What Turns People Into Serial Killers?

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One summer day in 1976, Jimmy appeared in the kitchen of the Haakenson house in St. Paul, his brown hair bleached blond. Carrying no backpack or suitcase, he told his family that he was off to Chicago. Jimmy had been known to leave home before, seeking fun and relief from a crowded house with four children, a mother who held as many as three jobs and a frequently absent father who worked as a plumber but also drank heavily. Jimmy had always come back.

Word that he had made it there safely came on Aug. 5. Jimmy called home and spoke to his mother, June Haakenson, assuring her that he was fine.

But then weeks passed with no word from him. Ms. Haakenson, a quiet, reserved woman, reported Jimmy missing to the police. In a message dated Sept. 7, 1976, the St. Paul police alerted the Chicago Police Department. “Mother thinks he may be in company of gays in Chicago,” the letter said. Family members said he was seen wearing makeup that summer.

“When he didn’t come back, we knew something had to have gone wrong,” Jackie Haakenson said. “What are the chances he met up with Gacy?”

A search revealed 29 bodies in or near Gacy’s house, 26 of which were found in the home’s crawl space. Four more were found in the nearby Des Plaines River. Mr. Gacy had abducted and raped some victims, and lured others to his home by promising them construction jobs or sex. Then he killed them, often by strangulation.

He then asked Donald Haakenson and Ms. Sisterman to submit DNA samples; Jimmy’s parents had both been dead for years.

“I didn’t want him to be dead, and especially dying the way he did,” Jeff Haakenson said. “But I’m relieved that he’s found, that he’s not missing anymore.”

Ms. Sisterman said she was grateful that her mother was not alive to hear it. “It would have killed her, literally,” she said.