For seven frustrating years, law-enforcement officials in the Pacific Northwest have combed the region for the mysterious Green River killer, so named because many of his victims were found near the Green River in King County, Wash. Between 1982 and 1984, when the murder spree appears to have ended, the shadowy killer may have snuffed out the lives of 48 women, most of them drifters or prostitutes, who were stabbed or strangled. After committing more than $15 million and as many as 55 officers to one of the biggest manhunts in U.S. history, police have finally identified a "viable suspect": William Jay Stevens II, 38, a former law student who is in the King County Jail on charges that include burglary and assault.
At first glance, Stevens seemed an unlikely candidate for a killer. Police were tipped off that he might be the slayer when a December 1988 episode of the syndicated television program Manhunt prompted calls from people who suspected he was the murderer. At the time, Stevens was in his last year at Gonzaga University Law School in Spokane and president of the student body. But his identity as an unassuming law student began to unravel quickly as investigators discovered that Stevens had been convicted in 1979 of stealing police equipment and had disappeared from a work-release program in 1981. Stevens was arrested on the old charges and sent back to jail.
After he was returned to custody, even more damaging evidence began to emerge. Investigators had long believed that the killer was either a policeman or a person posing as a police officer who lured his victims to their deaths with offers of assistance or by intimidating them. A search of Stevens' parents' property produced a police car, 100 police badges, 29 firearms and 26 license plates. This month the police obtained a search warrant in response to a 40-page affidavit prepared by the Green River Task Force, the group of King County officers assigned to the case. Recovered from Stevens' residence and his parents' home in Spokane were 55 boxes and bags of additional evidence, including 1,800 videotapes.
The affidavit sets out Stevens' life as a fugitive in chilling detail. A paper trail of credit-card slips places Stevens in proximity to 17 of the Green River crime scenes. In addition to the 48 Green River murders, the affidavit suggests, Stevens may also be responsible for at least a dozen other killings in Seattle, Portland and Tacoma. Informants alleged that he carried photographs of mutilated women and frequented prostitutes. One source quoted him as saying that he worked with Seattle vice detectives and in the line of duty "often was involved in the torture of prostitutes." Stevens also reportedly said he would like to have a videotape of "cutting up prostitutes." Informants added that he led them to believe that he worked for a secret government agency and went on secret "missions."