On this date, June 10, 1988, a Pedophile
Serial Killer was executed by lethal injection in Utah. He was convicted of the
murders of five young boys in 1983. I got the information from Wikipedia and
some other links. Please go to the VFFDP Blog to see the photos of the boys he
killed.
Arthur Gary Bishop (September 29, 1952 – June 10, 1988) was a convicted
American child molester and serial killer. He confessed to the murders of five
young boys in 1983, as a result of a routine police investigation.
 |
| Gary Arthur Bishop |
Background information
|
|
Birth
name
|
Arthur Gary
Bishop
|
Also
known as
|
Lynn Jones,
Roger W. Downs |
Born
|
September
29, 1952
Hinckley, Utah, USA |
Died
|
June 10,
1988 (aged 35)
Utah State Prison, Draper, Utah |
Cause of
death
|
Execution
by lethal injection
|
Conviction
|
Embezzlement,
Kidnapping, Murder, Sexual abuse of a minor |
Sentence
|
Death
|
Killings
|
|
Number
of victims
|
5
|
Country
|
United
States
|
State(s)
|
Utah
|
Date
apprehended
|
July 24,
1983
|
Early life
Arthur
Gary Bishop was born in Hinckley, Utah, the eldest of six brothers. Bishop was
raised as a devout Mormon, and was an Eagle Scout and an honor student. When
he was 18, Bishop served as a missionary in the Philippines.
Bishop
was arrested for embezzlement in February 1978 and given a five-year suspended
sentence, but he skipped his parole and fled to Salt Lake City, living under
the alias "Roger Downs". In October 1978, the LDS Church
excommunicated Bishop.
In
Salt Lake City, Bishop, registering under his pseudonym, joined the "Big
Brother" program. No one initially suspected "Downs" of child
molestation, although dozens of children would accuse him of abuse after he was
arrested for murder.
Murders
Bishop
killed his first victim, a four-year-old named Alonzo Daniels, on October 14,
1979. Bishop lured the boy from the courtyard of his apartment complex to his
own apartment with the promise of free candy. After attempting to sexually
assault the child, Bishop drowned him in a bathtub, and subsequently buried the
boy's body in the desert.
In
November 1980, Bishop killed for the second time. At a skating rink, he met an
11-year-old boy named Kim Peterson whom he lured to his apartment on the
pretext of buying a pair of roller-skates the boy was trying to sell. Witnesses
described the man Peterson had talked with at the roller-skating rink the day
prior to his disappearance as being white, aged 25–35, around 200 pounds and
with dark hair. Bishop bludgeoned Peterson to death and his body was buried
close to that of Alonzo Daniels outside of Cedar Fort. Bishop was again
routinely questioned, but was not considered a suspect in Peterson's
disappearance.
On
October 20, 1981, Bishop killed for the third time; luring a four-year-old
named Danny Davis from a supermarket to his home half a block away. Several
shoppers recalled a smiling man standing near the child, but could only give
vague descriptions as to his appearance. Police launched one of the biggest
searches in Salt Lake County history: teams of searchers scoured neighborhoods,
searching fields and nearby mountains, divers dredged ponds and lakes, shoppers
at the supermarket where Davis vanished agreed to undergo hypnosis in an effort
to dislodge greater details of the abductor, fliers were printed offering a
$20,000 reward, and the FBI were contacted but were unable to find any trace of
the boy.
Almost
two years later, on June 23, 1983, Bishop struck again, abducting a boy named
Troy Ward from a park near his home the day after his sixth birthday. Troy was
seen leaving the park on foot with a man just prior to 4 p.m. As with the prior
victims, Bishop sexually assaulted him, bludgeoned him and drowned him in his
bathtub.
One
month later, on July 14, Bishop killed his final victim: 13-year-old Graeme
Cunningham, who vanished from his neighbourhood prior to embarking upon a
camping trip with a friend and an adult chaperone: Arthur Bishop. The boy's
disappearance was statewide news.
Local
police looked into their past reports and found that Bishop ("Roger
Downs") lived in the vicinity of four of the murders, and knew the fifth
child's parents. Police brought "Downs" in for questioning on the
pretext of his assisting officers with their enquiries into Graeme Cunningham's
disappearance. At the station, police managed to obtain Downs's real name, and
eventually got him to confess to all five murders.
The
next day, Bishop led the police to three skeletons near Cedar Fort and two more
recent corpses near Big Cottonwood Creek. Bishop told police he obtained a
thrill from the act of murder, stating: "I'd do it again."
Trial and execution
Bishop
was brought to trial on February 27, 1984. During his trial, Bishop claimed
that an addiction to child pornography molded his violent sexual fantasies and
eventually drove him to act them out. The trial lasted six weeks; on March 19,
1984, Bishop was found guilty of five counts of aggravated murder, five counts
of aggravated kidnapping, and one count of sexually abusing a minor, and
sentenced to death. Upon receiving his sentence, Bishop apologized to his
victims' families and made a request to be executed by lethal injection.
After
his conviction he wrote a letter in which he explained the motivation for his
crimes:
I am a homosexual pedophile convicted of murder, and pornography was a determining factor in my downfall. Somehow I became sexually attracted to young boys and I would fantasize about them naked. Certain bookstores offered sex education, photographic, or art books which occasionally contained pictures of nude boys. I purchased such books and used them to enhance my masturbatory fantasies... Finding and procuring sexually arousing materials became an obsession. For me, seeing pornography was lighting a fuse on a stick of dynamite. I became stimulated and had to gratify my urges or explode. All boys became mere sexual objects. My conscience was desensitized and my sexual appetite entirely controlled my actions.
Bishop
was executed by lethal injection at Utah State Prison in Point of the Mountain
on June 10, 1988. Prior to his execution, he again expressed remorse for his
crimes.
Victims
- Alonzo Daniels, age 4, October 14, 1979
- Kim Peterson, age 11, November 8, 1980
- Danny Davis, age 4, October 25, 1981
- Troy Ward, age 6, June 23, 1983
- Graeme Cunningham, age 13, July 14, 1983
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