US Politics | I dug bones out of the mud beneath John Wayne Gacy’s home with my bare hands – my photos show the full horrors
A DETECTIVE used his bare hands to dig up victims buried under John Wayne Gacy's home \- what he saw and smelled that day still haunts him. Retired Des Plaines inspector Rafael Tovar and his team of 10 discovered 29 decaying bodies hidden across Gacy's Norwood Park Township residence. 
John Wayne Gacy raped, tortured and murdered 33 young men and boys between 1972 and 1978Rex Features 
Gacy buried his victims in a crawl space under the family homeRafael Tovar 
Rafael TovarDes Plaines officers dug out 26 bodies from Gacy's crawl space '/ ' 
Rafael TovarRafael Tovar remembers stumbling across two left femurs '/ ' 
GettyOfficers remember the ...putrid' smell of rotting flesh at Gacy's home '/ ' They arrived at the Illinois property one cold winter's day following a tip off that Robert Piest, a missing 15-year-old boy, had followed Gacy home on December 11, 1978. Though the search failed to turn up the boy, one of the officers noticed the smell of rotting flesh coming from Gacy's heating system, which ran from an underground crawl space. Des Plaines police returned with a second search warrant and began digging. What they experienced that day would turn their lives upside down, forcing some to quit or turn to the bottle to deal with the emotional toll of it all. Among the first finds the seasoned officers discovered was a left femur. READ MORE ON SERIAL KILLERS 
WORST NIGHTMARE Dahmer tortured and killed my dad - now the murderer stalks me in my sleep ...It was a bone already so we knew it couldn't have been Robert Piest because it had only been 10 days 'since his disappearance '. ...So then we kept digging and found a second femur \- a left femur \- and then we found a third left femur. By this point we're thinking there's a whole lot more here,... he told The Sun Online. After the initial find, cops tore up Gacy's floor to find more rotting bodies scattered around the home. Gacy had poured quicklime over his victims to speed up the decomposition process but once officers cut through that ...there was a putrid odour, unlike anything else..., Mr Tovar said. Most read in The US Sun 'INDESCRIBABLE LOSS' US students, 20, named among 153 killed in Seoul Halloween crush 'THE NICEST' Amanda Knox & ex reunite 15 years after arrest for Meredith Kercher murder HORROR FIND Missing woman found dead days after sending chilling final text to boyfriend TIME WARP Eerie 1938 footage 'proves' time travellers exist can you spot 'quantum leaper'? MAMA DRAMA Teen Mom fans in shock after Ashley Jones 'leaks phone call' with Amber Portwood NAME SHAME I know my kids will get bullied for their names but I'm going with them anyway When investigators told Gacy they planned on digging up his crawl space, he immediately cooperated and drew them a map pinpointing all the bodies. Mr Tovar said Gacy told officers he wanted them ...to be careful because I don't want you to dirty up my carpets so I'll tell you exactly where everything is.... ...It's a dodgy thing to say. There were 29 bodies in the house! ...He had absolutely no feelings whatsoever about human life. For him, killing an individual was like stepping on an ant. He had no moral fibre whatsoever.... Gacy, dubbed the ...killer clown... because he worked as one prior to his crimes \- was sentenced to death over murder of 33 young men and boys in Illinois during 1972 and 1978. He is said to have officers that he liked being a clown because they ...can get away with murder.... Most of his victims were buried in a small crawl space underneath his house of horrors, while others were thrown into the Des Plaines River. Gacy deceived many of his victims by telling them he needed their help with "scientific research", for which he would pay them up to $50 each. After luring the boys to his house, through lies or at gunpoint, Gacy would then ply them with alcohol and trick them into putting on handcuffs, occasionally as part of his clown routine. Then, once they were defenceless, he would torment his teenage victims, before raping them and finishing with what he called "the rope trick": strangling the boys with a length of rope. Many were ...runaways... \- boys from broken families whose disappearance would go unnoticed. Some were homosexual, which was a taboo at the time. One of the bodies belonged to the son of a Chicago police officer who begged Mr Tovar to keep his son's sexuality a secret. 
GettyOfficers worked day and night in cramp and cold conditions to get the victims out '/ ' 
Cops removed Gacy's flooring to access victims' bodiesRafael Tovar 
AP:Associated PressCops took six months to clear all the bodies, which were scattered around the property '/ ' Officers spent six months in dark, cold and cramped conditions clearing Gacy's crawl space, which took its own emotional toll. Two of Mr Tovar's men went on to face disciplinary hearings while others struggled to process the horror scenes of bodies stacked on bodies, decomposing slowly. Officers dug up corpses whose heads had detached themselves from the spine because of the way Gacy strangled them. Others were in such a state they couldn't be identified, according to Mr Tovar. ...He had them all around the outer edges of the house and he had dug up some trenches. Some of them he put one on top of the other,... the retired detective explained. ...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 because that was the only way we were going to identify them, so you dug with a very small gardening tool and then you used your hands. For him, killing an individual was like stepping on an ant. He had no moral fibre whatsoever Ret. Det. Rafael Tovar ...You couldn't wear gloves because the moment you stuck your hands into the mud, you pulled your hand out and it would suck the gloves right off you. So, by that time, we just decided to go at it. We didn't have all the equipment we have nowadays.... Mr Tovar's crew got the bodies out ...pretty quickly... after excavating eight feet down across the entire length and width of the property. The men piled the remains into body bags and triple checked mounds of mud to make sure they hadn't missed anything. He said there was one particular body in the south-west corner of the house that had 70 per cent of flesh on it, which had hardened up. The case still haunts Mr Tovar to this day and he meets with his old cop pals once a year for ...a bit of therapy.... ...It was a case of a lifetime,... he told us. ...To me it meant he stopped killing more people and was made to pay for his sins. Read More on The Sun 
PICK N SIX I'm a mum-of-6 and have strict rules to cope - they sound crazy but I don't care ...I was very proud and happy with all my colleagues who started with nothing and broke this case. ...But I saw the damage he did and I can't forget... he was an evil bastard.... 
Gacy performed as ...POGO the clown' at charity events and partiesRafael Tovar 
Retired Detective Rafael Tovar, 78, was among the first officers to arrive at Gacy's home 
.Five of Gacy's 33 victims remain unidentified '/ '
John Wayne Gacy raped, tortured and murdered 33 young men and boys between 1972 and 1978Rex Features Gacy buried his victims in a crawl space under the family homeRafael Tovar Rafael TovarDes Plaines officers dug out 26 bodies from Gacy's crawl space '/ ' Rafael TovarRafael Tovar remembers stumbling across two left femurs '/ ' GettyOfficers remember the ...putrid' smell of rotting flesh at Gacy's home '/ ' They arrived at the Illinois property one cold winter's day following a tip off that Robert Piest, a missing 15-year-old boy, had followed Gacy home on December 11, 1978. Though the search failed to turn up the boy, one of the officers noticed the smell of rotting flesh coming from Gacy's heating system, which ran from an underground crawl space. Des Plaines police returned with a second search warrant and began digging. What they experienced that day would turn their lives upside down, forcing some to quit or turn to the bottle to deal with the emotional toll of it all. Among the first finds the seasoned officers discovered was a left femur. READ MORE ON SERIAL KILLERS WORST NIGHTMARE Dahmer tortured and killed my dad - now the murderer stalks me in my sleep ...It was a bone already so we knew it couldn't have been Robert Piest because it had only been 10 days 'since his disappearance '. ...So then we kept digging and found a second femur \- a left femur \- and then we found a third left femur. By this point we're thinking there's a whole lot more here,... he told The Sun Online. After the initial find, cops tore up Gacy's floor to find more rotting bodies scattered around the home. Gacy had poured quicklime over his victims to speed up the decomposition process but once officers cut through that ...there was a putrid odour, unlike anything else..., Mr Tovar said. Most read in The US Sun 'INDESCRIBABLE LOSS' US students, 20, named among 153 killed in Seoul Halloween crush 'THE NICEST' Amanda Knox & ex reunite 15 years after arrest for Meredith Kercher murder HORROR FIND Missing woman found dead days after sending chilling final text to boyfriend TIME WARP Eerie 1938 footage 'proves' time travellers exist can you spot 'quantum leaper'? MAMA DRAMA Teen Mom fans in shock after Ashley Jones 'leaks phone call' with Amber Portwood NAME SHAME I know my kids will get bullied for their names but I'm going with them anyway When investigators told Gacy they planned on digging up his crawl space, he immediately cooperated and drew them a map pinpointing all the bodies. Mr Tovar said Gacy told officers he wanted them ...to be careful because I don't want you to dirty up my carpets so I'll tell you exactly where everything is.... ...It's a dodgy thing to say. There were 29 bodies in the house! ...He had absolutely no feelings whatsoever about human life. For him, killing an individual was like stepping on an ant. He had no moral fibre whatsoever.... Gacy, dubbed the ...killer clown... because he worked as one prior to his crimes \- was sentenced to death over murder of 33 young men and boys in Illinois during 1972 and 1978. He is said to have officers that he liked being a clown because they ...can get away with murder.... Most of his victims were buried in a small crawl space underneath his house of horrors, while others were thrown into the Des Plaines River. Gacy deceived many of his victims by telling them he needed their help with "scientific research", for which he would pay them up to $50 each. After luring the boys to his house, through lies or at gunpoint, Gacy would then ply them with alcohol and trick them into putting on handcuffs, occasionally as part of his clown routine. Then, once they were defenceless, he would torment his teenage victims, before raping them and finishing with what he called "the rope trick": strangling the boys with a length of rope. Many were ...runaways... \- boys from broken families whose disappearance would go unnoticed. Some were homosexual, which was a taboo at the time. One of the bodies belonged to the son of a Chicago police officer who begged Mr Tovar to keep his son's sexuality a secret. GettyOfficers worked day and night in cramp and cold conditions to get the victims out '/ ' Cops removed Gacy's flooring to access victims' bodiesRafael Tovar AP:Associated PressCops took six months to clear all the bodies, which were scattered around the property '/ ' Officers spent six months in dark, cold and cramped conditions clearing Gacy's crawl space, which took its own emotional toll. Two of Mr Tovar's men went on to face disciplinary hearings while others struggled to process the horror scenes of bodies stacked on bodies, decomposing slowly. Officers dug up corpses whose heads had detached themselves from the spine because of the way Gacy strangled them. Others were in such a state they couldn't be identified, according to Mr Tovar. ...He had them all around the outer edges of the house and he had dug up some trenches. Some of them he put one on top of the other,... the retired detective explained. ...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 because that was the only way we were going to identify them, so you dug with a very small gardening tool and then you used your hands. For him, killing an individual was like stepping on an ant. He had no moral fibre whatsoever Ret. Det. Rafael Tovar ...You couldn't wear gloves because the moment you stuck your hands into the mud, you pulled your hand out and it would suck the gloves right off you. So, by that time, we just decided to go at it. We didn't have all the equipment we have nowadays.... Mr Tovar's crew got the bodies out ...pretty quickly... after excavating eight feet down across the entire length and width of the property. The men piled the remains into body bags and triple checked mounds of mud to make sure they hadn't missed anything. He said there was one particular body in the south-west corner of the house that had 70 per cent of flesh on it, which had hardened up. The case still haunts Mr Tovar to this day and he meets with his old cop pals once a year for ...a bit of therapy.... ...It was a case of a lifetime,... he told us. ...To me it meant he stopped killing more people and was made to pay for his sins. Read More on The Sun PICK N SIX I'm a mum-of-6 and have strict rules to cope - they sound crazy but I don't care ...I was very proud and happy with all my colleagues who started with nothing and broke this case. ...But I saw the damage he did and I can't forget... he was an evil bastard.... Gacy performed as ...POGO the clown' at charity events and partiesRafael Tovar Retired Detective Rafael Tovar, 78, was among the first officers to arrive at Gacy's home .Five of Gacy's 33 victims remain unidentified '/ '
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