More Dodd Victims: Family Members -- Brother, Parents Await Execution With Pain And A Longing For Relief

Several times a day, Greg Dodd finds himself staring at the calendar on his desk, and it reminds him he is living in a countdown.

Today, it is 18 days until his brother is scheduled to be hanged; tomorrow it will be 17.

As Westley Allan Dodd draws closer to his Jan. 5 date with the gallows, Dodd's brother and father told The Seattle Times about the powerful emotions the killer's family is feeling: pain, sorrow, sympathy - and the longing for relief they hope the execution will bring.

"He's still my only brother," said Greg Dodd. "He's my big brother, my sister's big brother and my parents' firstborn. You can't write that away, no matter what has happened."

Jim Dodd, Westley's father, said, "Of course I still love Wes. He's my son . . . but my love for him doesn't alter the facts of what he has done. He is guilty of a horrible crime, and should pay the penalty prescribed by law."

Greg Dodd, 30, is an 11-year Navy veteran who bears a striking resemblance to the triple killer scheduled to become the first person executed in Washington since 1963.

As children, the two boys - 11 months apart - played together and enjoyed family outings to the mountains or beach. But as his notorious brother sits in Walla Walla for murdering three little boys in 1989, Greg and his wife, Mary, try to bring up their two young daughters in as normal a life as possible.

Relatives of Westley Dodd "are the unheard victims" of the tragedy being played out on the front pages and the TV newscasts, Greg Dodd said. Although he has great sympathy for the families of his brother's victims, he feels the public may not realize the Dodd family is suffering, too.

It would have been easier, he said, if Wes had died three years ago as his victims did. Then the family could grieve and move on, Greg Dodd said.

Instead, "I've had three years of knowing he's going to die, and now I know what date."

Particularly painful, he said, are the implications by some that Dodd's home life may be responsible for his crimes.

"Our lives weren't all bad. . . . We had good times," he said. "Me and my brother did the normal things. We played, we fought. We played out in the snow. We did normal kid things."

Westley Dodd's relatives have generally been private about their experiences and their pain. In the past two years, Greg Dodd has agreed to only two interviews, both with The Seattle Times. To protect his family's privacy, he asked the newspaper not to name the town where he lives.

Other members of the family have also been reluctant to speak to the news media.

Jim Dodd of Vancouver, Wash., said it hurts to see his oldest child depicted as a monster. "I've spent a lot of sleepless nights trying to decide what I should have done differently," he said. "But we don't get a second chance in raising our children."

Although he has not been close to his son in recent years, Jim Dodd remembers Westley as "a loving, responsive child."

Westley Dodd was 15 when his parents divorced. His mother, Carol Collins, recently told the Vancouver Columbian she is particularly hurt by her son's statements that he felt no love at home.

"I've wondered all along if he isn't trying find an excuse by making his family look bad, when it wasn't that way at all," she said.

It's been more than two years since Westley Dodd admitted the killings and said he was willing to accept the ultimate punishment. The passage of time and the uncertainty of the legal process have taken their toll on the Dodds.

"I'm finally beginning to feel how the families of the MIAs feel, because they're in that situation where there is no end," Jim Dodd said.

Jim Dodd said he doesn't know how to psychologically prepare himself for the execution.

"You just try to keep going and keep your wits about you," he said. "And keep busy. That's the main thing; don't sit and think about it too much."

Unless a court intervenes, Dodd will be executed shortly after midnight Jan. 5 for the murders of Vancouver brothers Cole and William Neer, 11 and 10, and Lee Iseli, 4, of Portland.

Jim Dodd doesn't know where he'll spend the evening of the execution. He is reluctant to stay at home because reporters will contact him, and says he has no desire to be at the state penitentiary at Walla Walla.

Jim Dodd shares Westley Dodd's resentment of death-penalty opponents who seek to block the execution.

"I'm afraid it's going to make it harder on us, harder on him. . . . The people who are trying to put a stop to it aren't considering Wes or anybody else," he said.

Greg Dodd also believes the execution should go ahead as planned, even though he admits he doesn't completely understand his feelings.

"It's my only brother that's going to die - but this murderer is getting his just reward," he said.

Of all the members of the Dodd family, the one most willing to talk to the news media has been Westley himself.

Greg and Mary Dodd say they were outraged recently at a television news show in which the interviewer detailed for Wes the medical trauma that a hanging produces. The reporter, they said, should have considered the hurt that description could cause both the Dodd family and the family of the 4-year-old Dodd killed by hanging.

The question of who'll receive Dodd's cremated remains has added to his family's discomfort. At Westley Dodd's request, the family signed a release turning the remains over to a Nashville woman they have never met, who says she fell in love with him while he was on death row.

Greg Dodd said his father had hoped to scatter Westley's remains on Mount St. Helens.

Even though the brothers have had little contact since Westley's arrest - Greg believes Westley gave away his last letter unopened - Greg said he thought disposing of the remains might be of some therapeutic value to the family.

"It's the closing paragraph of a book," he said. "Whether the book was bad or good, you want to close it, knowing that it is completely over."