Green River Hero Gets Miniseries Makeover

Janitorial in the sense he was always cleaning up after the fact.

As for supported statements about performance, the very fact he rode his notoriety from the case to get to where he is today is relevant. Was it the only reason people like him? No, some vote Republican regardless of who the opponent is.

As for playing arm chair QB for what could have been done differently, good question. Apparently the fact GLR was a suspect was a joke at his work. His coworkers KNEW he was a suspect as early as the mid 80s and he was killing well into the '90s. I do know funding to the GRTF was cut but still, the suspect was actively hunting and successfully.

The bigger point which cannot be debated is Dave Reichert is the one celebrated element to come out of the saga in the last 30 years and I find this notoriety to be bogus and somewhat unearned as it came at a ludicrous cost. Apparently we aren't going to agree on that point.

Let's take this a piece at a time.

Something isn't right? Well, yeah, You had an evil effective predator killing women living at the very margins of society. This was a horrible string of crimes. I would love it if you could have listed 3 things that could have been done to prevent this. Note that when you list these things try to point out the constraints that a real life police force with budget and personnel has to balance to implement these preventative actions. I would point out that free societies have never been successful at curbing prostitution.

Janitorial? Ok, please give me just two reasons why this was janitorial. Please to to make this somewhat specific.

Established fact? No, It is extremely sad that 48 women were killed. But unless you say that having more than 1 was too long then where was the line crossed? 10? 20? 30? Where in the string of murders did Gary R become a person of interest? What should they have done at that point?

Tony E's Crowd? Err, I keep looking over my shoulder and I don't see anyone there.

You seem to have a strong feelings about how fast things should be solved. RIGHT now on Beacon Hill there have been a string of sexual assaults against Asian women walking home from bus stops at night. It's been going on for a couple of years I think. It's up to 22 or 23 attacks. Please, let me know what the police are doing wrong. If you could explain *why* the police are falling to do the right things that would be even more helpful.

Let me change things slightly here. I did not vote for our current governor Christine Gregoire. I did not vote for her because of MY perception of her performance as a public servant. But, she won the election. For the life of me I can't think of any reason NOT to vote for her now. She appears to be an extremely effective governor. Her likely opponent (who I originally voted for) appears to have absolutely no compelling argument why he should replace her.

I bring this up because I think unsupported pronouncements about performance in a previous position serve no purpose. I bet you could come up with a lot of reasons having to do with his voting record as a member of the House.

The thing that makes this information medium SO much better than something like television news or talk radio or newspapers is that you have the REAL opportunity to educate me. You have the opportunity to do it without any interference of some host or the constraints of ads or whether will it fit on some letters to the editor page. You have the time and vast information resources. We live in a wonderful time for the exchange of ideas and it will only get better.

Nobody is assuming it is an easy job, but when the definition of your job is to protect the public and you happen to preside over the worst serial killings in US history, something isn't right.

If Reichert were a Democrat I'm pretty sure I'd still feel he has the dubious honor of leading an investigation that was more janitorial than it was preemptive.

It isn't a matter of thinking the case took too long to be solved, that is an established fact as evidenced by 48 counts of murder. Regardless, Reichert is a celebrity now so it appears Tony E's crowd wins the talking points battle.

Again, this is amazing.

I am not a cop. I will NOT assume that it is an easy job. I will NOT believe that all cases can be solved in 40 minutes with time for 4 commercial breaks. I do assume that it is a really shitty job where the vast majority of your "customers" are not happy at all to be workiing with you and in fact some will attempt to do serious bodily harm to you. Most customers are drunk and many are very stupid.

The GR case had a lot of people working on it. Again one MUST assume that some were VERY VERY good at their jobs. This large group did in fact identify Gary R. early, did look at him VERY closely, did in fact administer a lie detector test, did take dna samples from him but forensic abilities at the time were not sufficient. In fact, he was arrested when forensics improved, and were applied on evidence gathered years before. No amount of stamping your feet on the ground and shouting GO FASTER would have made things go faster. Gary R. seems to have been a very effective (sick, evil, without any redeeming value) predator.

Dave R. was a/the lead in this effort. Somebody has to be in the lead in any group effort. Rarely is that leader the most important contributor to the effort, but they often get a lot of credit. This is the nature things. It is neither fair nor unfair. It simply is.

Dave R. did in fact decide try a different form of public service after being KC Sheriff. So he points to his years of public service as something the voters should consider when deciding to vote for him. This is absolutely something he should do. One thing some here may have forgotten is that it was NOT at all apparent to ANYONE in King County politics which party (Dem. or Rep.) he would run for Congress with.

So, if he had decided to run Democrat and been elected as a Democrat would the antipathy directed at him by some be as strong?

Who were his opponents?

1) A radio talk show host. (Job descript: Get your listeners riled up about a controversial topic so they call in. Others listen. Sell advertisements to show.) Hard to compare this as public service.

2) A Microsoft manager. (Sorry, I'm a former MSFT engineer. I can simply not give an unbiased description of this form of human existence) Again though, this seems like a tough comparison to make as to public service.

Next opponent - Same Msft manager he BEAT in 2006! Hmmm.

I moved to Seattle from Redmond in 1998. I have never voted for Dave R. in his runs for the House. (I don't recall whether I ever voted in a King County Sheriff election that he participated in.) I will never have a chance to vote in his House elections. I do not in fact know that I would vote for him even if I had a chance to. However, the vitriolic ramblings about how the Green River case not being solved as quickly as some think it "should" have adds NOTHING to the discussion.

What's worse, not catching the worst serial killer in US history until well after his "prime" or using the name recognition you got from that case to catapult yourself into celebrity?

This is amazing.

Let's ignore "rabid leftist tendencies". Basically a judgement is made on Mr. Reichert in the context of an interrogation of a complete sicko. He had to sit and repeatedly try to extract desired information from an extremely evil person. Somebody had to go into that room and talk Ridgway. I am so very glad it wasn't me or anyone else that I cared about. Somebody had to go in an clean the cesspool and an objection is made that he came out stinky.

Here is the more interesting question. What's worse, the person who has to do this as their job or the person who reads about it for "educational" or entertainment purposes.

Aside from my generally rabid leftist tendencies--which make me automatically, dislike Reichert as a Republican congressman--I remember reading this about a year ago in Seattle Weekly. The following are exchanges between Reichert and Ridgway, as recorded in Tomas Guillen's Serial Killers: Issues Explored Through the Green River Murders and reprinted in the Weekly article referenced above. The Weekly article also appears to have video of these exchanges, though I didn't watch to see if it worked.

Reichert: Is that something you ever thought about doing? Being a cop?

Ridgway: I thought about being a doctor and a cop.

Reichert: Yeah. What kind of doctor?

Ridgway: Just a doctor. You know when you're young you . . .

Reichert: Not a gynecologist?

Ridgway: No. Not a gynecologist.

Reichert: (Laughing) Just a doctor.

Reichert: Did you ever play doctor when you were a little boy? . . . The neighborhood girls?

Ridgway: A cousin. I gave her a— a penny to see what her, uh, vagina looked like.

Reichert: Big—big spender.

Ridgway: And of course I got caught and got whipped, you know.

Reichert: You should've given her a dollar instead of a penny.

And, of course...

[Reichert speaking to Ridgway about a dead dog]: "Was it around the neighbor—, did it happen to kind of wander down and just bark or something when you were trying to get rid of the body? Now that would make sense, see . . . you don't choke the dog doggie style. . . . Like your favorite style (laughs).

Ridgway: Yeah, (unintelligible) doggie style, yeah, doggie.

Reichert: Pretty good for a sheriff, huh (laughs)?

Reichert: Did you ever think about somehow trying to figure out a way to keep it?

Ridgway: Never, uh, never, never thought about cutting them off or anything like that.

Reichert: Maybe keep, you know, in the, in the freezer or something?

Ridgway: I never thought about it. Never thought about that or, or anything that, uh, uh, from a woman's body, to keep it someplace, it never, uh, thought of cutting anything off like, like a breast or something like that.

Reichert: How come?

Ridgway: I don't know . . .

Reichert: Plus, your wife when, uh, open up a freezer and see a boob in there. . . . Wouldn't be good?

Ridgway: Or a, or a clitoris in there, a couple of them, you know.

Reichert: You'd have a lot of explaining to do?

Ridgway: Uh-huh.

Reichert: (Laughs)

Ridgway: Or girlfriend, uh, come over, hey, I need to get some ice out of the refrigerator.

Reichert: Yeah.

Ridgway: What's this?

Reichert: (Laughs) Exactly. Well, and then what would you say?

Ridgway: Uh, I don't know what I would say. Uh, maybe, uh, those are, uh, oysters.

Reichert: Think she'd buy that?

Ridgway: Uh, (unintelligible) she cook it up.

I'm confused. He's in the House. He's ALWAYS up for re-election soon.

Further, he wrote a book about something he was involved with for a long time. There are VERY few writers in the world who wouldn't be happy to sell movie rights to their work.

In addition, while some of the seattlest bloggers and commenters might have extensive law enforcement backgrounds which permit them to judge the efficiency of a difficult investigation, I work from the assumption that at least 10 percent of the people who worked on the investigation were VERY good at their jobs. By their very nature, these preditors seem to take a long time to capture. Still, some things just don't happen quick enough for the peanut gallery.

As for irrational media darling... It is my impression that journalist are nice to elected officials that provide of access. This is NOT a bad thing for a public official to provide.

And finally, perhaps there is a desire to see someone else in the House seat currently occupied by Mr. Reichert, say someone from a different party. He's been elected twice now. The last one in a VERY difficult environment for a one term Republican. Unless one wishes to assume that the voters in his district are stupid, he must be doing something meets the needs of his district OR that his opponents are particularly weak.

As an aside: Now that we have a top-two primary, perhaps there will be a more interesting race in his district. (One might even think that the City of Seattle might get a different member of the House because of the top-two.)

How convenient. If I'm not mistaken, he's up for re-election soon.