A detective who worked on the John Wayne Gacy house has revealed what he saw under the killer's home.
John Wayne Gacy, also known as the Killer Clown or Pogo the Clown, was one of the most infamous serial killers in American history.
Born on March 17, 1942, in Chicago, Illinois, Gacy was responsible for the deaths of at least 33 young men and boys between 1972 and 1978.
Gacy’s murder spree primarily targeted teenage boys and young men, most of whom he lured to his home with promises of work or money in exchange for participation in what he described as "scientific research."
Once in his home, Gacy would handcuff his victims, often under the guise of performing a "trick," and then subject them to brutal torture, sexual assault, and eventually, murder, per Biography.com.
The investigation into Gacy began after the disappearance of 15-year-old Robert Piest in December 1978.
Piest had told a co-worker that he was going to meet Gacy about a potential job, but he was never seen again.
This led police to Gacy’s home, where a search warrant was eventually issued.
Initially, no bodies were found, but when officers noticed a foul odor coming from the crawl space beneath his home, they returned with another warrant.
The investigation, led by Des Plaines inspector Rafael Tovar and his team of ten, uncovered the gruesome reality inside Gacy’s Norwood Park Township home.
For six harrowing months, they worked to clear the remains of 29 bodies, using only their bare hands to avoid damaging evidence crucial for identifying the victims.
Speaking to The Sun Online, Tovar recalled the horror of what they uncovered: “There was a putrid odour, unlike anything else.”
The bodies, in various stages of decomposition, were piled atop one another in trenches dug by Gacy along the crawl space’s edges. The discovery left detectives traumatized, with many still haunted by the memories.
The break in the case came when an officer noticed the smell of decaying flesh seeping through Gacy’s heating system, which was connected to the crawl space.
A second search warrant was issued, and during the excavation, Tovar made a chilling discovery.
“I found a femur bone,” he said, immediately realizing it couldn’t belong to Robert Piest, who had only been missing for 10 days.
“Then we found a second femur—a left femur—and a third left femur. By this point, we’re thinking there’s a whole lot more here.”
Confronted with the impending full excavation of his home, Gacy cooperated, drawing a map of where each body was buried to prevent officers from disturbing his carpets.
However, the physical and emotional toll of unearthing the bodies was immense.
Tovar described the grueling conditions in the basement: “It was very wet, very moist down there. You couldn’t dig with a shovel because we were afraid of breaking a bone or knocking some teeth out.”
Instead, they used small gardening tools and their hands. “We didn’t have all the equipment we have nowadays.”
One particular image seared into Tovar’s memory was that of a decapitated body, the head removed due to Gacy’s method of strangulation.
Decades later, Tovar and his colleagues still meet annually, reflecting on the case that left a permanent mark on their lives.
“It was a case of a lifetime,” Tovar said. “To me, it meant he stopped killing more people and was made to pay for his sins. But I saw the damage he did, and I can’t forget... he was an evil b**tard.”
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