Kerri Rawson says father, the BTK Killer, likely sexually abused her
- BTK Killer convicted in 2005 of killing 10 people from 1974 to 1991
- Kerri Rawson, his daughter, said he sexually abused, strangled her
- Rawson said this has left her with neck problems, even as an adult
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This article mentions sexual assault. If you or someone you know needs help, please call the National Sexual Assault Hotline at 800-656-4673.
(NewsNation) — Kerri Rawson, the daughter of Dennis Rader, known as the “BTK Killer,” said in an interview with NewsNation multiple experts have told her it is “very possible” her father sexually abused her.
Therapists, criminologists and other experts had previously said it was likely she’d been sexually abused, but it was a journal entry found by the Osage County Sheriff’s Office in Oklahoma that Rawson said confirmed this.
Watch the full interview with Kerri Rawson on NewsNation’s “Banfield” tonight at 10/9c from CrimeCon. Need help finding your channel? Click here.
Rawson said that one of her dad’s journal entries has a notion in it marked “1981” and then, in all capital letters, “KERRI/BND/GAME.” BND stands for “bondage,” Rawson said.
“We knew right away that it pretty much symbolizes that my father committed sexual abuse against me when I was 2, 2 1/2,” Rawson said in an interview Friday at CrimeCon in Nashville, Tennessee.
After doing trauma therapy, Rawson confronted her dad with what she had learned while visiting him. While there, she showed him a Polaroid Rader took where he’s dressed like a woman, strangling a doll.
“When I saw the photo this summer, I knew that’s what he had done to me,” Rawson said. “And I’ve had that stuck in me, this image of something happening to me when I was little. And I’ve always had an issue with my neck.”
However, Rader denied ever harming his family, saying it was a “fantasy.”
“But we know that he strangled my brother twice as a young adult. I saw that. I witnessed it,” Rawson said. “So between the trauma I’ve had, this thing embedded in me, the disassociation, the night terrors, I’m 100% sure he harmed me when I was little.”
Rader gave himself the “BTK” nickname, which stands for “Bind, Torture, Kill.” He first struck in 1974, stoking fears throughout the 1970s in the Wichita, Kansas, area. Rader, a former Air Force sergeant who was married with two kids, lived in the Wichita area almost his entire life.
Before being convicted in 2005 of killing 10 people from 1974 to 1991, he led investigators and the media on a cat-and-mouse game. Authorities still believe there are multiple missing persons cases connected to him. Rawson has been helping law enforcement as they conduct their investigations and worked as a victim advocate. She has written two books: “A Serial Killer’s Daughter: My Story of Faith, Love and Overcoming” and “Breaking Free: Overcoming the Trauma of My Serial Killer Father.”
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
