing child immediately triggered a statewide search, incorporating the resources of local and municipal police forces all across the state in cooperation with the Illinois State Police.

As other states adopted similar laws and similar sensibilities with reference to missing children, it became possible to create the national network, now known as a Child Abduction Emergency, or CAE, commonly referred to as an Amber Alert
.

Therefore, these boys …and eleven more, did not die in vain.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

W
E PUT OFF
writing this part of the book until the last possible second because it is the scariest part. That’s saying something when you consider that we are writing a book about John Wayne Gacy but believe us; it’s true. We were both petrified that we would forget to mention someone, thereby hurting the feelings of a person for whom one of us, or both of us, cares deeply.

However, pretending that we wrote this book without help just because our names are on the cover would be a crime greater than the ones portrayed in its pages. So … here goes.

Bob Motta joined with me on a journey that only a very few lawyers would have had the courage to undertake. When Bob sent that fateful telegram and stepped up to offer his help, he was clearly jumping off of a cliff with me and he knew it. Yet, he fearlessly did so without looking back. I could not have done it without you, Bob. Fate brought us together and I am the one who benefited. I couldn’t have asked for a better partner, cocounsel, and friend.

We both have to thank Attorney Pam Curran. Pam has been Sam’s loyal and dedicated associate and our friend. She puts up with Sam, a daunting task; and she somehow puts up with Danny, who never shuts up. Her encouragement and countless hours of listening, transcribing, reviewing, and critiquing helped to make this book possible. To Lissy Peace, our agent and friend, whose dedication to this project made it a reality after thirty long years,
thank you, Lissy. The personnel at Skyhorse Publishing, who welcomed us and made us feel comfortable and confident, especially our editor, Jennifer McCartney, whose knowledge, experience, and incredible attention to detail made this a better book. She also put up with Danny, who never shuts up. Author and friend Georgia Durante shared her expertise and offered her guidance before and during the pendency of the project. Deanna Amirante, Sam’s loving wife, offered her input, inspiration, and encouragement. She also opened her beautiful home at all hours to late-night, chain-smoking bull sessions when everyone, including her husband, should have been in bed sleeping. Holly Hueser, paralegal at the Sullivan Firm, Ltd., dragged her boss’s files up from storage and facilitated access to those files and provided an office where Danny could work. Terry Sullivan, the “Sullivan” of the Sullivan Firm Ltd., allowed complete access to his files and supported our efforts in the telling of this story. Terry also helped sell the idea of the book to everyone that would listen to him and Sam in Key West, Florida, in spite of the fact that we are now competing with his best-selling book,
Killer Clown: The John Wayne Gacy Murders
. Judge Al Swanson gave us insights and contributed vital information from his days as a reporter covering the
Gacy
case. Steve Veenstra, of Fountain Valley, California, reviewed our first drafts and offered editing advice and constructive criticism beginning with the earliest days of the project. And, thanks to Tim Kiefer for his help and expertise in the making of our videos.

Sam would also like to thank his mentors who taught him how to be a lawyer with passion for our Constitution and the criminal justice system, including Nunzio Tisci, Judge John Madden, Judge James Geocaris, James Doherty, John G. Phillips, Joseph Fasano, Judge Louis Garippo, Judge Robert Sklodowski, and Robert Martwick. I would also like to thank my friends who have encouraged me through the years and never gave up on the idea of this publication, including Gino Peronti, Jeanne Raines, Judge Anthony Iosco,
Judge Les Bonaguro, Judge Annie O’Donnell, Judge Nick Zagone, Judge Howard Fink, Bob Motta, Jim Hussey, Ernie Blomquist, and Judge James Etchingham, the greatest law partner a lawyer could ever have.

I would also like to thank those people who labored with me and took up most of the load during the
Gacy
case in my law office, including Larry Gabriele, Dennis Nudo, Dick Nelson, Lee Poteracki, and their great and dedicated staff who spent countless hours typing, transcribing, copying, and running errands. Thank you, Erlene, Lee, Rita, and Joanne. I must thank Linda Kennedy, Bob Motta’s girlfriend, for transcribing the tapes of hours upon hours of interviews with Gacy. She typed her fingers raw. I would also like to thank the numerous investigators assigned to the case, especially Lindy DiDomenico, Nick Mestousis, and Tony Christopher, who not only spent endless hours interviewing hundreds of people all over the country, but also served as our bodyguards throughout the trial. I would also like to express my deepest appreciation to the members of the press, including Jay Levine, Irv Kupcinat, Michael Sneed, Carol Marine, Maurice Possley, Tony Gianetti, Walter Jacobson, Bill Curtis, Dick Kay, John Drummond, Paul Galoway, Tom Fitzpatrick, John Drury, Ron Majors, and all of the others who always treated two young lawyers with dignity, respect, and fairness. In addition, thank you, Marcia Danitz, Verna Sadok, and Andy Austin, the courtroom artists who always made us look better than we really do. I would also like to thank Sheriff Don Gasparini and all of the other court personnel of the Winnebago County courthouse in Rockford, Illinois, for making us feel safe and comfortable during jury selection. A special thank-you to all of the court personnel of the Circuit Court of Cook County assigned to the case for their professionalism. I would also like to thank my fellow marines and all of the members of the other armed forces for giving the ultimate sacrifice so that our constitutional rights may always be protected. In that light, I would like to thank my fellow members of the judiciary and
fellow lawyers who ensure everyday in our criminal court system that even the John Gacys of the world receive a fair trial. I would be remiss if I were to not thank two people who, throughout the
Gacy
case, in spite of the great odds against us, and the whole world hating us, put their entire faith, trust, hope, and confidence in Bob’s and my abilities to see to it that their brother received a fair trial, John Gacy’s sisters, Karen and Joanne.