Green River Killer

Gary Ridgway
Mugshot in November 2001
Born	Gary Leon Ridgway (1949-02-18) February 18, 1949 (age 67) Salt Lake City, Utah, U.S.
Other names	The Green River Killer
Criminal penalty	Life imprisonment without parole
Spouse(s)	Claudia Kraig Barrows (m. August 15, 1970; div. January 14, 1972) Marcia Lorene Brown (m. December 14, 1973; div. May 27, 1981) Judith Lorraine Lynch (m. June 12, 1988; div. September 5, 2002)
Conviction(s)	Murder Solicitation
Killings
Victims	Convicted of 49, confessed to 71, presumed to be at least 90+
Span of killings	1982–1998 confirmed, but could be as recent as 2001
Country	United States
State(s)	Washington
Date apprehended	November 30, 2001
Imprisoned at	Washington State Penitentiary, Walla Walla, Washington

Gary Leon Ridgway (born February 18, 1949) is an American serial killer known as the Green River Killer. He was initially convicted of 48 separate murders and later confessed to nearly twice that number. As part of his plea bargain, an additional conviction was added, bringing the total number of convictions to 49, making him the most prolific American serial killer in history according to confirmed murders. He murdered numerous women and girls in Washington State during the 1980s and 1990s. Most of his victims were alleged to be prostitutes and other women in vulnerable situations, including underage runaways. The press gave him his nickname after the first five victims were found in the Green River before his identity was known. He strangled the women, usually by hand but sometimes using ligatures. After strangling them, he would dump their bodies in forested and overgrown areas in King County, often returning to the dead bodies to have sexual intercourse with them.

On November 30, 2001, as he was leaving the Kenworth truck factory where he worked in Renton, Washington, he was arrested for the murders of four women whose cases were linked to him through DNA evidence. As part of a plea bargain wherein he agreed to disclose the locations of still-missing women, he was spared the death penalty and received a sentence of life imprisonment without parole.

Gary Leon Ridgway was born on February 18, 1949, in Salt Lake City, Utah. He was the second of Mary and Thomas Ridgway's three sons. His home life was somewhat troubled; relatives have described his mother as domineering and have said that young Ridgway witnessed more than one violent argument between his parents. His father was a bus driver who would often complain about the presence of prostitutes. Gary Ridgway was tested with an I.Q. of 82. When he was 16, he stabbed a six-year-old boy, who survived the attack. He had led the boy into the woods and then stabbed him through the ribs into his liver.