Marketing masterpiece: sheriff dave reichert, serial killer killer.

"It's one thing to write a hero [for a movie]. It's different to be a real hero. That's what David Reichert is. It's slightly intimidating to play him when you know the breadth of his accomplishments, but we had a great group of people to help bring it to life. We knew we had to live up to Congressman Reichert's actions. We knew what a hero he was. The real challenge was trying to live up to that." ~~ actor Tom Cavanagh (above right)

"[Dave Reichert] desecrated the victims. The public ought to know that," says Seattle University journalism and criminal justice Professor Tomás Guillén.

The pristinely coiffed sheriff (above left with the actor who plays him) is portrayed as the dogged cop who got the Green River killer in The Capture of the Green River Killer, airing Sunday and Monday nights on the Lifetime Movie Network.

Guillen is describing Republican 8th District Congressman Reichert, known in local law enforcement as 'Sheriff Hairspray' -- and for his manipulation of the Green River murder investigation in order to climb up into party politics.

The movie will keep alive the Reichert-stoked myth that his police work and determination was responsible for the arrest of Gary Ridgway.

Many argue the opposite is true.

Coincidentally, as this TV movie potboiler is released, Reichert is in political trouble. His 2006 challenger, Darcy Burner came from nowhere to within a few points of beating him despite millions raised national Republicans and visits by President Bush, Laura, Bush, John McCain and Karl Rove.

(And glory be! We just found out that $5000 donated to Sheriff Dave's campaign this cycle from the National Cable & Telecommunications Association is where, we're told, the executives at the Lifetime Network donated tons of money this year).

Burner's running again, and despite another visit by Bush, has has out-fundraised him for the last three quarters.

But this ain't the first time the myth has been massaged to coincide with Reichert's career advancement or a political campaign.

The movie is based on his self-reverential book, Chasing the Devil, the release of which in late July, 2004 was exquisitely synched-up with his primary campaign in a crowded Republican field anxious to replace the retiring Jennifer Dunn.

Bolstered by his publisher's marketing and his own political campaign, the book made for a perfect PR storm. Reichert's face was thrust onto the front pages of local papers. He was interviewed on CNN and Court TV in full dress uniform (every hair present and accounted for) talking about "capturing" the killer.

Although Chasing the Devil was a great political instrument, it was neither a literary nor a popular success. Not exactly a bestseller: you can now buy a like-new copy on Amazon for $1.74. (We did, and wouldn't recommend it.)

P-I books critic, John Marshall wrote that Reichert painted himself as "muscular, charismatic, devoutly Christian, a dogged mix of Dudley Do-Right and the Lone Ranger."

"Reichert used the serial murder case to move forward," Guillén told BlatherWatch. "It was a travesty." Photos released when Ridgway was arrested show Reichert in a suit posing in the bottom of a ravine near the Des Moines Highway.

"He used the grave site of a murder victim for personal ambition," says Guillén.

Although the Sheriff told the P-I's Vanessa Ho last week he's troubled about the potential artistic license of the movie, and worried about how it would tell "such a personal, complex and horrific story, which culminated with Ridgway pleading guilty to killing 48 women and girls."

Reichert told Ho he was paid "less than six figures -- much of it went to charity." Jeez, those are mightily carefully chosen words to describe the amount he was paid for what is a mighty piece of slobbering, free, campaign media. Hell, it coulda been $99,999.99! And "much" to charity? not all or even most for -- if you believe his hype -- simply doing his job as a paid public servant?

(We hope he gave a little to detectives like Randy Mullinax, who arrested Ridgway,and is barely mentioned in the movie; or to Tom Jensen, the cop who actually submitted the DNA evidence in 2001 leading to the arrest. He's left out completely).

Reichert hasn't always been so modest when portraying himself; nor has he been so troubled about how his campaign has portrayed his role in the case. Known in Congress as "The Man from Green River," he became the public face of the sensational arrest of the serial killer by elbowing his way in front of the cameras on November 30, 2001 when the sensational collar was announced.

Everyone knows Reichert is the guy who caught the Green River killer, because he proclaims it every time he opens his mouth in public.

Why is Reichert against choice for women? When asked, he's told an interviewer: "I have a great respect for life. I've seen a lot of death in my career, worked Green River, seen lots of dead bodies."

"He got elected based on Green River, when in fact, he didn't solve it and he didn't win against Gary Ridgway," says Guillén who covered the Green River story for the Seattle Times from its beginnings and has written two books on the subject.

Fact is: technology caught the killer, not Detective Reichert's dogged shoe-leather sleuthing as this movie and his press so dramatically implies. Even then, on Sheriff Reichert's watch, the saliva sample that could have busted Ridgway as early as 1996 when the DNA technology became
available, was not tested until 2001.

His book is more than three quarters done before he makes passing reference to the fact that the task force had commanders over the "lead detectives." Former Detective Bob Keppel told the P-I, Reichert was "one detective among many," and never led discussions about the direction of the task force as a true leader would have.

Actually, he had little to do with the investigation having left the task force in 1990 to climb the bureaucratic ladder in the Sheriff's Department. What's more, published accounts show how Reichert's tremendous ego was responsible for early police blunders that stalled the investigation and let Gary Ridgway continue killing for decades.

Women died in the interim.

As a political instrument, his book was inspired. Media was flooded with pictures of the sheriff in a muscle shirt sifting for bones at a body dump site; or in full Sheriffian regalia sternly leaning into and staring down the cowering serial killer from across a table. Reichert won the primary easily and got a tremendous knee-up in the 2004 general election.

(His hair will never not be a big part of his political persona. It's magnificent. KIRO talk host Dave Ross who lost to Reichert in 2004 told us: "He's got great hair, he's acknowledged he's got great hair." "[Reichert's] hair, says Mark Prothero, the killer's attorney who wrote, Defending Gary) "is always ready for the next photo opportunity.")

"My standing orders were that we were going to campaign on issues," says Ross. "Rumors I got about Dave or the Green River killer or the release of the book -- we weren't going to touch them."

But there's more than a little résumé inflation going on in Chasing the Devil. There's some obfuscatin', too. Reichert had been "lead detective" in 1982 as the first bodies surfaced in and around the Green River. His book, however, would let you believe he held the title until 1990, never mentioning that several other detectives led in later murders.

Reichert's record as sheriff was exposed in devastating reporting by the P-I's Lewis Kamb in 2006 who found plenty of former colleagues who'd reveal him to be "an ambitious self-promoter, an inexperienced manager prone to poor decisions, even a close-minded detective more obstacle than asset to a serial murder investigation."

Reichert refused to be interviewed in person for the P-I piece, preferring to answer the reporter's questions in writing.

The people around the case use strong adjectives to describe the former Sheriff's professional behavior: manipulative, self-serving, amateurish, ambitious, creepy, bungling, inappropriate, opportunistic, egotistical, voyeuristic, and stubborn. Very different from the descriptives we've been hearing for years from him: heroic, gracious, sensitive, muscular, chivalrous, well-mannered, brave, clean and reverent. We would add: dishonest.

Voters will have another chance to decide in November.

Comments

[Andrew Ferguson]

You can download the movie now on iTunes for free: http://freeitunessongs.blogspot.com/2008/03/video-lmn-movies-capture-of-green-river.html

[Daniel K]

Quite fitting that while Darcy Burner do the work you'd expect of one's congresswoman, Reichert is futzing around in Hollywood.

Oh, and lets not forget the irony of Reichert’s anti-“murderabilia” campaign (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P9LVk7ZrBgU&feature=related) when he writes his own tell all book and accepts to have it made into a mini-series for a 6-figure sum.

[sparky]

I thought actors liked to research the characters they played? Guess not.

[Elliot Ness]

Shouldn't that be "My 2+18 year quest to capture the killer"..as he took his lazy ass time with Ridgeway like he was polishing off his 4 year college education, but taking a slovenly 20 years to complete.

[joanie hussein for Obama]

Now really, folks. Just who is surprised by this?

Fictionalized docu-drama-TV movies? The way most conservatives get their information anyway. It won't change much. The market for this movie will vote Reichert anyway.

[mark]

"The market for this movie will vote Reichert anyway."

Doesn't Lifetime pander to post-menopausal women, Joanie?

[joanie hussein for Obama]

I don't know, Mark. I don't watch Lifetime. Do you?

[gk91]

Ross should never have been picked to run against Alban, as Ross had a long public record of positions it was easy to scare people with.

What 'work' is Burner doing besides raising money? Isn't she using the dead in Iraq as she trumpets her "responsible" plan to end the war there?

[Catlin Capital]

The last this we need s Darcy Burner...she lost. Time for someone new.

BTW..this applies to Rossi as well.

[Daniel K]

gk91 - So by your logic, running on a platform to bring a responsible end to the war in Iraq is "using the dead in Iraq"?

Are you serious?

Go do a Google News search on Darcy Burner and Dave Reichert and you'll see article after article about the Iraq plan with regards to Burner. On the flip side all we can read about on Reichert is this mini-series.

So who’s the statesperson of the two? Who is fighting for the constituents rather than a royalty check? Who’s creating a large coalition of support to tackle the most important fiasco in recent history?

The Green River Killer mini-series is simply a reminder of how poorly Reichert performed as an investigator and Sheriff. The fact it is his opponent that is doing something to bring an end to this war, reminds us that Reichert is just as much a dud as an uninfluential nobody congressman.

[cinco]

Reichert is the Democrat equivalent of Jim McDermott.

[Daniel K]

cinco - except he is a repub.

[sparky]

heh dontcha hate when that happens, cinco?

[Don S.]

In Kirkland we only see Dave Reichert when he is running. We voted for him reluctantly in 2004, but saw him for who he is fairly soon therafter. He's not the brightest bulb in the string, he's a little lazy, and he is too close to the Bush administration despite his feeble efforts to get away. Golly, guess who's warning us about global warming, now? What a shallow fake.

[carlos]

Don why did you vote for him in 2004? What made the difference?

[Tommy008]

Reichert got all dolled up in his dress uniform and manned up to Gary Ridgeway in a "staring comtest". This was filmed and has been since plastered all over the tv. The Seatac puke stood his ground with Dave for a good while, but finally gave into the manlier fellow.By the way, i once shared a house with an unpleasant Ukranian ex-wrestler in Sea Tac. Later, after I'd long since moved out, and the Ridgeway trial was in the news, I tracked down the little house in Seatac they kept mentioning as the house where he comitted many of the murders. It sounded creepily close to the house from my past, from the address. I found it. It was in a little cul-de-sac, just a half dozen or less houses behind the fenced back yard of my former house. A very strange feeling occurred when i found this out.

[Tommy008]

Matt, Carleen and kirby are sounding more and more like Larry Curly and Moe. Matt Haber makes Sherriff Dave, Carleen and Kirby sound like rocket scientists. Last time ichecked this isn't Fargo or Provo. KVI must do better. We deserve better. The pickup truck/gunrack, "these are my people" circa 1981 shtick isn't working. get a clue, KVI PD.

[bill]

Good Post Tommy. I quit KVI/kirby when they came up with the whole hick/pickup truck schtick. Went to 1300 like Laura in the morning alot better

[Dr. No Comments]

I don't understand why Tomás Guillén, of all people, wants the public to know that Reichert "desecrated the victims." Guillén's career and reputation were also built on the Green River murders, and other murder investigations. Guillén's book cover has a picture of Wendy Coffield's body being dragged out of the river, under the words "16 PAGES OF CHILLING PHOTOGRAPHS". As for posing for pictures at grave sites and crime scenes -- it's such a common practice that it's a cliché. Reichert's real offense is that he's a typical politician.

[Kim Maddux]

Get off Reicherts's back. He did what he could. His boss at the time wanted him to shut down the whole investigation. I'm not saying that capturing Ridgeway,should have put him in congress, but somebody voted him in that position. Nobody is perfect. He was,able to bring peace to some of these families by bringing them closure.