Seattle, WA ? For four terrifying years in the mid-1980s, dozens of missing women turned up dead in western Washington state, their bodies left near rivers and ravines, interstates and airports.

Then it stopped. One set of remains was found in 1989, but for the next decade there was nothing — and little hope of ever finding seven missing women listed among the 49 victims of the Green River killer.

That changed this summer, as detectives painstakingly searched sites old and new to discover four more sets of remains, three of them positively identified as members of the missing seven.

“You want this day to come, but you don’t want this day to come,” said Marilyn Molina, 37, whose only sister, Marie Malvar, was the latest to be found.

Meanwhile, investigators are continuing to search. They returned Sunday to the Green River south of Seattle, where the first bodies were found in 1982 and where the killer got his name.

King County sheriff’s detectives aren’t saying what changed this summer. But many people believe a local truck painter arrested in late 2001 has agreed to cooperate and is leading investigators to more bodies in hopes of avoiding the death penalty.

“There’s just no other explanation in mind,” said Seattle attorney William Bailey, who is representing the mother of one victim in a wrongful death claim against the painter, 54-year-old Gary Ridgway. “I think it’s the right thing to do to plea bargain with Ridgway so that he never gets out.”

Investigators said Ridgway, who has pleaded not guilty to seven counts of aggravated first-degree murder, is linked by DNA evidence to some of the deaths. His lawyers have declined to say whether he is cooperating.

Malvar, who was 18 when she disappeared April 30, 1983, was identified Wednesday after investigators found her skull and jaw in a wooded ravine near Auburn. The bones of April Buttram and Pammy Avent also turned up this summer. Buttram was 17 when she disappeared, while Avent was 16.

Investigators also found a set of remains in June that they have not identified, bringing the total number of unidentified sets of remains in the case to five.

The Green River Task Force searches for human remains in a wooded ravine off 65th Avenue South in Auburn, Wash. The Sept. 28 search is part of an investigation into the Green River serial killings.