Police Continue Searching for Bodies at Convict’s Home

by Des Plaines (AP)

The remains of three bodies have been found at the home of a convicted sex offender, and other bodies may be buried in earthen mounds there, police said Friday. The owner of the house was charged Friday with murder. And as John W. Gacy Jr., 36, who owns the modest one-story, brick bungalow, was being charged with murdering one missing youth, police were tearing up part of his house to see if more bodies could be found. The skeletal remains of two bodies were removed, the Cook County medical examiner said, one from the crawl space under the house and one from the garage. Both bodies had been buried.

The medical examiner, Dr. Robert J. Stein, said that contrary to what police reported, the two bodies removed are the only two found so far. He said the search would continue today. The finding of three bodies was announced earlier by the Des Plaines police chief. Authorities said Gacy confessed Thursday to strangling Robert Piest, 15, of Des Plaines. Gacy was being held without bond. Authorities said that Gacy, twice divorced and living alone, was convicted in Iowa in 1968 of sex crimes, served time and was paroled in 1971. He had lived in the home where the bodies were discovered for six years and operated a contracting business from it.

Gacy served about 1 1/2 years at the Iowa Men’s Reformatory after pleading guilty in a sexual incident involving a teenage boy in Waterloo, authorities said. In November 1968, Gacy pleaded guilty to a sodomy charge in Waterloo. Police said the incident involved a teenage boy. Gacy was sentenced to 10 years, serving about 18 months before being paroled. Records show that after Gacy was indicted, he also was charged with attempted perjury, going armed with intent, and making malicious threats to extort. Those charges were filed in connection with beating and Macing of a 15-year-old youth in a remote area near Hudson, Iowa.

The charges were dropped when Gacy pleaded guilty to the sodomy charge. Gacy had been manager of three fried chicken stores in Waterloo from 1966 until he went to prison. In 1967, he had been named an outstanding vice president of the Jaycees. The Chicago Tribune reported that several unidentified police investigators said that Gacy has given an oral statement asserting that he strangled 32 young boys. However, repeated checks with various authorities were unable to confirm the report.