Green River killer heading back to Washington State Penitentiary
Sep 18, 2015, 4:09 PM | Updated: 4:43 pm
Gary Ridgway will return to the Washington State Penitentiary in Walla Walla, according to the Department of Corrections. (AP)
(AP)
The Green River killer is on his way back to Washington.
Gary Ridgway will return to the Washington State Penitentiary in Walla Walla, according to the Department of Corrections.
The decision was made after law enforcement raised concerns of Ridgway’s availability for future murder investigations. Ridgway will return from the U.S. Penitentiary in Florence, Colo.
The decision to transfer Ridgway to Colorado because of the high level of security and personnel needed to house him at a state penitentiary. The facility in Colorado he was headed to is designed to manage high-risk inmates, which includes the Unabomber and one of the Oklahoma City bombers. However, Ridgway never made it that facility, as he was in another facility designed for intake and assessment. Since his arrival in Colorado, Ridgway has been housed in a maximum custody cell by himself with no access to the general prison population.
Ridgway, known as the Green River killer for murdering 49 people over 20 years, was convicted in 2004. After his arrest in 2001 based on DNA evidence, Ridgway agreed to a plea bargain with the King County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office, in which he agreed to detail his crimes in exchange for no death penalty.
Prosecutors were eventually able to charge him with 48 murders between 1982 and 1998.
He pleaded guilty in 2011 to a 49th murder. By Ridgway’s own count, the number of victims is closer to 70.
The 66-year-old man is serving a life sentence without parole.
The Associated Press contributed to this story.
