Listen to The Oregonian’s TV reporter Kristi Turnquist interview Octavia Spencer about “Lost Women of Highway 20″ on the Beat Check with The Oregonian podcast. Subscribe to Beat Check wherever you listen to podcasts.
While true crime tales have become mainstays of media and pop culture, the disturbing stories told in The Oregonian/OregonLive’s 2018 prize-winning project, “Ghosts of Highway 20″ had a particular impact on Octavia Spencer, the Oscar-winning actor, who help produce the new “Lost Women of Highway 20” documentary series for Investigation Discovery.
“I had never heard of this story,” Spencer said in a recent interview. “I had never heard of these women, or the killer, or the circumstance that allowed him to hide in plain sight.”
Spencer was intrigued by the case and, as part of her partnership with the Investigation Discovery cable channel – a deal that also includes “Feds,” a nonfiction series about FBI agents and their investigations – she became an executive producer and narrator of “Lost Women of Highway 20,” a three-hour documentary series that will air Sunday, Nov. 5, on the ID network, and be available to stream on demand shortly after.
- Watch every episode of “Lost Women of Highway 20″ starting Sunday, Nov. 5, at 9 p.m. on Investigation Discovery with a free trial of the Philo streaming service.
“Lost Women of Highway 20″ explores the stories that were at the heart of “Ghosts of Highway 20,” a five-part multimedia project produced by an Oregonian/OregonLive team that included reporter Noelle Crombie, who wrote the series; multimedia journalist Beth Nakamura; and video editor Dave Killen.
“Ghosts of Highway 20″ focused on cases involving women who were raped and killed over the course of several years in the vicinity of Highway 20, in Oregon. The stories and documentary videos explored the crimes associated with a former highway worker named John Arthur Ackroyd. The project closely examined the experiences of the women who were victims, and a flawed justice system.
“‘Ghosts of Highway 20′ was so illuminating and scary,” Spencer said. “I’m from rural Alabama, so I spent a lot of time on dark highways.” She felt a kinship, she said, with the women who were Ackroyd’s victims, and the fear they had to feel.
“I knew that we really wanted to tell this story,” Spencer said. “We really wanted to restore some of the dignity that was taken from these women.”
Like “Ghosts of Highway 20,” the ID documentary series “Lost Women of Highway 20″ includes interviews with friends, family members and law enforcement investigators connected to the disappearances and deaths of Kaye Turner, Melissa Sanders, Sheila Swanson and Rachanda Pickle, Ackroyd’s stepdaughter. The documentary also features interviews with The Oregonian reporter Crombie, and with Marlene Gabrielsen, who recounts being raped by Ackroyd in 1977. She survived the brutal assault, but despite Gabrielsen reporting the crime to the police, authorities didn’t prosecute Ackroyd.
“He got away with it,” as Crombie says in the docuseries.
Marlene Gabrielsen shares her story of being raped by John Arthur Ackroyd in the three-part Investigation Discovery documentary series, "Lost Women of Highway 20."Courtesy of Investigation Discovery
Gabrielsen’s experience “made me angry,” Spencer said. To know that Ackroyd “could have been arrested and had no more victims if only her voice had been heard” was an important message to convey, Spencer said.
Spencer was also struck, she said, by how many of the people whose stories are told in “Lost Women of Highway 20″ were victims of abuse. Even when they spoke out about being hurt, Spencer said, “no one helped them.”
“I hope that we remember that the best way to protect a community is to listen to victims when they come forward,” Spencer said.
Arianna LaPenne, director of “Lost Women of Highway 20,” echoes Spencer’s view that the docuseries is intended to go beyond the true-crime stories viewers may be accustomed to seeing.
For LaPenne, the challenge in making the docuseries was to “do better by these women. Could we take these stories, and make this series about the individuals, about the people? And that’s what drove the process of making this,” she said in a recent interview.
“You can’t bring someone back,” LaPenne said, but you can tell a story that “shows the meaning and value of their life,” and of the people that love them. The goal of the docuseries”is to say that this person mattered.”
LaPenne, who spent nearly eight weeks in Oregon last year working on “Lost Women of Highway 20,” said, “There’s a trope in true crime of the fascinating serial killer,” portraying a murderer as “some kind of diabolical genius.”
“Lost Women of Highway 20″ upends that stereotype, LaPenne said. “This was a very ordinary guy that was allowed to function in plain sight. There is so much violence against women that occurs that way.”
“Because these women were from backgrounds that were often overlooked or ignored,” LaPenne said, they weren’t listened to. “To really come to terms with that is devastating.”
All three parts of “Lost Women of Highway 20″ premiere back-to-back Sunday, Nov. 5, at 9 p.m. on Investigation Discovery. Many Portland-area viewers can also watch the series three hours earlier, beginning at 6 p.m. The series will also stream on Philo, which offers a free trial; and on Max. “Feds” premieres at 10 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 8, on Investigation Discovery.
— Kristi Turnquist
503-221-8227; kturnquist@oregonian.com; @Kristiturnquist
Our journalism needs your support. Please become a subscriber today at OregonLive.com/subscribe