Serial killer. Born Gary Leon Ridgway on February 18, 1949, in Salt Lake City, Utah. Raised near Seattle’s Pacific Highway, a deprived neighborhood near SeaTac airport, Ridgway was a poor student and was sent to Vietnam after high school. When he returned, he got a job painting trucks, which he kept for 30 years. Though he married three times and was fanatical about religion, Ridgway was a frequent customer of prostitutes. Ridgway’s slayings began in 1982, when young runaways and prostitutes began disappearing from state Route 99 in south King County, Washington. He brought many of them to his home and strangled them, then left them in woodsy, remote sites. The first few bodies turned up along the now-notorious Green River. Dubbed the Green River Killer, Ridgway eluded the law until 2001, when King County sheriff Dave Reichert—the first officer assigned to the case in 1982—called a meeting to re-examine evidence using newly developed DNA-testing technology. The analysis produced a match between evidence from the victims and Ridgway, and he was charged with four counts of aggravated murder in December 2001. Ridgway eventually pleaded guilty to 48 counts of aggravated first-degree murder. Facing the prospect of execution, Ridgway told investigators that he killed as many as 60 women, and revealed where he'd hidden the bodies of four young women who had never been found. He was sentenced to life in prison in December 2003 having committed more murders than any serial killer in U.S. history.
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The story of prominent attorney Joel Steinberg and author Hedda Nussbaum whose inconspicuous lives were brought out as a public spectacle when their six-year-old daughter, Lisa, died following severe abuse and neglect.
Debra Jean Milke is charged and convicted of the shooting death of her 4-year-old son. Her accusers believe she felt the child was an inconvenience while she claims the charges are unfounded.
He terrorized the Wichita, KS community in a killing spree that began over 30 years ago. After taunting investigators through the press, the BTK Killer dropped out of sight. But in early 2004, his own ego tripped him up. Now we know that the BTK Killer is Dennis Rader, a regular churchgoer and member of that same community he terrorized for decades. In an unprecedented courtroom confession, the infamous serial killer described 10 of his murders in dispassionate detail. But who is the man behind the BTK Killer, and what made him do it? Through interviews with investigators and experts, people who knew Rader and his victims, and through the words of Rader himself, this special will reveal insights into what drove Rader to become a killer, and how he evaded capture for so many years. Bill Kurtis hosts.
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A woman claims she was framed for the murder of her husband's ex-wife and escapes from prison after serving nine years. Throughout her time as a fugitive, Laurie Bembenek gained astonishing public support.
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Two men serving time for the 1991 rape and murder of a beautiful young woman in Hawaii proclaim their innocence.
A man's murder is orchestrated by his wife and her lover demonstrating the chilling reality of how an online conversation ultimately led to a homicide.
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A man murders his grandfather aided by his stepfather and attempts to appeal to the court that the homicide was justified, claiming the man had abused him for years.
A look at examples of the historical existence of cruel and unusual punishments, although there is a constitutional ban for that type of abuse of prisoners.