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Thursday, November 12, 2009 - 7:08 PM
Ostensibly, these young men had joined in a fad that was sweeping the
country during the 1980s, especially among teenagers, of satanic
worship. Yet the Rippers had taken their rituals much farther than
most who believed they could somehow contact the Dark One. Gecht's
associates took the flesh they had removed from their victims,
according to Tommy's confession, cut it up, and consumed it as a form
of ancient devilish communion. Gecht allegedly had an altar in the
attic of his Northwest Side home, where they gathered during the
evening hours after his wife was gone to work. Supposedly, he had
painted six red-and-black crosses on the walls and covered the altar
with a red cloth. Tommy told the police that they would all kneel
together around the altar and Gecht would produce the freshly-removed
breasts. He would read passages from the Bible as each man
masturbated into the fleshy portion of the body part. When everyone
was finished, Gecht would cut it up and hand around the pieces for them
to eat. Tommy said that he had witnessed two murders himself and had
participated in nearly a dozen such rituals. When the detectives asked
him why he had done such macabre and illegal activities, he told them
in all seriousness that Gecht had the power to make them do whatever he
wanted. "You just have to do it," he said with conviction. Apparently
he was convinced that Gecht had some supernatural connection, and he
was afraid of what Gecht might do to him if he did not do as he was
told. After the interrogations, the team killers were held in
Pontiac Correctional Center on $1 million bond on a variety of
charges. Gecht adamantly refused to admit to the charges, although he
had worked as a construction subcontractor for John Wayne Gacy during
the 1970s, and it had supposedly been said that Gacy's
single mistake was not the killing of 33 young men but keeping most of
the bodies under his house. In other words, Gecht showed no awareness
of the wrongness of Gacy's brutality. He just thought the man had gone
about it the wrong way. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
As the police interviewed more people,
they learned that Spreitzer and the Kokoraleis brothers were not alone
in their fear of Gecht or their belief in his powers. Others also
claimed that he had a real ability to draw people to him and get them
to do his bidding. One person warned detectives to never look into
Gecht's eyes. No matter how sick or disgusting an act might be, he
could inspire others to get involved. He got his start by molesting
his sister, according to some accounts, and was then sent to live with
his grandparents (though he denies this in letters to Jennifer Furio).
Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire During adolescence, he developed his keen interest in Satanism and its
secret rituals. The newspapers grabbed the story, using headlines
that linked the "Ripper Crew" or the "Chicago Rippers" with the
notorious Jack the Ripper. Each member of this deadly crew faced his
own separate trial.
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