Dr. Jeffrey Smalldon

And I wrote him a letter, told him that I'd read several books about his case.

He would have known from reading my letter that I knew quite a bit about it.

And I said, I didn't mention the hospital murders.

From that first letter, I just wanted to engage him.

And I told him, you know, are you willing to talk with me, have a dialogue through letters in true narcissist fashion?

He said, if you think you know one thing about me from those books you've read, I am sorry to tell you you're wrong.

You don't know one thing about me.

Like, he's the black box with all the privileged information and you can come get it or not, but don't think you found it anywhere else.

You need to come to the source.

And that began a correspondence that lasted three calendar years.

And he began calling me on the phone once in a while.

But he said, after we'd been corresponding for about seven months, why don't you come visit me?

I hadn't thought of doing that.

It was 450 miles away from where I lived, but I decided, well, I mean, I always remind people when I tell this story,

I was early on in my graduate work.

I had never, when I went out to visit Gacy, I had never before been in the same room as someone known to have committed murder, even one murder.

That's how green I was.

And I drove out there to see him and spent two days with him on that first visit and then made a subsequent visit where I also spent two days.

Well, quite a few things.

You know, I think I said before he was a world-class bullshitter.