BTK killer begins serving life sentences

EL DORADO, Kan. – As he was being driven to prison Friday to begin serving ten consecutive life sentences, Dennis Rader chatted with officers about the weather – noting how green the scenery looked.

At one point, a radio station played the emotional testimony of victims’ family members from Rader’s sentencing as the BTK serial killer, Sedgwick County Sheriff Gary Steed said.

“He stared out the window,” Steed said. “And when he turned and looked at me he had tears in his eyes.”

The killer was led into the El Dorado Correctional Facility prison at 7:28 a.m. CDT, having arrived in the back seat of a sedan accompanied by a marked sheriff’s patrol car and another vehicle carrying seven officers. He wore an orange jumpsuit and was chained at the wrists and ankles.

It is uncertain whether Rader will spend the rest of his life in El Dorado. He’ll undergo a two-week screening to determine if he is best fit to remain or be transferred to one of the state’s other maximum-security prisons, in Lansing and Hutchinson.

While he is in El Dorado, he will be held in an 80-square-foot cell with a concrete slab bunk, metal shelving and a chair, sink and plastic trash can. He’ll be issued a brown jumpsuit and blue slip-on shoes.

At least initially, Rader will have no television or radio and limited access to reading materials, except his own legal documents. His meals will be delivered through an opening in his cell door.

For now, he will be allowed three brief showers and five one-hour recreation periods each week. During the free time, he’ll be kept in restraints and escorted to a 10-foot-by-10-foot outdoor pen surrounded on the sides and top by chain link.

“Public safety is our primary mission,” said Ray Roberts, the warden.