Hutchinson, Kansas
Marvin J. Gifford Jr.
June 4, 2008
by Jim Grawe
Long before his arrest this week, it seems that Marvin Gifford Jr. made a name for himself in the mobile home park where he lived.
"He's a creep," Christy Minns says.
"Creepy!" Nick Niemeyer says.
"I just got a bad vibe about the guy," April Niemeyer says. "He just creeped me out."
"We all thought he was an odd unit," Maria Starr says.
Neighbors say they'd often see Gifford just sitting on his porch, staring at people. Some of the women say he's peeped in their windows and harassed them. Minns, who is in her 20s, says it all seemed to add up when Gifford was arrested for three sexual assaults of elderly women and the murder of 85-year-old Pearl Arthaud.
"He knocks on my windows," Minns says. "He rigns my doorbell at six in the morning. He tried to give my daughter a rattle and I said 'no thank-you'. That's when the neighbor guy came over and made him leave the yard because he wouldn't leave."
A few years ago, Gifford was sentenced to 24 months in jail for exposing himself to elderly women and grabbing one of them. But he remained free as he appealed his case. Minns says Gifford has been more aggressive toward her recently. She says she called police two weeks ago. Now Gifford has been arrested for a series of sexual assaults and a murder, Minns and her neighbors regret he couldn't have been stopped sooner. They are relieved though that nobody in their neighborhood got hurt.
McPherson Police Chief Dennis Shaw says Gifford has a long history of contacts with his department, dating back to drug charges in 1982. Other contacts include window peeping, suspicious activity, criminal trespass, sexual battery and lewd and lascivious behavior.
Gifford was charged with window peeping in 2000 at the home of a 24 year old woman. In 2004 Gifford was convicted of exposing himself to a 76 year old woman. A year later he exposed himself to a 71 year old woman. The same year Gifford exposed himself to a 76 year old woman and grabbed her, although she was able to get away.
After McPherson Police learned of the sexual assaults of the elderly women in Reno County, they gave authorities there Gifford's name as a person of interest.
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