Tacoma Man Searches Woods For Green River Murder Victims

ENUMCLAW - He terrorized the community for two decades and murdered dozens of women. Green River killer Gary Ridgway is locked up for his crimes. Earlier this week, we told you about a Tacoma man who believes some of the serial killer's victims have yet to be found, and that's why on Saturday he launched his own search.

In the thick wooded area about 5 miles east of Enumclaw, Rob Fitzgerald and his cadaver dog "Wendy" are retracing the steps of Green River killer Gary Ridgway.

"So, it was an area that would have fit that profile, it would have been OK for him to put a body here and get back to it for access, because, he did revisit them," said Fitzgerald.

For the last year Rob has studied this terrain and Ridgway's method of murder. He believes Ridgway dumped as many as 10 bodies somewhere in these woods in East King County in the 80's and 90's.

Rob has invested $10,000 of his own money and put together a search team with a Law Enforcement background to scour a 40 mile long area along State Route 410 to Greenwater. He wants to bring the victim's families some closure.

"It gave him plenty of room to stop. No one would notice what he was doing here, you can see there's cars, makes no big deal," said Fitzgerald.

Gary Ridgway escaped the death penalty 7 years ago when he confessed to killing 48 women. But, Cops always believed he murdered more victims he didn't fess up to.

Rob thinks with "Wendy's" trained nose and new high tech equipment that Cops didn't have two decades ago, he'll find human remains that went undiscovered.

"This is a soil density meter and what it does it can tell if the soil has ever been dug. You scan a huge area we set up a grid with ropes, and if there's ever been a grave dug on it it'll show up as a hot spot on there," said Fitzgerald.

Rob's team is working alone the King County Sheriff's Office is not involved in this search. That's why Rob wants to make sure what he turns over to the Cops is legitimate.

"This is called a comparative skeleton we use it for bone comparisons. So, we have every bone in the human body, so, if we find a bone there's lots of animal bones in the woods this gives us a way to compare it to an actual human bone," said Fitzgerald.

Rob and his team didn't make any major discoveries on Saturday, but, they have plenty of time to do so. They'll be searching the wooded area east of Enumclaw for the rest of the summer.