You mention in your book the confusing feelings that Gacy's letters evoked. What was the conflict?
It made me sick to my stomach to read about what he did to those kids -- how he tortured them, and strangled them, and raped them for hours and sometimes days. It just makes you sick. But how long does the anger you feel from a movie or a book that you read last? And then you talk to him. It's always hard to remember the hate. I'm not ever saying that I thought he was a great guy. It's hard to keep in perspective who he is when you speak to him every single day. Gacy was part of my life. That can't change.
You seem like a very strong man physically, but when you and Gacy were actually alone in the prison, you seemed to feel as though your life was in danger. What made you feel so weak?
I used to kick-box and work out and stuff like that. You're asking yourself, "How can Jason feel threatened?" First of all, step into any prison in this country and you will turn a lighter shade of pale. Secondly, the guards treated me like garbage. I'm not the good one. I'm the groupie that's going to visit a serial killer. The second I walk in, I'm already scared that I'm in a prison, all alone. No one knows I'm in here. My family doesn't support what I'm doing ... I'm standing in front of Gacy, the doors are locked behind me.
And he was nude. Didn't he pull down his pants?
Not initially. But we were alone. The cameras face away. I'm in his world now. I'm in his control, and it's a big thing with sociopaths -- control. The guards are taken care of, so to speak.
At one point on the second day, he's ready to rape you, you're terrified. He admits to murdering those people, which he had always denied before, publicly and privately. At that point did you think that you had been successful?
As a trillion thoughts ran through my mind, I was telling myself that I couldn't believe that he was admitting this stuff to me. I knew -- and I was hoping to get out of this alive -- that what I had witnessed was historic. I saw the point of transaction with a serial killer. What they do, how they act, before they kill someone. The rage, the anger, the facial expressions. I think Gacy thought he was at home. That he wasn't in jail any longer. I had flashbacks of every single victim and what they went through.
How could he have raped you in those circumstances?
He was ready. He thought I would do everything he said. He thought that he controlled me. He had his pen -- and he threatened to stab me in the neck if he had to. Again, he thought that he was at home, that he had me in cuffs and could control me. He grabbed me and tried to throw me over this chair with a pen in my neck. You got to put all these things together. You are alone with this guy who has done it before and he wants it now.
After this book comes out, a lot of people will be utterly fascinated and try to emulate what you did. How will you respond to it?
I've been getting up to 20 e-mails a day from people all over the country. I thought that when my book came out, people would read it because they wanted to learn about serial killers. These messages are saying, "Wow, you are just like me. I've always wanted to get closer to the dark side. I've always thought the same things that you've thought. I was always alone and isolated from my family growing up." It's shocking to me.
So when you date nowadays, do you tell women about your past?
What do you tell them? "What do you do?" "Well, I talk to serial killers. I see if I can get information from them." Maybe if I spend two hours explaining things, they'll really understand what I do. But guess what happens. They'll tell a friend. As soon as it goes second-hand, they say, "Don't talk to him, he's a freak. He talks to serial killers." I've learned the hard way.
At the beginning of the book, you explain that clowns really terrify you, and John Wayne Gacy was known as the Clown Killer. How do you feel when you see clowns now?
I've always been scared of clowns, because it's something about that painted-on face that makes you say, "Who's behind that? Are they really happy?" The theme of my life has been "what makes people do what they do?"
So you're still fearful of clowns?
I wouldn't go to the circus and run. But I wouldn't say I would hang out with one. You don't know who you're talking to.
One of the really surprising photos in the book, alongside the photos of you with Gacy and Koko, is one with you and George and Barbara Bush. What was going through your mind when you were photographed with the Bushes?
With George and Barbara? It was awesome. I was just really excited to meet them. It was just Secret Service allowed in there at the time, and I got to meet them. He made a comment to me, like, "Hey, it looks like you work out," and Barbara was like, "It's good to meet you." I did think, "If they only knew who else I was pictured with."
About the writer
Craig Offman is the New York correspondent for Salon Books.
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