John Wayne Gacy Criminal Profile
Michael Vass
Marshall University One of the most terrifying things that can happen within a community is to find out that a serial killer is on the loose. Nothing can draw in the attention of millions of people worldwide quite like news of mass killings. For whatever reason, after all of the chaos and danger that can potentially come from a serial killer, people become extremely interested in these killers. Movies and documentaries are made, books are written, and countless numbers of people like to spend their free time learning about these killers. Due to this obsession, it might appear to some that serial killings are common, especially in the United States. This, however, is simply not the case. According …show more content…
These serial killers are some of the most brutal and violent people that have ever lived. One of the most “famous” serial killers today is John Wayne Gacy. Convicted of the rape and murder of 33 male victims, mostly teenagers, Gacy will go down in history as one of the worst serial killers in U.S. history. The purpose of this paper is to provide a criminal profile on this man, John Wayne Gacy.
John Wayne Gacy was born on March 17, 1942 in Chicago, Illinois. His father, John Stanley Gacy, worked in automobile repairs and his mother, Marion Elaine Robinson, was a stay at home mom. Gacy was of Polish and Danish descent, as his grandparents had immigrated to the United States. Gacy was the middle child of the family, having both an older and a younger sister. As a child, Gacy had a close relationship with his mother and his sisters. Gacy’s father was an alcoholic and would often abuse his family, both physically and verbally. This, of course, resulted in a difficult relationship for Gacy and his …show more content…
Gacy has stated that one of his earliest memories of his childhood was of his father beating him with a belt (Cahill & Ewing, 1986). This went on to be a common occurrence of Gacy’s childhood. His father would often beat him with a belt, sometimes for no reason at all. Along with the physical abuse, Gacy’s father would often engage in verbal abuse, telling him that he was stupid and comparing him to his sisters in a feminine way. In later years, Gacy acknowledged that he was never good enough for his father, but would always deny that he hated him (Cahill & Ewing,