My Father, the BTK Killer (2025) Plot Summary & Ending Explained

The film closes on the uneasy aftermath of Dennis Rader’s arrest, showing Kerri Rawson’s final, painful encounter with the man who raised her. After the FBI used her university DNA sample to confirm her father’s identity, she began visiting him in prison – a move meant to coax any hidden confessions. During one such meeting she confronted him about a note he’d kept that listed her name in connection with his twisted “bondage games,” suggesting she may have been assaulted as a child. Rader flat‑out denied any wrongdoing against his family, and Kerri, feeling the weight of his lies, cut off all further contact. That conversation becomes the documentary’s emotional climax, underscoring how the horror of his crimes extended beyond the victims he killed.

The ending then shifts to the present, revealing the divergent paths the two have taken. Rader, now in his eighties, remains incarcerated at the El Dorado Correctional Facility, serving a 175‑year sentence for ten murders and the countless taunts he sent to the media. Kerri, meanwhile, lives a quiet life in Kansas with her husband and two children, keeping her address secret while continuing to speak out about the trauma of being “the daughter of a serial killer.” Her childhood home has been razed, leaving only an empty lot, a stark symbol of the effort to erase the physical reminder of the nightmare. The documentary ends on a lingering note of unresolved pain, hinting that Kerri may never fully know whether she herself was directly victimized, but she has chosen to keep telling her story on her own terms.