Gary Ridgway
What are the root causes of a person becoming a serial killer? There have been many different serial killers over the past years, but only one is the infamous “Green River Killer.” Gary Ridgway was dubbed the “Green River Killer” because many of his first victims were found near the Green River in Washington. There are many factors which contribute as to why a person turns and takes their anger out on other people. Some people have a normal childhood with a loving family, while some are not so lucky. A loving family is built around the parents, but if the parents choose violence over love, then that is what the child will grow up only knowing. Gary Ridgway is an American serial killer who killed over sixty women within a twenty year period.
Gary Ridgway was born in Salt Lake City on February 18, 1949. He was the second of three brothers. Ridgway’s parents were Thomas Newton Ridgway and Mary Rita Steinman. At the time, they rented a room near a local high school. Ridgway’s older brother, Gregory, was born in 1948. Ridgway’s younger brother, Thomas, was born in 1951. In 1960, Ridgway’s parents moved the family into a small three bedroom house in a neighborhood called McMicken Heights which is now the City of SeaTac. He was “Raised near Seattle’s Pacific Highway, a deprived neighborhood near SeaTac airport …” (Biography, 2013). They lived in a working class neighborhood where many other kids lived also. All the kids played together and walked to school together. Ridgway’s father was a metro bus driver whose route was the Pacific Highway South into Seattle. The route went through the infamous strip where Gary would later find so many of his victims. His father also enjoyed running garage sales. Ridgway’s mother was a saleswoman at J.C. Penney in Renton and also a gardener. At home, the Ridgway’s seemed like the typical suburban family. Gary Ridgway grew up in a troubled home life. Relatives remember describing Ridgway’s mother as being very authoritative. Ridgway witnessed his parents violently arguing more than one time. His mom would scream at her sons while dad spanked them. He would wet the bed as a child and his mother would bathe him immediately after discovering the accidents. He was a bed wetter into his early teens. Ridgway’s mother would disparage him around other family members. He had inconsistent feelings of anger and sexual attraction towards his mother. He would gaze upon his mother when she sunbathed and he had sexual fantasies about her. Almost in the same breath, Ridgway would feel rage about his mother in that he wanted to kill her.
Most serial killers have a rich fantasy life that involves sexuality and violence fused together. They come to believe that they can’t have one without the other. The first time that they kill may even be on a lark. This seemed to be the case when Ridgway acted on one homicidal urge when he was sixteen. “When Gary was sixteen, he came up on a six year old boy playing and lured the boy...
