John Wayne Gacy is scheduled to be executed in two weeks. The date is set. The legal appeals have been exhausted.
And yet, there remains a small, quiet question that very few people ever have to answer: what is it actually like to witness an execution?
Most people imagine that the experience begins when the curtains open, when the condemned man is finally revealed behind the glass. But that is not true. The experience does not begin in the execution chamber.
It begins much earlier, often weeks before, with a simple piece of paper.
It all begins with a letter.
A letter that informs a selected few that they have been approved to witness a state-sanctioned death. Hundreds of people apply to witness the execution of John Wayne Gacy. Reporters, legal professionals, and members of the public submit their names, hoping to secure one of the limited spots inside the prison.
Only a few are approved.
Under Illinois law, only six official witnesses are permitted behind the glass. That is the standard procedure. Six seats, reserved for those who have a direct and official role in the process.
But this is not a standard execution.
Gacy’s execution draws worldwide attention. The list triples.
What would normally be a small, tightly controlled group becomes something far larger. Six officials are joined by twelve journalists. The final count reaches eighteen witnesses who will be allowed into the witness room to observe the procedure firsthand.
Notably absent are those closest to the case. For security reasons, neither Gacy’s family nor the families of the 33 young men and boys he murdered are allowed inside. The people who have the most personal stake in this moment are kept outside the walls.
They will learn of the execution’s outcome the same way the rest of the world will: through official statements and press releases.
The selected witnesses arrive at Stateville Correctional Center. From this moment on, everything is controlled.
There is no casual entry. There is no wandering through the facility. Every step is monitored.
Every movement is observed. The witnesses are instructed to park in designated areas and report to the administration building. One by one, identities are verified against the official witness list.
The verification process is thorough and deliberate. Names are checked. Faces are compared to identification documents.
And then, the personal effects are collected.
All electronic devices disappear into lockers. Phones, cameras, recording devices—everything that could capture a moment of this night is locked away. Even personal pens and notebooks are prohibited.
The authorities are determined to prevent any unauthorized recording or note-taking from leaving the facility.
Instead, each witness receives a prison-issued notepad and two pencils. Every observation must be written down by hand.
There is no digital record of this night. No photographs. No audio recordings.
The only documentation that will exist is whatever these eighteen people choose to write down in their own handwriting, moments after seeing it with their own eyes.
Darkness has settled over Stateville. The waiting begins.
The witnesses are led to a waiting area. Coffee is served, water, basic refreshments. The prison staff provides the essentials, the kind of modest hospitality that might accompany a long business meeting.
But few have an appetite. Most simply sit in silence, watching the hours pass.
There is nothing to do but wait. The small talk that might normally fill such a room never materializes. The weight of the occasion presses down on the conversation until there is none left.
The execution is scheduled for 12:01 a.m. Yet, nothing is certain.
As with every execution, a judge could still intervene, even minutes before the procedure is set to begin. A last-minute stay could arrive at any moment. The witnesses know this.
They sit with the understanding that this entire night could be called off at any second, that they could be sent home without ever seeing what they came to see.
After hours of waiting, the witnesses are called together. The prison spokesperson gives a final briefing.
The room falls quiet as the spokesperson speaks. The rules are laid out again. The schedule is confirmed.
And then, the procedure is explained in clinical, measured terms.
Shortly before midnight, Mr. Gacy will be secured to the gurney. An IV will be inserted.
At 12:01 a. m. , it will be connected to the execution chemicals.
He pauses. The room absorbs the information in silence.
Please remain calm. Follow staff instructions at all times. Remain seated until instructed otherwise.
The rules have been explained. The procedure has been outlined. All that remains is more waiting.
The witnesses return to their chairs. The clock continues its slow advance. Every minute feels longer than the one before.
The anticipation builds in the silence, and there is nothing to do but sit with it.
The wait is over.
The witnesses are asked to stand. Escorted by heavily armed correctional officers, they begin the walk to the execution chamber.
The journey through the prison is unlike anything they have experienced before. Past heavy steel doors, concrete corridors, locked security gates—no one is free to wander. Each turn takes them deeper into the prison, into an area that few outsiders will ever see.
The architecture of the prison becomes more oppressive as they move inward. The hallways narrow. The lighting grows harsher.
The sound of their own footsteps echoes off the bare concrete walls.
There is little conversation. Only footsteps, jangling keys, metal gates locking behind them.
Each gate closes with a definitive clang, sealing off the path behind them. There is no going back. The execution chamber is just ahead.
At approximately 11:30 p.m., the 18 witnesses take their seats inside the witness room.
The room is small and austere. Journalists, prosecutors, attorneys—they all sit together in a space that offers no comfort and no distraction. Concrete walls surround them.
Rows of chairs face the observation window.
Beyond the glass, the execution chamber is hidden behind closed blinds. The witnesses cannot see what is happening on the other side. They can only sit and wait, staring at the barrier that separates them from the condemned man.
On the other side, the killer clown is being prepared for execution.
John Wayne Gacy, who entertained children at parties dressed as Pogo the Clown, who committed some of the most horrific murders in American history, is now lying on a gurney in a state execution chamber. He is secured to the gurney. IV lines are inserted into both arms.
The witnesses are never allowed to see that part. They will witness death, not its preparation.
The insertion of the needles, the positioning of the body, the final adjustments—all of this happens out of sight. The witnesses are spared the clinical realities of the setup. They will only see the finished product, the moment when the procedure officially begins.
Exactly at midnight, Gacy’s death warrant takes effect.
With every final legal obstacle exhausted, there is nothing left to stop the execution. The courts have ruled. The appeals have failed.
The clock has reached the appointed hour, and the state of Illinois is now authorized to carry out the sentence.
Two minutes later, the blinds begin to open.
For the first time that night, the witnesses see John Wayne Gacy.
He lies motionless on the gurney, his arms resting outstretched on padded supports. The bright lights of the execution chamber illuminate every detail. His eyes remain fixed on the ceiling.
He never looks toward the witness room.
The silence is total. The witnesses watch in stillness as the man who took so many lives lies waiting for his own to end.
The warden steps forward and asks for a final statement.
The words most often attributed to Gacy are simple: “Kiss my ass.”
But even that remains disputed. Some heard it. Others said it never happened.
The ambiguity of those final moments, the uncertainty of what was actually said, would become part of the execution’s lasting legacy.
After receiving final authorization to proceed, the warden gives a subtle signal.
Hidden behind the wall, the executioner injects the first chemical: sodium thiopental, intended to render Gacy unconscious. The 𝒹𝓇𝓊𝑔 is designed to put him to sleep, to ensure that he feels nothing of what follows.
The witnesses watch as Gacy slowly closes his eyes, takes a deep breath, and dozes off.
There is no struggle. No visible pain. Only a man who appears to have fallen asleep.
And for many witnesses, that quietness is precisely what makes it so unsettling.
The transition from life to unconsciousness is smooth. There is no dramatic moment of resistance. No final twitch of defiance.
The condemned man simply drifts away, and the room observes in absolute stillness.
Shortly after the sodium thiopental is administered, the executioner begins injecting the second chemical.
The second 𝒹𝓇𝓊𝑔 is intended to paralyze the body, to stop the lungs from drawing breath. It is a grisly step in the process, made bearable only by the fact that Gacy is already unconscious. He should feel nothing.
He should simply stop breathing and drift further away.
But then, something goes wrong.
Several witnesses notice the clear tubing suddenly stop flowing. The liquid inside turns cloudy.
What should be a steady, uninterrupted flow has come to a halt. The witnesses watch in confusion as the procedure that was moving forward so smoothly suddenly stops. The tubing that should be carrying the chemicals into Gacy’s veins is blocked.
Minutes pass. Gacy is still alive.
The witnesses sit in silence, staring at the motionless body behind the glass. The procedure has stopped, but no one has told them why. There is no announcement.
No explanation. Just a long, uncertain pause.
Inside the execution chamber, the procedure is halted. No one knows why.
The medical team scrambled to assess the situation. Something has gone wrong with the line, and the execution cannot continue until it is fixed. But the witnesses are not privy to any of this.
They are left to wonder, to speculate, to sit with their own uncertainty.
Then, without warning, the blinds slam shut.
The execution chamber disappears from view. The witnesses are left staring at a blank barrier. No explanation is given.
The room falls into a stunned silence. What just happened? Is it over?
Did something go wrong? No one answers.
Behind the closed blinds, officials discover the cause.
A chemical reaction has blocked the IV line. It was a preventable error, caused by the line not being properly flushed between injections. The two chemicals reacted with each other inside the tubing, forming a blockage that stopped the flow completely.
While technicians work frantically to replace the clogged tube, the witnesses can do nothing but wait.
The minutes stretch out. Confused glances spread through the room. Whispers grow louder.
The silence of the waiting room is replaced by a low murmur of uncertainty. The witnesses exchange looks, trying to understand what is happening on the other side of the blinds.
Correctional officers order everyone back to silence.
The room quiets again, but the tension remains. Behind the blinds, the state is forced to repair an execution already underway.
At 12:21 a.m., without warning, the blinds open once again.
For a second time, the bright lights of the execution chamber flood the witness room. Gacy is still there. Motionless.
As though nothing has happened.
The scene is almost exactly as they left it. The body on the gurney, the IV lines, the sterile equipment. But behind the scenes, the blocked intravenous line has been replaced.
This time, the remaining chemicals are administered as intended.
The flow resumes. The procedure continues.
Minutes later, Gacy’s heart stops.
The witnesses watch as the monitors confirm what they have come to see. The body is still. The heart has ceased to beat.
The execution has reached its conclusion.
Silence returns.
The county coroner enters the execution chamber. After confirming the absence of a heartbeat and checking for any remaining signs of life, he quietly nods to the warden.
The official confirmation is made. The death is complete.
The overhead speakers crackle to life.
“Ladies and gentlemen, inmate Gacy has been pronounced dead at 12:58 a. m. The procedure is now complete.
Please remain seated until instructed to leave.”
The voice is flat, professional, clinical. The words hang in the air as the witnesses absorb what they have just heard. It is over.
The man they came to see die is dead.
For the final time, the blinds close.
The witnesses are escorted out quickly and in silence, minimizing any opportunity for conversation before they leave the building. The state wants no lingering discussion, no shared reflections in the hallway. The witnesses are separated and moved out efficiently.
For many, the most disturbing part of the night was not what they had seen. It was what they hadn’t.
The minutes when the blinds were closed, when the execution was being repaired, when the state was fixing its own mistake and preparing to try again—those minutes haunted the witnesses more than the sight of Gacy’s final breath. They had watched a man die, but they had also watched the machinery of death break down and start again, hidden from view.
For what felt like an eternity, the execution continued beyond the witnesses’ view before quietly resuming as though nothing had happened.
The question that lingered in their minds was simple: what else had they not been allowed to see?
Within minutes, the media witnesses are escorted onto white shuttle buses and driven outside the prison gates to the temporary press center.
The transition is jarring. One moment they are inside the silent, controlled world of the prison. The next, they are in the glare of camera lights, surrounded by reporters and officials.
Questions begin almost immediately.
Prison officials insist the execution proceeded properly, describing the interruption only as a minor technical adjustment. The language is careful, designed to minimize the significance of what happened. A minor technical adjustment.
A small hiccup. Nothing to be concerned about.
Many reporters push back.
They challenge officials over the competence of the execution team, the blocked intravenous line, and the ethics of restarting an execution behind closed blinds. The questions are pointed, insistent. The officials give measured answers, but the dissatisfaction is visible in the room.
Then, the microphones are handed to William Kunkle, one of the prosecutors who helped convict John Wayne Gacy in 1980.
Kunkle steps forward with the calm authority of a man who has waited a long time for this moment. His message is unmistakable. The scales of justice have finally been balanced.
He dismisses the delay entirely. Compared with the hours of terror endured by Gacy’s 33 victims, he says, “18 minutes is insignificant.”
The calculation is cold, but it lands. The victims endured unimaginable suffering, and the man who inflicted that suffering was forced to endure only a few extra minutes of unconsciousness on a gurney.
Then, he adds one final remark.
“He lived 18 minutes longer than he should have.”
The words hang in the air. There is no further argument. There is nothing more to say.
If you were offered a seat in that witness room, would you take it?
The question is simple, but the answer is complicated. Watching a man die is not an easy thing. Watching the state 𝓀𝒾𝓁𝓁 a man, even a man who killed so many others, is not a comfortable experience.
It is a moment that stays with you long after you leave the prison walls.
Would you want to see justice carried out with your own eyes? Or would you rather look away, trusting that the system works without needing to witness its final act?
The witnesses who sat in that room on the night of May 10, 1994, do not have to imagine. They were there. They saw.
And they carry that night with them for the rest of their lives.