You Might Also Like: That's So Criminal

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The Happy Face Killer had many names. One being Happy Face, two being Keith Hunter Jefferson, and the third being Just Dad.

We talked to the serial killer's daughter, Melissa Moore. Does she still talk to her dad after his killing spree? And why she moved back to the scene of the crime? Are there signs that Melissa may have missed? I'm Lyndon Blake and you're listening to That's So Criminal.

Today's episode is fascinating. I'm speaking with Melissa Moore. She is the daughter of the Happy Face serial killer, Keith Hunter Jefferson. Dennis Quaid portrayed him in a movie. This was the serial killer who killed eight women in the early 1990s. He was on the West Coast, Oregon down to California. He became a very well-known serial killer because while he was doing his killing spree, he was taunting the news outlets. He was writing letters to them and signing them with a smiley face. That's how he got the nickname Happy Face. He's pretty evil. His daughter, Melissa Moore, has learned to accept that, yes, her father is a serial killer, but she's turning this horrible situation, that is her story, into using it for good. Her fourth book, Killer in the Family, comes out today, October 13th. We're going to get into that, what she's doing for other victims' families, but really how she put her life back together after it was ripped apart, knowing the man that raised her was out there killing women when he wasn't taking her to school or taking her out to eat. Here's my interview with Melissa Moore, the daughter of the Happy Face serial killer. Okay, so still in Oregon, how close to where you grew up?

Melissa Moore (3:20)

I'm actually not far from my father's first victim.

I grew up actually in Spokane, Washington, and I moved to Portland, Oregon, to reconnect with a guy I grew up with, and we got married and blended our families, and brought me back to Portland, Oregon where my dad lived and committed some of his crimes. So I'm not going to lie, it was hard at the beginning to adjust to being in the same environment, the same things that you see, the landmarks that bring back those memories. But I feel like I'm able to make better ones now, so it's not always associated with this horrible past, you know?

Lyndon Blake (4:12)

Yeah, and I mean, unfortunately, we all know that your dad, it was multiple states, so you would truly to get away, you would have to get out of the West. But yeah, I mean, I knew Oregon had such a big history in it, and so that has to be tough. But I'm sure it makes you feel like you know you've grown so much, since obviously being a little girl, but even this next chapter, it's like, okay, I'm taking control of my story and making the good memories, and I'm not going to live in this dark cloud of what he did.

Melissa Moore (4:49)

And that was the biggest transformation in my life because at the beginning, when my father was arrested 30 years ago, I thought that I had to wallow and live in the shadows because of obviously the shame, I still feel the shame of having my father as the Happy Face Serial Killer. But I started to realize like I'm not my father.