The Killer of Salt Lake City

Ronnie Lee Gardner was an American criminal- not a serial killer, but a notorious murderer. His first murder, a robbery gone wrong, was nothing to hit nationwide headlines. But his numerous escape attempts, in particular the way in which he escaped, grabbed the attention of the mainstream media back in the 1980's. Since then, his story was one of constant parole hearings and unsuccessful appeals against the death sentence he had been handed down. Ronnie Lee Gardner's story is a sad one: not just because of the deaths of his innocent victims, or of his own life, precious like all life, which he wasted in robbery, drugs and crime from the days of his youth. But his story is a sad one because his life, so fraught with physical and sexual abuse, poverty and institutionalization could have been so much different. While his crimes overshadow any sympathy that his awful life could possibly garner, it is nonetheless instructive to look at how things went so wrong for him, and perhaps to understand how criminals become what they are.