1949–present
Gary Ridgway Today: “Green River Killer” Offered to Locate Other Victims
Gary Ridgway, the infamous “Green River Killer,” was mysteriously moved between prisons in September 2024, and now we know why.
The Seattle Times reported that 76-year-old Ridgway briefly left the Washington State Penitentiary in Walla Walla, Washington, because he told investigators he could help them find the remains of more of his victims. According to recently unsealed court documents, he offered to take sheriff’s detectives to multiple locations in King County and was briefly transferred to the King County Jail.
A sheriff’s spokesperson declined to reveal if any additional remains were found with Ridgway’s information, only telling the outlet that “the involved cases remain open.”
Ridgway has pleaded guilty to 49 murders and is currently serving the same number of consecutive life sentences in prison. However, he has claimed responsibility for 75 to 80 killings in previous interviews.
Police have identified victims of Ridgway as recently as December 2023, when they confirmed remains found in 1985 as those of 15-year-old Lori Anne Razpotnik.
Who Is Gary Ridgway?
Serial killer Gary Ridgway, originally from Utah, held a job painting trucks for 30 years and was married three times. He began murdering women in 1982 and was caught in 2001 when a DNA test had revealed a match. Ridgway has claimed he killed at least 71 people along Route 99 in south King County, Washington. He eventually pleaded guilty to 49 counts of aggravated first-degree murder and has received multiple life sentences in prison, where he remains today.
Quick Facts
FULL NAME: Gary Leon Ridgway
BORN: February 18, 1949
BIRTHPLACE: Salt Lake City, Utah
SPOUSES: Claudia Barrows (1970–1972), Marcia Brown (1973–1981), and Judith Lynch (1988–2002)
ASTROLOGICAL SIGN: Aquarius
Early Life
Gary Leon Ridgway was born on February 18, 1949, in Salt Lake City. Raised near Seattle’s Pacific Highway, a deprived neighborhood near SeaTac airport, Ridgway was a poor student and was sent to Vietnam after high school. When he returned, he got a job painting trucks, which he kept for 30 years. Although he married three times and was fanatical about religion, Ridgway was a frequent customer of prostitutes.
Green River Victims
Ridgway’s slayings began in 1982, when young runaways and prostitutes began disappearing from state Route 99 in south King County, Washington. He brought many of them to his home and strangled them, then left them in woodsy, remote sites. The first few bodies turned up along the now-notorious Green River.
Dubbed the Green River Killer, Ridgway eluded the law until 2001, when King County sheriff Dave Reichert, the first officer assigned to the case in 1982, called a meeting to re-examine evidence using newly developed DNA-testing technology. The analysis produced a match between evidence from the victims and Ridgway, and he was charged with four counts of aggravated murder in December 2001. Ridgway eventually pleaded guilty to 49 counts of aggravated first-degree murder.
Facing the prospect of execution, Ridgway made a deal with investigators to revealed where he had hidden the bodies of several of the young women who had yet to be found while also agreeing to plead guilty to any future cases where his confession could be substantiated by evidence. He was sentenced to life in prison in December 2003, having committed more murders than any serial killer in American history at the time. (In 2012, authorities apprehended Samuel Little on a drug charge and eventually confirmed he killed as many as 60 victims.) Ridgway is currently incarcerated at Washington State Penitentiary.
An additional body was found in 2011, with Ridgway receiving another life sentence. In 2013, he claimed in one media interview that he had murdered 75 to 80 women, with speculation over Ridgway was telling the truth or seeking further attention.
Recently Identified Victims
In 2020, police identified 14-year-old Wendy Stephens as Ridgway’s youngest known victim. Stephens had run away from home in August 1983, and her remains were recovered from a swamp behind a baseball field the following year.
Three years later, in December 2023, the King County Sheriff’s Office in Washington announced it had identified another victim through DNA technology: Lori Anne Razpotnik, who ran away from home at age 15 in 1982 and was never seen again. Her remains were discovered in 1985 and became known as “Bones 17” during the investigation. Ridgway admitted in 2002 that he placed two of his victims in the area where Razpotnik was found.
According to court documents unsealed in March 2025, Ridgway was briefly transferred from Washington State Penitentiary in September 2024 after telling detectives he could help them find the remains of multiple unidentified victims in King County. It isn’t yet known if the excursion led to any findings, with authorities saying that multiple cases remain open.
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