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'Their Worst Nightmare Was True': Boy Killed By Gacy ID'd After 40+ Years

By Heather Cherone | July 19, 2017 2:12pm | Updated on July 21, 2017 11:16am
 James
James "Jimmy" Byron Haakenson was identified Wednesday as one of the 33 people killed by Gacy.
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DNAinfo/Heather Cherone

CHICAGO — Victim No. 24 now has a name.

Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart on Wednesday named James "Jimmy" Byron Haakenson as the latest victim to be identified of John Wayne Gacy, the serial killer whose reign of terror claimed 33 lives.

Haakenson's body was identified using DNA submitted to Cook County officials by his sister and brother, and is the second Gacy victim to be identified by Dart, who launched an effort to identify all of the serial killer's victims in 2011.

His body had been found in the crawl space of Gacy's Far Northwest Side home but the identity had been unknown.

Officials traveled to Minnesota earlier this week to tell Haakenson's family.

"We had to tell them their worst nightmare was true," Dart said.


Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart has announces that he has identified James "Jimmy" Byron Haakenson as one of the 33 people killed by serial killer John Wayne Gacy. [DNAinfo/Heather Cherone.]

Six bodies — including one buried directly beneath Haakenson — have yet to be identified, Dart said. Haakenson was buried underneath Rick Johnston, who was killed around the same time.

Twenty-nine of Gacy's victims were found in the crawl space of the house at 8213 W. Summerdale Ave. in the O'Hare neighborhood. The home was torn down in the 1970s and replaced with a new house in the late 1980s.

"He was a special kid loved by his family," Dart said.

Investigators believe that Haakenson was killed within days of arriving in Chicago on Aug. 5, 1976 from the Minneapolis-St. Paul area, Dart said.

"He was not a runaway, but wanted to see the big city," Dart said.

The timeline of Haakenson's death could help investigators identify the person buried beneath him, Dart said.

Dart said investigators did not know how Haakenson crossed paths with Gacy, who was known to cruise areas of the city frequented by gay men and teens as well as those looking for work, Dart said.

Haakenson's mother traveled to Chicago in 1979 and met with investigators, telling him that she believed her son had been killed by Gacy. However, because she did not have any dental records from her son, there was no way for officials to identify her son's body, Dart said.

Gacy, who frequently performed at children's parties as a clown named Pogo, was executed by the state of Illinois in 1994.

Haakenson's nephew came across a news report about Dart's efforts to identify Gacy's victims, and contacted the sherriff's office, Dart said.

That effort, led by Detective Sgt. Jason Moran of the Cook County Sheriff's Department, has led to approximately 170 leads, of which 130 have been examined. Fifty-seven DNA tests have been run in an effort to identify Gacy's victims.

That search— which began in 2011 — led unwittingly to the closure of nearly a dozen cold cases across the country, and helped find five men who had vanished and their families had presumed dead, officials said.

"We still want people to come forward," Dart said. "Every family deserves to have closure. At the end of the day, there is no timeline to bring justice."

Tips that might identify the six remaining Gacy victims can be made by calling 708-865-6244.