Son of Gary Ridgway
Matthew Ridgway remembers his father as a relaxed man, who never got angry. A man who took him camping and taught him how to play baseball. Matthew says he's father was always there, school concerts and every baseball game, and always there for him just like a normal father.
"I don't think I ever remember him not being there" - M. Ridgway
During the years when Gary Ridgway was taking his son on bike rides and numerous camping trips, he also was terrorizing the South Sound by killing women and dumping their bodies in deserted areas. Gary Ridgway told investigators this summer he sometimes showed his son's picture or the boy's room at his home to women to put them at ease. Reporters say in July 1982, Ridgway picked up a woman with his son in the car, killed her in a nearby woods, and then told the boy the woman had decided to walk home.
Even though Matthew's mother told him when he was in fourth or fifth grade that police were questioning his father about the murders, he never believed his dad could be the Green River Killer.
When he was younger, Matthew Ridgway said he thought his father was just one of 500 possible suspects in the killings. "I think that's how I related," Matthew said in 2001, "that he's just one of the guys that happened to be one place and, you know, he's my dad. He didn't do it, you know."
"I don't think I ever remember him not being there" - M. Ridgway
During the years when Gary Ridgway was taking his son on bike rides and numerous camping trips, he also was terrorizing the South Sound by killing women and dumping their bodies in deserted areas. Gary Ridgway told investigators this summer he sometimes showed his son's picture or the boy's room at his home to women to put them at ease. Reporters say in July 1982, Ridgway picked up a woman with his son in the car, killed her in a nearby woods, and then told the boy the woman had decided to walk home.
Even though Matthew's mother told him when he was in fourth or fifth grade that police were questioning his father about the murders, he never believed his dad could be the Green River Killer.
When he was younger, Matthew Ridgway said he thought his father was just one of 500 possible suspects in the killings. "I think that's how I related," Matthew said in 2001, "that he's just one of the guys that happened to be one place and, you know, he's my dad. He didn't do it, you know."