SEATTLE, Dec. 3 (UPI) -- The long-awaited arrest of a suspect in connection with the Green River Killer serial murders has opened up new questions about the man in custody and scores of unsolved homicides in the Pacific Northwest.
Gary Leon Ridgway, 52, remained jailed Monday while King County prosecutors prepared to file formal charges against him later this week in connection with four of the 49 murders attributed to the elusive serial killer.
"I believe he's killed more than four," Sheriff Dave Reichert said during the weekend as more than 70 investigators scoured the four Seattle-area homes where Ridgway has lived since the 1980s, when the Green River slayings occurred. "A lot more than four."
Deputies were expecetd to dig up the yard of his current residence in Auburn on Tuesday.
Ridgway was arrested last Friday after a sophisticated new DNA test allegedly linked him to three murders. The fourth charge was based on other unspecified evidence that may be revealed when Ridgway is arraigned Wednesday.
Media reports in Seattle said investigators were particularly interested in finding bits of green carpeting that could have been the source of fibers found at some of the Green River crime scenes.
Sheriff's officials have been careful not to even call Ridgway the Green River Killer since there is apparently not yet any evidence linking him to the other slayings, however detectives will be examining the unsolved murders of some 80 women in the region, some of whom were linked to the Green River series and others that were not.
"We are going to have to look to see if Mr. Ridgway is responsible for their deaths," said Reichert.
The Green River murders occurred between 1982 and 1984 and were so named because the bodies of the victims, primarily prostitutes, were dumped in the Green River south of Seattle. Ridgway had been questioned early in the investigation due to his apparent propensity to solicit prostitutes, however the killings stopped while Ridgway was free and still living in the area.
Some detectives had assumed that the murders came to a halt because the killer had died, moved away from the area or been sent to prison on other charges. Ridgway, who is married, stayed put and continued working at the same job he had held since 1969.
Longtime investigator Bob Keppel told the Seattle Post-Intelligencer on Sunday that the apparent lack of activity by the Green River Killer in the Seattle area did not necessarily mean the culprit had changed his ways, but had instead had started seeking out victims in other areas.
"If he's related to all 49 in King County," Keppel said, "we aren't the only show in the state or in the nation. He's been other places and that's going to have to be tracked."
