Blood Lust: Portrait of a Serial Sex Killer

by Gary C. King

  Parker also knew of another sexually related incident that had been described to him by Dayton. Dayton had told him of a male relative who had inserted a needle into the head of his own penis while Dayton watched. The self-inflicted act had left Dayton shocked, and Dayton's recounting of it had left an indelible memory in Parker's mind.

  There was little doubt in Strovink's mind that Dayton's sexual inadequacy stemmed from unusual or deviant acts he had experienced during childhood. It was little wonder that Dayton could find release only from violent sexual acts and murder. He had needed help a long time ago but, sadly, hadn't gotten it.

  Chapter 21

  As they studied Dayton's background, it became increasingly clearer to Turner and the other task force detectives that he fit many of the general characteristics of the classic profile of a serial killer developed years earlier by Special Agent John E. Douglas of the FBI's Behavioral Sciences Unit at Quantico, Virginia. Douglas and several of his colleagues defined serial murder as the killing "of separate victims with time breaks between victims," with the breaks being as short as a few hours but as long as days, weeks, or even months. The so-called time breaks were referred to by Douglas as a "cooling off" period. Dayton clearly qualified as a serial killer under Douglas's definition.

  Turner had realized early in the investigation, even before interviewing any surviving witnesses, that Dayton's crimes were also sexual in nature. It was obvious. All of his victims were nude when found, and the multiple stabbings and cuttings to the bodies also indicated that the murders were sexual and committed during sadistic fantasy. Because of the length of time that the bodies had lain in the woods and the fact that they were so badly decomposed, the criminologists had not been able to locate, much less collect, semen samples. It simply was no longer there in any identifiable form. There was no doubt that he suffered from symptoms known in law enforcement and psychology circles as "episodic aggressive behavior."

  Dayton's aberrant behavior, first and foremost, was ritualistic, though not necessarily in the ceremonial meaning of the term. Turner had found that Dayton's crimes, whether he allowed his victims to live or whether he killed them, were repeated in a definite observable pattern which thus formed the ritual. The pattern rarely digressed from crime to crime, and it seemed he was unable to alter it even to change or disguise his modus operandi. He always chose prostitutes, easy victims of opportunity, some of whom in all likelihood had even initiated contact with him as he trolled the city streets. His ritual was crystal clear: bondage, torture, sexual deviancy, mutilation, and murder. His ritualistic behavior, simply put, provided the framework in which his darkest fantasies could be carried out, and in some dark way he was able to justify his actions to himself.

  From what Turner had discerned from the testimonials of the victims who had survived, Dayton's patterns also clearly fit the various phases of the ritual of serial murder that such killers go through. Dayton always started out in a fantasy state that involved bondage, in which he imagined the tremendous power he could possess over women who had been incapacitated. Fantasizing about it turned him on, elevated his mood, and became the springboard that hurled him into action. Then he would begin trolling the high vice areas and wooing his potential victims with the promise of money.

  Once he had his victim baited and inside his truck, he would demonstrate his power over her, which essentially comprised the capturing phase of the ritual. Hours later, after he reached the apex of his sexual frenzy, he would murder his victim in the most horrifying way imaginable. Afterward he would take souvenirs of his kill, apparently clothing and jewelry, to aid him in reliving the episode again and again within the confines of his tormented mind. It was conceivable that he had also planned to take body parts as trophies, but since he left the sawed-off feet and eviscerated remains at the crime scenes, Turner could only speculate on that point. But eventually, after growing tired of reliving what had already occurred and his bloodlust no longer satisfied, Dayton's desire for a new victim and fresh blood became uncontrollable and he would become depressed. It seemed that it was always within days or sometimes merely hours before Dayton entered the depression phase, during which the vicious cycle would begin all over again. The thought processes and feelings were similar, perhaps identical, to those that other sex criminals, such as exhibitionists and rapists, experience, except that the consequences of Dayton's, as well as other serial killers', actions were unarguably much more severe.

  The variances in Dayton's method of operation were minute, if they could be observed at all. Unlike many serial killers, he did not seem to place his victims' bodies into any special or peculiar positions that would be indicative of the "ceremonial" form of the ritual that some killers go through. He merely dumped them in the Molalla forest, an area he had been familiar with for a good many years and so had grown to be comfortable with. Unlike some serial killers, it did not seem like he wanted his victims to be found, though he made little attempt to bury or otherwise cover their bodies. It was generally accepted that he felt the elements of nature and the remoteness of his dumping ground would prevent them from being found. He definitely wasn't seeking publicity or recognition by committing the atrocious acts, but rather was fulfilling some sort of primal need that the normal mind has difficulty comprehending.

  Turner detected that Dayton had no sense of remorse, and conceded that it was possible that Dayton thought he was doing mankind a service by ridding it of street whores. From everything that Turner had so far learned about Dayton it seemed possible, even likely, that he held a deep-seated hatred toward women, perhaps even feeling that they could not be trusted. From the interviews with witnesses, Dayton's blood seemed to boil when he observed women openly prostituting themselves for money.

  In other behavior patterns that the task force detectives observed, Dayton obviously wore a mask of sanity, as most serial killers do. He not only wanted to conceal his homosexual activities and homicidal binges, but he wanted to feel accepted, even respected in his community. His mask of sanity was illustrated by the fact that he had a wife, a child, and was a successful businessman. Although he had a prior criminal record, Dayton managed to keep it under wraps from most people he knew and with whom he associated. When all was said and done, it seemed as if he had a split personality.

  Dayton was also compulsive. His compulsiveness manifested itself in his neatness and cleanliness. Not only did he keep his own body clean, but he had kept his shop, his truck, and his home meticulous. Everything clearly had its place and was kept in its place.

  In addition, Turner found, Dayton seemed to have a chronic inability to tell the truth. His lying manifested itself when he would encounter a former victim and, when asked by the victim herself about what he had done, would lie and say he didn't do it or would feign forgetfulness. He would also lie regularly to his wife about working late at the shop when he would in fact be out maiming, torturing, and killing women on any given night. Turner viewed Dayton's lying to his wife as a form of self-preservation. He couldn't be truthful because he knew she would go to the police if she was aware of what he had really been up to.

  Dayton, Turner observed, seemed to possess traits of both the organized and the disorganized offender. In the final analysis, however, Dayton appeared more organized than disorganized. Disorganized offenders seemed to operate closer to their homes, within their safety or "comfort zone," and normally were not concerned about the physical evidence left at the crime scene. Dayton seemed to venture out from his comfort zone—that is, he did not commit his crimes close to home. But he did seem to stay within the confines of Union Avenue, 82nd Street, and the Molalla forest, all of which, perhaps, could be considered his comfort zone. He littered the crime scenes with bondage devices, alcohol bottles, orange juice containers, and a knife, as a disorganized killer would do.

  While roaming free, he was a predator, and even under lock and key he remained psychopathic, as most organized serial killers are. He seemed to live by the credo that rules w
ere made to be broken, and had exhibited chronic aberrant behavior patterns throughout much of his life. Dayton also seemed to plan out his crimes and had assembled and carried with him all of the items he would need to accomplish his grisly deeds, items such as ropes, elastic cords, knives, straps, collars, and anything else that would make his control over the victim and commission of the crime easier to carry out. Yet another trait of the organized serial killer that Dayton clearly held was that, despite having a high I.Q., he often had low grades in school.

  Also, the organized offender is more likely to be successful in carrying out a more lengthy series of murders than the disorganized type before getting caught because he has a tendency to make fewer mistakes and he will not leave his victims' bodies too close to his comfort zone. Dayton clearly possessed traits of both a disorganized and an organized serial killer and so it was difficult to classify him precisely as either. Dayton's apparent mishmash of both types illustrated the complexity of such killers.

  Moreover, Dayton's history of serious assault, deviate sexual behavior, and obvious hypersexuality, the possibility that he was abused both sexually and physically as a child, and his history of alcohol and drug abuse served to augment his patterns of episodic aggressive behavior. There was no doubt in Turner's mind that Dayton Leroy Rogers had been a serial killer in the making for a long, long time. He was glad that Dayton was behind bars, and he wanted to make certain that he remained so.

  As Turner continued to build his cases against Dayton, he contacted a number of people who knew the murder suspect. Kenneth Wertz, a former employee of Dayton's, told Turner about an occasion when he picked up burnable refuse from inside the shop at Small Engine Repair Unlimited and asked Dayton if he wanted him to dispose of it in the wood stove. Dayton took the trash from him and told him he would rather do it himself, which Wertz considered odd. On another occasion, Wertz said he found a woman's high-heel shoe next to the wood stove. It was another oddity that he couldn't get out of his mind after the Molalla forest killings had come to light.

  Once, when he and Dayton were discussing family life, Wertz said that Dayton told him that he resented his parents and indicated that religion had been forced on him as a child. During a discussion about Dayton's wife and eighteen-month-old son, Dayton made the comment to Wertz that "having a family cuts down on your sex life." There was nothing else that he considered unusual about Dayton or his habits and lifestyle that he could think of.

  Lynn B. Johnson, who worked as a tool salesman and was a business acquaintance of Dayton's, explained to Turner that he had frequently taken air and power tools to Dayton's shop in Woodburn to be repaired. He said that Dayton had always done excellent work and took only a few days at most to finish each job. However, by April or May 1987, Johnson noticed that Dayton's work began to slip. Dayton appeared exhausted during this period and looked like he had been going without sleep for long periods. He became months behind in the work that Johnson brought to him, and eventually Johnson seldom saw him at his shop. Johnson didn't know what had happened to Dayton, but he felt that something very wrong was going on in his personal life.

  In response to a message left at the task force offices, Turner contacted Roberto Ancisco, forty-five, who had worked as the floor manager of the Coast to Coast store in Woodburn when Dayton still worked there at the store's small-engine repair shop, prior to opening his own shop. Ancisco had worked with Dayton for nearly two years, and although they had gotten off to a bad start with each other, eventually the two became friends.

  "What did you think about Dayton?" asked Turner.

  "I thought he was a nice guy," said Ancisco. "I never imagined that he would do something like what's being reported. Sometimes he was temperamental, sometimes he was a little weird. Even though I always took it with a grain of salt, Dayton sometimes talked about coming to Portland, going out with different girls, stuff like that."

  Ancisco explained that Dayton often came to work early, sometimes an hour or so before anyone else. Sometimes he would be carrying paper grocery bags, but Ancisco did not know what was inside them.

  "Sometimes I'd watch him and he would take a sack, a brown sack, to and from the shop. I always suspected that he was stealing tools. He would take stuff to and from the truck really early in the morning and then he'd take off."

  "Were they small bags or large ones? Heavy or light?" asked Turner.

  "It looked like they were light, because he wasn't putting a lot of strength into holding them. He could fit them underneath the seat of his truck. I just kept it under my hat, because my boss always defended him."

  "What do you mean? Defend him how?"

  "Every time I'd complain about Dayton the boss would say, 'Leave him alone. I'll take care of it.' You know, that kind of shit."

  It wasn't uncommon for Dayton to change clothes, either, upon his arrival at work, and he frequently carried a change of clean clothes in the back of his pickup.

  "I'd sometimes ask him, 'Dayton, why do you have clean clothes in the back of your truck?' He would say, 'Well, I'm going to Portland after work.' And he would change into them in our bathroom at the store. He would wash up, shave, put cologne on, and take off like he was a different man."

  "Did you ever see him throw away any clothes?" asked Turner.

  "No. He always kept the clothes, even the dirty ones, there in his truck. He sometimes had a coat hanger or two hanging on the hook inside the truck."

  There were those damn coat hangers again. How many times had people linked Dayton with coat hangers since Turner began the investigation? Turner couldn't even begin to recount the instances, but each time the hangers were mentioned, their significance reached out and hit Turner like a bolt of lightning.

  There were instances, said Ancisco, when Dayton would leave the store and head off to Portland during business hours. Dayton made the trips when the hardware store's owner was gone on business and as time went on, the runs to Portland became more frequent.

  "Dayton would come up to me about nine o'clock in the morning to tell me had to go to Portland. When I'd ask him what for, he always said he had to go to Black & Decker or to Homelight Chainsaws, companies we did business with. I'd look at my watch and say, 'Okay. What time you gonna be back?' He usually said, 'I'll be back around one o'clock.' He always told me that he was going to take his lunch, too, before coming back to work. But then he wouldn't show up when he said he would."

  "He wouldn't come back anytime?" Turner pressed.

  "Not until three or four o'clock in the afternoon. And then I'd say, 'Dayton? Where the hell have you been?' And he'd say that he got tied up in traffic. When he could see that I didn't believe him and that I was mad, he'd say he was over on Union. 'You should have seen the girls up there,' he'd say. I'd say, 'What the hell were you doing over on Union when Black & Decker was on the other side of the Willamette River?' He'd just shrug it off and say that he had some business to take care of over there."

  "Did you ever see him throw anything away after he returned from one of these trips?" Turner wanted to know.

  "No. He just carried those brown bags to and from the shop and kept them underneath the seat of the truck."

  On one occasion, said Ancisco, he and Dayton were chatting at the store sometime in July 1985, when the subject of their discussion eventually turned toward women. Ancisco, who was divorced, said Dayton encouraged him to go out and "pick up women." Dayton also talked about a young blond woman, the daughter of one of Ancisco's friends. Dayton wanted Ancisco to introduce him to the woman.

  "'Why don't you introduce me to her?'" Ancisco quoted Dayton as having asked. "'I'd sure like to go out with her.' I said, 'Why don't you just leave her alone? You know she's married and so are you.' He'd always shake his head, lick his lips, and say, 'I'd sure like to go out with her.' "

  "Was there anything else that struck you as strange about Dayton?"

  "One time he told me he picked up two girls during one of his trips to Portland, and these girls supp
osedly took him to their homes, where he said he'd had a wild time with them," said Ancisco. "But I never believed him, to tell you the truth. Talk is cheap, and he had a beautiful wife, a very nice lady, and a brand-new son. I just never took it serious."

  Occasionally, when they went out together to a restaurant or a bar, Dayton frequently attempted to hustle the waitresses.

  "He'd tell them dirty jokes and make obscene gestures at them. When I told him I didn't know how he could do that to those girls, he just shrugged and said, 'Aw, they love it, you know.' I'd shake my head and tell him he was crazy, and then he'd just look at me and laugh that silly laugh of his and say, 'Bobby. You just don't know me.' "

  "Did you ever notice him going through mood swings?"

  "Oh, yeah. At times he was a real nice guy. Other times he'd lose his temper. There was one occasion when he and I got into it over the way he treated a customer. He took a hammer and he slapped it and pounded it on the bench like he wanted to hit me with it. I said, 'Just cool off, Dayton. You don't treat customers like that.' Then he'd back off. He seemed like he had two sides to him. Sometimes it was like he wasn't even there, that his mind was away, thinking about something else."

  Ancisco explained that Dayton once asked him if he'd ever had kinky sex or torture sex. Although it had shocked him, Ancisco brushed off the remarks by thinking that Dayton must have been joking or was crazy.

  "He said, 'Have you ever had kinky sex?' And I said, 'No. What do you mean by kinky sex?' He clarified it by saying, 'Torture sex.' "

  On one occasion when he went to lunch with Dayton and rode in Dayton's truck, Ancisco said he pushed the button on the glove compartment and a kitchen knife tumbled out. When Ancisco picked it up, Dayton looked at him icily, then took the knife out of his hand and placed it back inside the glove compartment.

  "He talked to me about violence and women," said Ancisco, clarifying that Dayton never mentioned anyone by name that he'd been violent with. "I said, 'You know, Dayton. If somebody ever hurt my daughters, I would find the man and I would get even with him.' He'd just laugh and say, 'Sure, Bobby. If you only knew things about me.' "