Criminology - Tom Steeples

Episode Date: August 31, 2019

Tom Steeples was a Nashville man who was in the computer business. Tom's life took a dark turn as his addictions worsened. Tom drank, took cocaine, and racked up sizable gambling debts. He allegedly murdered a bar owner that he owed money to in 1993. The police believe he murdered a newlywed couple in 1994. Tom would never stand trial for any of these murders. Join Mike and Morf as they discuss the mysterious Tom Steeples. After the 1994 murder, police began to look at similarities between that and a vicious 1992 attack on a couple that left a woman dead. The couple met with a man named Tom Johnson was Tennessee that day on a computer business deal. The meeting turned dark when Johnson violently attacked the couple. Could this mysterious man have been Tom Steeples? Many people believe there is enough evidence to collect the dots. You can help support the show at patreon.com/criminology An Emash Digital production Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Criminology is a true crime podcast that may contain discussion about violent or disturbing topics. Listener discretion is advised. Hello, everyone, and welcome to episode 76 of criminology. I'm Mike Ferguson. And this is Mike Morford. Mr. Morford, how are you today? I'm doing great. How about you?

I'm doing good, man. I am ready to record another episode. I think I've talked about this before, but the recording of the. episodes and the talking and and you know going through the case that's the best part for me the research and and all that that is what it is it's kind of you know getting ready for this part yeah all that fact finding and researching and checking stuff out comes together and you get to hear what it sounds like in the episode so before we jump in let's do our patreon shoutouts we had rosemary Robertson, Kimmy Kearns, Nick Reynolds, Terry Timlet, and Deborah McGlynn. So big thanks to all the new

Patreon supporters and a big thanks to all the people that continue to support us month after month. Thanks for all that support. It's amazing as always. And if you'd like to help support criminology on Patreon, you can do so by visiting patreon.com slash criminology. All right, Morp, let's dive right in. We're talking about Tom Steepels. Tom Steepels was a Nashville businessman who murdered a bar owner in 1993 and a newlywed couple in 1994. But before he could stand trial for both of these cases, he killed himself. He overdosed on cocaine. There is an unsolved 1992 Georgia case that bears striking similarities to the newlywed couples murder. So people have asked the question, was Tom Steeple's responsible for that attack as well?

It's one of the big questions about this guy. Was he a serial killer? And I think more if you have these types of questions in a lot of cases, maybe, you know, not to the degree of this one that we're going to talk about. But, you know, I think with any killer, one of the questions that I always end up with at the end of the research is, is this it? Is this all they did? And I say that and that sounds horrible, is this it? Because, you know, most of these people commit such heinous acts. But it's the question of how much more did they do? How much carnage did they leave behind that nobody knows about? The police never figured it out. The perpetrator never, you know, admitted to X number. You know, I just, I always leave these cases thinking, wow, this person probably did so much more,

committed so many more crimes than what we're talking about because obviously we can only talk about what is no. Yeah, I think it's pretty evident that this guy, Tom Steeples, as we'll, dive into wasn't a nice guy and he was involved in a series of murders. And the question, as you mentioned, how many more are out there that we don't know about? These are the ones that they connected him to. And when we use the term serial killer, everybody immediately thinks, son of Sam, Zodiac, Ted Bundy, these massive victim counts and they're well known. Here's a guy that sort of slipped under the radar. A lot of people don't know his name, but he still may very well

be a serial killer. And, you know, if we look at what a serial killer is, the FBI's definition of a serial killer is a series of two or more murders committed at separate events, usually, but not always, by one offender acting alone. So based on the FBI's criteria, it seems very likely that this guy was a serial killer. And you're talking about... the FBI's definition. There's other definitions, right? Some of them include a cooling off period. I've seen two or more. I've seen the number be a little bit higher. But I guess when it comes down to it with this case, for me, it's whether or not Tom Steeples was involved in this unsolved 1992, Georgia case. Tom Steeples was born on November 3rd, 1944. There's not much known about his childhood.

But when Tom was 11 years old, police removed him from his adoptive father's Chicago home for about a year. Over allegations, his father physically abused him. His father was a police officer in a suburb of Chicago at that time. Around the age of 18, Tom joined the Marine Corps. But shortly after joining, he was involved in a drinking incident, which resulted in a short jail sentence and dishonorable discharge. Soon after his release, he began serving a three-year sentence in a federal penitentiary, on charges of taking a stolen car across state lines. He was released in 1964.

So he gets out of prison. The guy's 20 years old. In those last two years, things didn't go very well for him, right? More if I mean 18, he joins the Marine Corps. That doesn't go well. He's put in the brig. He gets a dishonorable discharge. And then right after getting out, he's picked up for driving a stolen car. Not a good start as a young man. After prison, Tom Steeples moved back to the Chicago area and he lived there for several years before moving to Memphis, Tennessee in the early 70s. While in Memphis, Tom did a few odd jobs before he actually got his first decent job as a warehouse manager for McCormick business forms. He held that job until 1975 when the owner fired him after an argument. It was around this time. Tom went out on a date with a

young woman, but instead of taking her home, he drove her to his apartment. And when they got there, Tom choked her and forced her to have sex with him in a van parked next to his apartment. The woman apparently decided not to prosecute him for rape. And the charge guys, lowered to assault. Tom pleaded not guilty and was sentenced to one year in prison. But he didn't serve the full year because by the end of 1975, he had moved to Nashville and was working for a computer company called Forms and Supplies of Nashville, located at 1120 Elm Hill Pipe. His name was even featured in a 1975 newspaper ad for the company. So despite his criminal past, this guy seems to be getting jobs, but here we have all the stuff that's troubling

mixed in. And just because he's got this job doesn't mean those issues aren't there. And we could even go back to the physical abuse. I think in a lot of these cases we discuss, the people that do this kind of stuff have some kind of history of being physically abused or harmed when they were younger. And you wonder if some of that is at play with this guy. Yeah, I always think that, I mean, the majority of the research that we do on killers shows that there was some type of abuse in their childhood. And you just wonder how much it plays into it, you know, whether they were abused themselves or they watched their father abuse their mother.

How much did they take away from that? And how much of that goes into their thinking, their thought patterns as they get older and really morph to me how they view women. Because to me, I think that's the big piece that I kind of see over and over these men watching, let's say, their father, you know, physically abuse their mother. It seems like in many times, it kind of sets them on the path of thinking, well, that's how you treat women. And you touched on the fact that this guy was able to land, you know, some pretty

good jobs, right? It's the 70s. I'm not sure what type of background checks they're doing at this point in time, but it does seem like he didn't have a whole lot of trouble kind of landing one fairly good gig after another. Yeah, it makes you wonder if he was putting on some kind of facade for people that knew him and potential employers. Well, I don't think there's any doubt. He's not going to go into the interview and act like the person that he is deep down inside. He's not going to assault a receptionist the minute he walks in, right? He's putting on that face that he wants an employer to see. I think to an extent that's what we all do.

But when you look at a lot of killers, I mean, look at Bundy, look at, I mean, you name it. A lot of them were able to wear a mask, right? That to everyone that knew them, they thought, man, this person's great. You hear it all the time after some big killer is caught. The neighbors were like, I can't believe this guy would have done that. He was great. He let me borrow his tools. You hear it all the time, Morp.

Despite his criminal past, in 1977, Tom Steepels married Tilly Ruth Trest, an IBM systems engineer from Nashville, and the couple moved to Mount Juliet in Tennessee, about 28 miles northeast of Nashville. Together, the couple bought forms and supplies of Nashville, changing an in anamed computer forms and supplies incorporated. In 1979, Tilly gave birth to their daughter, Ashley, followed by his son John in 1981. But the Steeples' marriage was a rocky one, and in 1991, Tilly filed for divorce. She claimed that Tom bragged her about having multiple affairs with sex workers, and that he had given her venereal diseases that he contracted. Tilly also claimed that Tom assaulted and attempted to rape another woman on November 29, 1991,

in a teepee that he built in their backyard. When Tilly tried to stop him, he choked and hit her. So for all the women out there, if your husband builds a TEP in your backyard, that's a red flag. There's something going on, maybe, possibly check into it. Tilly got a temporary restraining order against Tom, blocking him from. from any contact with her and the kids, as well as their computer business. Not long after this, Tilly found several suicide notes from Tom in their Mount Juliet

home. The day she found these notes, she also found her husband in a second home that they owned in Donaldson. He was sitting in his truck with a hose running from the exhaust pipe into the cab while the engine was running. she called the police. And when the police got there, Tom ran from the truck to the back of the house. Now, eventually, Tilly dropped the divorce petition, claiming that she and Tom had reconciled. But a year later, the couple's troubles worsened when Tom started using cocaine. Not only that, but he started gambling and ended up losing large sums of money on video poker at the Corral Club. The Corral Club was owned by a man named Ronald Ronnie Bingham. Sometime after 3.30 a.m. on October 17, 1993, Tom walked into the corral club with a 38 caliber

pistol and shot Ronnie to death. Afterwards, Tom doused Ronnie's body with gasoline and set the bar on fire. When police arrived at the crime scene, they found Ronnie's body sitting upright in a chair. Police believe Tom's motive for killing Ronnie was to get out of paying the large gambling debt. Police arrested Tom shortly after and charged him with criminal homicide. He pleaded not guilty to the charge and his attorney, Ed Yarbrough, claimed the detectives had a weak case based on circumstantial evidence. Tom Steeples was released on a $150,000 bond,

and on March 7, 1994, he entered the Stagecoach Lounge, where a chance encounter would change the lives of two families forever. It was at the Stagecoach Lounge, where Tom met Rob, and Kelly Phillips. Rob and Kelly Phillips were young. They were in love. They had recently been married. Rob was a Navy veteran from South Carolina.

He was an auto mechanic by day and an aspiring country singer by night. Friends described him as a polite, well-behaved man who loved his music. Kelly was described as extremely kind. She was an attractive woman who made him. men's meat by working as a waitress and a catering manager for a local catering business. Rob and Kelly met in 1993 at Leo's Little Bit of Country Bar in San Marcos, California. This is a place where Kelly was working at the time. Rob would perform at the bar with his band, Rob Phillips, and Charleston County.

After almost a year of dating, Rob and Kelly got married. Soon after, Rob landed a singing gig in Mexico. Kelly gave up her well-paying catering job to follow Rob there, but at some point Rob lost the singing gig and the couple returned to California, settling in the town of Fallbrook, about 30 miles north of San Marcos. Life for the newlyweds was hard after their return. The two struggled to bring in enough money to pay their bills. Kelly's mother and stepfather, Judy and Robin Widry,

gave them several thousand dollars to bow them out of prison. debt. Oh, more if I remember those days, man, being a young married person, not making a lot of money. It's a tough time. It's a great time, right? Because you're in love. You've met the person that you want to spend the rest of your life with, but you're really not, at least this was in my case. And I think it is in a lot of people's cases, especially when you marry young, you're not in a position where you're really doing well financially. So it's kind of like this balance between the new love and trying to pay all your bills. It can be a struggle. I think like most families, there were people there to support them and help them out of that situation. So they had that going for them. In March 1994, 24-year-old Rob and

28-year-old Kelly decided to leave California. Kelly had sent resumes to. various catering businesses in Nashville, and she received some positive responses. Rob figured he could get a job there as a mechanic. And we're also talking about Nashville, right? Rob was an aspiring country singer. I'm sure there was some allure there that, you know, he could get some gigs at the bars and maybe get discovered. So Kelly sold her car and the couple's furniture, getting about $900 in cash for their cross-country move. They packed two suitcases, a color TV, and some boxes of their personal belongings. Then they drove to Nashville in their Ford pickup truck.

Morp, these people are going all out. This is a big move for them. California to Nashville, $900 is not a ton of money. It's not going to last all that long. But if you look at it on the other hand, what do they have to lose? They're not doing that great in California. Besides maybe giving up some family support, it sounds to me like they're looking for a new start. Rob and Kelly made the trip safely.

Really the only thing that stood out about the trip was that they had a flat tire along the way. And they arrived in Tennessee around 6.30 p.m. on Monday, March 7th, 1994. They checked into room 112 at the Ocano Lodge, located at 970 Murfreesboro Road in South Nashville. At 7 p.m., Kelly called her mother Judy while Rob looked for a job in the classified ad section of the local newspaper. Kelly sounded happy on the phone with Judy. She told her mom about the trip and the flat tire and mentioned that her and Rob were going

to grab a bite to eat. The couple planned to go to bed early that night because Kelly had a job at an interview early the next morning. Judy told Kelly to call her collect the next day to tell her how the interview went. But Kelly never called Judy. Around 1130 a.m. on March 8th, a motel maid opened the door to room 112 at the Econo Lodge and made a gruesome discovery. She found the bloody and battered bodies of Rob and Kelly Phillips. The horrified woman quickly called 911. When police arrived on scene, they were not prepared for what they were about to see.

Detectives Pat Pestiglione and Bill Piedmore later said that the crime scene was extremely bloody. They even said that it was hard to describe in words. It was unbelievable. And our Patreon members are familiar with Pat Pistiglione. We did an amazing interview with him that went up only on. on Patreon. Pat hosts a show now on investigation discovery called Deadly Recall. And the thing about Pat Pestiglione is that he has a photographic memory. It's said morph that he can remember every single detail of every case he's ever worked on. And he's worked on some pretty big cases.

Yeah, unlike Pat Pistiglione, I don't have a great memory, but I have a good memory of that conversation with him. And it was very impressive some of those details that he can pull back in his memory and just relay them to you with no issues at all. And you wonder in a case like this, if that kind of memory is really an invaluable tool for an investigator. I think it would be a great tool for anyone. I've always wanted to have that type of ability, if for nothing else, then to win arguments

with my wife. because we argue all the time about things that somebody said or that happened, you know, the week before. My memory is a little fuzzy on it. So I'm not always able to, you know, win those arguments. But if I had a photographic memory, I couldn't lose. In the suburbs of D.C., a woman fails to show up for work and is found brutally murdered. I wonder what's emergency. We just walked in the door and there's blood in the foyer.

For the next two decades, the case remained unsolved until new technology allowed investigators to do what had once been impossible. A new series from ABC Audio in 2020, Blood and Water. Listen now, wherever you get your podcasts. The Shaw Festival presents the most beloved musical of all time. My Fair Lady. This is the story of Eliza Doolittle, the Cockney Flower Girl who, Professor Henry Higginsbecks, he can turn into a lady. Don't miss, My Fair Lady,

a wonderfully lavish and lovelry production. This year at the Shaw. For best seats at best prices, go to Shawfest.com. But back to this crime scene, there was no sign of forced entry into the room, Rob and Kelly were both tied to the bed. Their skulls were crushed, and it was later determined that they were punched repeatedly and ultimately both struck with some type of hard object. This was extremely brutal. Both Rob and Kelly were beaten beyond recognition, and it was

determined that Kelly had been raped. The couple's TV was still in the room, but the couple's, some of their other items were missing. Kelly's diamond earrings that she always wore, her blue turquoise ring and some other jewelry was missing. Also missing were some pots and pans and a mixer. But the mixer's two beaters were still in the room. So the mixer itself is gone, but the beaters that go with it were left in the room. It also appeared that the killer stole Robin Kelly's cash. So you take this crime. seen as a whole. Obviously, two extremely brutal murders and police theorize that the motive for the murders was robbery. Some of those things that were stolen don't seem like typical things that a thief

would target. You know, if it was a safe or large sums of cash, that kind of stuff. But pans and pots and mixers, it just seems weird the stuff that was taken. Yeah, I was. I was. I was. I was, thinking the same thing more if I get it, $900 in cash or whatever the amount was, right, by the time they landed there in Nashville. A robber is going to take that, no doubt. Diamond earrings, rings, other types of jewelry, that's easy to take. But a mixer with none of the beaters, pots and pans. What kind of robber takes pots and pants? That type of stuff just doesn't make sense. As far as I know, there's not some big black market for pots and pans and mixers. It doesn't seem like the usual items that are taken in a burglary.

Through the investigation, police learned of the Phillips whereabouts on March 7th after Kelly spoke with her mother on the phone. First, Rob and Kelly ate dinner at a fast food restaurant on Murphysboro Road. Then they went to Big Jim Stagecoach Lounge, located at 8,000. 870, Murfreesboro Road, about two blocks from their motel. Witnesses at the bar told police the couple was drinking coffee and talking to a man who was drinking alcohol. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary. Before Rob and Kelly left the bar, Rob got up on stage and sang the song, Kill in Time, by country singer Clint Black. While the bar stayed open until 2 a.m., police said Rob and Kelly were back in their motel room

by midnight. And I know more if you have no idea who Clint Black is. You don't like country music. You don't listen to country music. I think we've been over that before, right? I know who Clint Black is. Oh, you do? I do.

I have older relatives that listen to Clint Black. Oh, okay. I like the way you throw that in there. I have older relatives that listen to Clint Black. Hey, I'm just saying in the 90s, in the 90s in the time frame that we're talking about, Clint Black was a huge deal. one of my favorite country singers. And actually that song is,

is one of my favorites. Are you going to sing a verse from it? I would sing it for you now, but I think it would destroy the flow of the podcast. So I will refrain. So it sounds to me like the authorities have a pretty good idea, right? Of what Robin Kelly were doing up until about that midnight time frame. It's after midnight that things get kind of.

of murky. Authorities don't really know exactly what happened between midnight and 1130 a.m. when the maid found their bodies. But their theory was that Rob opened the motel door to the killer, who then struck Rob with a metal object. The killer tied Kelly's hands and feet to the bed and then beat Rob to death in front of her. Next, the killer raped Kelly before bludgeoning her to death as well. That sounds like a plausible theory. But the thing about it was that really from a very early stage, police had a good idea on a suspect. Tom Steepels. Tom Steepels was a waiting trial on the murder of Ronnie Bingham. He was out on bond when these murders occurred. So detectives approached Tom and he voluntarily gave up hair,

saliva, semen, and blood samples. They then used his DNA against DNA collected at the crime scene for lab testing. So this was 1994. DNA testing was around, but in reality, it was still pretty much in its infancy. By no means, Morf, was it what it is today? Early on, the DNA technology was just very basic. I think if they had a person's sample to compare one-to-one against a killer's DNA sample, they could do things like positively match the two.

It's not like today where they take a little small sample and have to make it into a bigger sample to compare against a very small sample they have from a killer. So I think, you know, a one-to-one match or one-to-one ruling out was something that they could do early on. On April 8th, while police searched Steeple's Place of Business, Forms and Supplies Incorporated, they found cocaine and cracked and charged Tom with one count of felony possession of cocaine. Phone records showed that Tom used his mobile phone on Murphy's Borough Road on the night of the double murder, and he called the Econological from work within 24 hours after the murders. The witnesses who saw a man talking to the couple at the bar identified that man as Tom Steeple's,

and he became the prime suspect in Rob and Kelly's murders. On May 5th, a woman named Denise Sloan told police that she went to the Ramada Inn on Spence Lane with a man. A news broadcast about the murders came on the television, and it showed a picture of Tom Steeple's as their prime suspect. This woman, Denise Sloan, realized that the man she was with was Tom Steeple's. Tom got upset over this news broadcast. He then emptied the contents of a small bag onto the motel bed. The items included gloves, duct tape, nylon straps, and a metal rod. This woman was frightened and she had very good reason to be.

So Denise told the man that she was going to get a drink and she left the room. She called a friend from the motel lobby to come get her and then she said, she fled the motel. Denise's friend called police. Morph, I think that's a tough position to imagine yourself in, right? You've been out. You met someone. All right. You end up back in a hotel room, whatever the circumstances were. And you're sitting there and on the television pops up a picture of the man that you're with, the man that you probably just met. And it's indicating that he's the. prime suspect in these horrible double murders. I can't imagine the fright, the sudden jolt that

would go through your body at that point in time. And the fact that this woman, Denise Sloan, was able to work her way out of the room is amazing. I can only speculate, but I can't imagine that Denise's fate would have been great. I mean, you're in the room with a killer. The man now knows that you've seen him on television. I'm surprised she was able to get out of that room a lot. Yeah, and I think the old saying is true. Sometimes you've just got to trust your gut and your instincts and take action. And that's what she did. And for whatever reason, she was able to get out of there. but I think she's, like you mentioned, she could have easily been another victim. And that's not something you're going to forget, right?

You're going to live with that thought the rest of your life. I would imagine thinking that you had possibly this very close brush with death. When police arrived at the motel, they found the rumor this incident happened empty. But luckily for them, Tom registered the room under his own name. On May 13, 1994, police arrested Tom on drug possession resulting from the April Eve search. At the time of his arrest, he had 53 rocks of cocaine in his possession. Police also charged him with possession for resale. Tom's bond was set at $30,000.

The DNA results came back at the end of May, 1994. The semen taken from Kelly's body and the seaman sample Tom gave to police were a match. police then charged Tom Steeple's with the murders of Rob and Kelly Phillips and with Kelly's rape. And this is the part that I don't understand. And maybe it's because Tom Steeples didn't understand at that point in time very much about how DNA worked. But the fact that he would voluntarily just give up all these samples, hair, semen, saliva, you name it, he must have known that he left evidence. inside that room, and it was going to come back to him. I just don't get what the thinking there was. It wasn't like he gave the samples and then, you know, took off. He stayed around town. And we mentioned this was early on in the history of DNA use. So maybe he just didn't have that

understanding of how the whole process worked and how easily police would be able to connect those murders to him. We mentioned early on in this episode a, murder that took place in October of 1992 in Georgia. There were some striking similarities between the murders of Rob and Kelly Phillips and this murder that took place in Georgia. Some facets of the murder that took place in Georgia had investigators wondering if the two cases were related. 22-year-old Heather Uffelman of Aaron Tennessee and her 21-year-old,

year old fiancee Jeremy Rolfs from Illinois were both seniors at Middle Tennessee State University in Murphysboro in fall of 1992. Heather was born on December 17, 1969, to Osman and Helen Uffleman. She came from a large family with four older sisters and one older brother. Heather had a job at a radio station WMOT and as a tutor at Middle Tennessee State's development writing lab. She was a good student and a compassionate person. Heather was majoring in English at MTSU and about to receive her degree. Jeremy Rolst was born on January 28th, 1970 and had one sister. He was an energetic student at MTSU and went out of his way to get the job done. He worked for about six months at the Halsey Company in Nashville, a group that made music videos. I think his intention was to stay there

worked there after graduation. In October 1992, the Halsey Company was trying to sell a computer system called the Apple Quadra 950, and they placed an ad in a trade publication. A man named Tom C. Johnson answered the ad, saying that he was a freelance computer programmer and database consultant. He and Jeremy agreed to meet at a motel in Marietta, Georgia. One source says, that Jeremy met with Johnson several times prior in Murphy's Borough, Tennessee to negotiate the sale of the computer for around $31,000. So more not sure what type of computer this is, the Apple Quadra 950, but it just goes to show you, you know, what computers cost back in the day. Now, this was 1992. This must have been a pretty, how shall I say, technologically advanced or a big computer,

because even in 92 computers didn't cost $31,000, personal computers anyway. I remember having an Apple two something something. I can't remember the exact name of it when I was in high school. That would have been, you know, let's say $89.90. And I know for a fact it didn't cost $31,000 because my parents didn't have $31,000. Yeah, it's sort of makes you think when this technology first comes out, it's like the televisions even where they're, you know, $5,000 or some astronomical amount and then a couple years later, they're $799. The technology, as it becomes more readily available, it comes down in price.

Heather was worried that Jeremy would fall off sleepable driving because he had recently worked long hours. So she changed her schedule at the radio station to accompany Jeremy on his trip. Jeremy and Heather arrived in Marietta around 7.30 a.m. on October 24th, 1992, 1992, and checked into the Knights Inn, located at 2,500 Delk Road. They were to meet Johnson that morning in his motel room. When the couple met up with Johnson, he told them that his business partner would be joining them in about a half hour. So to kill some time, Jeremy and Heather went out for breakfast. Then around 8 a.m. Johnson suggested to Jeremy that they load the computer into his

car while they waited for his business partner. After that, Johnson, Jeremy, and Heather went to Johnson's motel room and chatted for about 20 minutes. It was around this time that Jeremy began to get impatient. He was tired of waiting for Johnson's business partner to arrive. In fact, he began to doubt Johnson. Johnson's story altogether. Jeremy told Tom Johnson that he was getting tired of waiting. All of a sudden, Tom Johnson pulled out a small semi-automatic pistol that was possibly a 25 caliber and told Jeremy and Heather to get down on the floor. He then forced them to roll up in the blankets, and he started beating the couple with a hammer. Heather started screaming from the

vicious blows, and Jeremy told her to stop screaming and the man would leave. Johnson then struck Jeremy several times before going back to Heather. Jeremy was still conscious and watched Johnson wipe the countertop for fingerprints before he left the room. Around 9.30 a.m., the Marietta Police Department received a call from the night clerk and several other calls from guests at the night's end. The night clerk told police he was out on the motel premises when he found Jeremy walking around.

He was disoriented and he was. bleeding from the head. Jeremy told him he needed help. By the time authorities arrived at the motel, the suspect had fled, along with the Apple Quadra computer system. When police went to Johnson's room, they found Heather unconscious and barely clinging to life. She was still wrapped up in the blankets. Jeremy and Heather were both rushed to Kennesstone Hospital, where Heather later died from head injuries at 1230 p.m. Despite being severely injured in the attack, Jeremy was able to give police a description of their attacker. He said the man was a white male in his 30s, who stood between 5 foot 9 and 6 feet tall, and weighed between 160 and 175 pounds. He was clean cut with short

brown hair and was wearing a light-colored dress shirt and expensive-looking alligator skin boots. The man was driving a dark brown Dodge Dynasty with Tennessee plates. Police also discovered that a woman at the motel complained about a noise disturbance coming from Tom's room, about an hour before the attack. They thought this woman was possibly Tom's accomplice, trying to sabotage the plan when she discovered he was planning to commit murder instead of robbery. But hotel staff apparently didn't check out the disturbance that the woman reported. This case was featured on Unsolved Mysteries. And Unsolved Mysteries did a reenactment, which is typical, right, of how. that show went, I think more if this was a particularly memorable episode. Because of the way

that it unfolded, the brutality, just everything about it. Investigators told the show in April 1994 that they believed that Tom Johnson pulled a similar scam just one week before Heather's murder, but he never showed up for the appointment. Authority said at the time that the motive for the attacks was robbery. It was determined that Heather had not been sexually assaulted. Jeremy was released from the hospital on October 28, 1992, the very same day that Heather was laid to rest. Based on his description of this man, Tom Johnson, police released a composite sketch to the media, hoping that someone would recognize the killer. But no one ever came forward. around this same time, the MTSU Foundation set up a scholarship fund in Heather's memory.

And I think we have to talk about this composite sketch just for a minute. You know, Morph, and I think I've told you this before, I'm not one that looks at a lot of pictures versus composite sketches and things. Oh, yeah, that's that same person. For some reason, I guess my mind doesn't work that way. I oftentimes don't see the similarities. But when you look at the composite sketch next to a picture of Tom Steeple's, they are eerily similar, very similar in my mind. And maybe we'll put those up on our Facebook page.

That's different for me. Because like I said, I just don't normally see the connection a lot of times, but I definitely see this one. In December 1992, Jeremy Rolfs wrote a piece for the Tennessean in their Nashville eye section called When It Happens to You. Here's an excerpt. You may have heard that Heather Uffleman, the woman I was planning on spending a full and wonderful life with, died from her wounds. You may have said to someone you love, that's terrible, and then turn the page.

News is more than what you read. News is more than the images of police and ambulance as you see on TV. more than official statements read by a newscaster. News is about people who used to say it could never happen to me. And how true is that? I mean, we all read horrible things every day in the news. And I think a lot of times we think that same thing. You know, that could never happen to me.

I don't know, maybe that is changing now in the world we live in. A lot of people we hear from say, you know, listening to true crime podcast. or watching true crime things on TV has made them much more aware of the things going on around them in their life. I think that's a good thing. But this piece by Jeremy Rolf says it's heartbreaking. To be involved in something like this where the woman you love or the man you love, either way, dies and you survive, that would be horrible for the survivor.

You know it is. And you know that's something that Jeremy had to carry with him for the rest of his life. And it wouldn't be easy. Jeremy struggled for years after losing the love of his life, Heather. And sadly, tragedy would find Jeremy once again. On March 31, 1997, Jeremy was killed in a car accident in South Africa while doing volunteer work for the Peace Corps. His mother was with him, but she survived.

The driver of the vehicle had fallen asleep at the wheel and hit another vehicle head on. Jeremy was buried in Forest Park, Illinois. And Morph, I think when you look at this piece of the case, the incident in Georgia with Jeremy and Heather, and you look at them as people. You really get a sense, right, of what type of people Heather and Jeremy were. They were going to school. It sounds like they were ambitious. but above that, they were a friendly, gentle, loving couple.

And then you talk about Jeremy after he's lost Heather. He's over in South Africa, working for the Peace Corps, giving back to humanity when he's killed. It's just, it's tragic all the way around, the whole thing. I think one thing that's sadly ironic is one thing that they both shared was a love of technology and computers, and ultimately, that's what led to them being attacked and led to Heather being murdered. We talked earlier about how police would eventually notice similarities between these two cases that we've talked about. After the brutal murders of Rob and Kelly Phillips, police looked

into the possibility that Tom C. Johnson was actually Tom Steeples. By June of 1994, Nashville police told the media, they did not believe the two cases were related. saying the physical descriptions of both suspects were totally different. Additionally, Tom Johnson was in his 30s, whereas Tom Steeples was almost 50. Yeah, so I think that the physical description maybe put the police off. It's a big difference, right? 30s, 50s, but I will say this, more if there are some people that you really have a hard time pegging their age. You know, people that are, you know, in their late 40s, but look 30.

That happens. And I don't know. I go back to the known picture of Tom Steepels and the composite sketch made from the murder in Georgia, they look very similar to me. And I think that when you compare the crimes, the attacks in the hotel rooms, the fact a car with Tennessee license plates. is seen leaving the scene. It makes you wonder if there is something to it, some possible connection, and if Tom Steeples was Tom Johnson. Despite the differences, it's hard to ignore the similarities between these two cases. You have two young couples robbed, viciously beaten in motel rooms, both assailants were named Tom and in the computer business. Also, it's thought

both assailants were from Tennessee. I think the problem is police had no evidence connecting these two crimes together. And then meanwhile, back in Nashville, Tom Steeples was sitting in a jail cell on murder and rape charges in the Phillips case. I don't forget, he's also awaiting trial for the murder of Ronnie Bingham. Ed Yarbrough, who was representing Tom in the Bingham case, declined to represent him in the Phillips case. Then on August 9th, 1994, a judge allowed Yarbrough to withdraw from defending Tom in the Bingham case altogether. So something's going on there, Morve. Yeah, you wonder if there's

some kind of conflict or he just doesn't believe the guy is innocent and he doesn't want to represent him if he feels he's guilty. Yeah, we don't know what it was, right? Couldn't find anything concrete as to why he did not want to represent him, but there's no doubt he didn't want to. Two days after Ed Yarbrough withdrew from representing Tom Steeples, Tom was found unconscious in his cell at Metro Jail at around 350 p.m. Metro Jail is a maximum security facility. Officers and medical staff performed CPR, and Tom was then taken to Metro General Hospital, where he died from cardiac arrest at 4.25 p.m. toxicology reports later showed that his blood cocaine level was about 70 times a toxicity level of the drug and 34 times the level found in most cocaine overdoses.

Tom Staples had undoubtedly taken his own life. Yeah, I don't think there's much doubt here more if on the part of authorities. This is a level of cocaine that can't be explained any other way. 70 times the toxicity level of the drug. And just about two weeks before he died, Tom suffered a drug overdose and was moved to Metro jail. His wife Tilly Steeples was ultimately charged with arranging to deliver cocaine to Tom. Between July 26th and August 10th, apparently she hid it in a sealed envelope that was

ultimately carried to Tom by his attorney, Ed Yarbrough. Officers on duty that day were found to not be at fault in Tom's death. So this man was able to get his wife to deliver cocaine to him into different correctional facilities. So you have to wonder, was that first drug overdose a first attempt to take his own life and then he followed it up with the second one at Metro jail. It sounds like it. I don't know for sure. But I'm always amazed at how easy it seems to be for prisoners to get drugs in jail. The one place you would think it would be extremely tough to get drugs. It seems like everybody has them if they want them. You hear it all the time. Go back to somebody like Richard Speck. I mean, that guy was just sitting around

having the most fun of his life doing drugs. He was getting anything he wanted. But the big thing here is that Tom Steeples died before ever going to trial for either the Bingham or Phillips murders. Kelly Phillips' mom, Judy, went back to California after Tom's death. And she still resides there today. And I think in those types of instances, you always wonder what the closure is for the families. I mean, they know this guy died. They know that he killed their family members, but technically more if a jury never pronounced him guilty of the murders. You just wonder what type of difference that is when it comes to the victim's families or the

victims themselves that survived. It's like that old saying, you're innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. And technically, although police think he was the guy, he was never proven to be. So is it better to get a guilty verdict and then have the person that murdered your family member sit in a prison cell, let's say, for the rest of his life? Or is it better for that person to be dead? but technically never be convicted of the crime. I don't know. I mean, I guess that would depend person to person.

Police never found Tom C. Johnson, and there's never been an arrest in Heather Uthelman's murder and Jeremy Rolf's attack. Police have never connected that case officially with the Phillips case. Heather Uffleman's murder remains unsolved and open today. In April 1996, Tilly Steeples was charged with the murder of her husband and accused of supplying Tom with cocaine two weeks before his death. However, the murder charge was dropped a few months later, and Tilly pleaded no contest to the charges of smuggling cocaine or a husband in exchange for a lighter sentence.

A former inmate of Tom, a guy by the name of Michael Evans, testified at Tilly's 1996 trial that he received a package containing underwear, socks, and a sweatsuit that was delivered to the jail after he had spoken to Tilly on. on the phone. Evan said that he told Tom where the package was and then went to take a shower. Two and a half hours later, Tom was dead. Another witness that testified against Tilly Steeples was a man named Dan Van Loon. He worked for Tilly at the computer business that she still owned at the time of her trial. So apparently Tilly asked this Dan Van Loon how much cocaine it would take to kill a person. You had another witness that said Tilly cashed a $1,000 check and met with a drug dealer

named Fred Ross at a local motel. Tilly denied all of this when she took the stand and testified. At the sentencing hearing, Tilly claimed she was falsely accused of the crime and that police had a vendetta against her. Her lawyer said she should not have to serve any time in prison because she was a victim of severe physical and mental abuse at the hands of her husband. However, Tilly was sentenced to six years in prison. The previous summer, Tilly filed a lawsuit against Metro Jail for failure to watch and supervise her husband. She claimed that if they had, he would not have been able to ingest the cocaine. In 1998, Tilly filed and lost an appeal, but she was paroled on November 24th, 1999 after serving only nine months in prison. But her legal troubles were far from over.

On November 11, 2002, Tilly and her then partner, David Rabby, were indicted on federal charges stemming from a major multi-state internet scam. They ran from a Mount Juliette, Tennessee home. The couple owned 800America.com and they cheated the company's investors out of millions. of dollars. Two days later, the SEC filed a civil enforcement action against the pair. The SEC also charged Tilly with making materially false and misleading statements to 800 America.com incorporated Zaccountant in violation of the Exchange Act rule. Rabby was ultimately convicted and died in prison in 2005. Tilly was sentenced to 70 months in prison and two years supervised release.

and ordered to pay restitution in the amount of over $9 million. After Tilly got out, she remarried and she currently resides in Mississippi. Some people believe that Tilly Steeples knew more about her husband's crimes than she let on. And some also believe that she was the woman at the Georgia motel who tried sabotaging Tom Johnson's plan to murder Heather Uffelman and Jeremy Rolfe. As violent a man as Tom Steeples was his entire life, life. It's possible there were other murder victims. We may never know if Tom Steeples was Heather's killer, but maybe one day someone will talk. And more, if we talked at the beginning of this episode

about Tom Steeple's as a serial killer, and based on the FBI definition that you gave, the crimes that he has thought to have committed would definitely make him a serial killer. But I think in wrapping up this case. It's definitely a strange one, right? Tons of evidence against Tom Steeples in the murders that he was charged with, but he died before he could be convicted. And I think anytime you have that happen, it's a very strange situation. You're basically saying this guy was a murderer, he was a bad guy, but a court of law never really said that he was, right? Did a jury of his peers never convicted him?

It always is strange, I think, when, when this situation occurs. And then you have the murder of Heather Uffelman in Georgia. There's so many things about that case that lead many people to believe that Tom Johnson was really Tom Steeples, the motel, the computer angle, the compulsive. the composite sketch. Now, you have the big difference in ages. We talked about that. But again, I think some people sometimes get ages incorrect. So I don't know. It's a fascinating case. It's horrible. You know, a number of people lost their lives, but the details are fascinating. And the sad thing is that barring new evidence coming to light or new witness coming out of the shadows,

there's a good chance that some of these cases we discussed today won't have any kind of finale to them. Yeah, I think tougher to get resolution, right, when the person that you believe did it is dead. Because even if, let's say some DNA came to light that we don't know about, or somebody came forward, let's say Tilly came forward and said, yep, this is what happened. in the case of Heather Uffleman, what are they going to do? The man is dead, has been dead for, you know, a good number of years. Where's the finality? But that's it.

That's the case of Tom Steepels. If you love the show and you haven't done so, go out, give us a five-star rating. You can leave a review if you want. And keep on telling your friends. That goes a long way towards helping people find the show. Thanks goes out to Debbie Buck at TruecrimeDiva.com for writing and research assistants in this episode. If you want to follow us on social media, find us on Twitter with the handle at Criminology Pod. You can also find us on Facebook by searching for Criminology Podcast.

You can also join our discussion group on Facebook, which is called Criminology Podcast Discussion and Fans. All right, that's it for us, Morf. We will be back with an all-new episode of Criminology next Saturday night. So for Mike Ferguson. And more. We'll talk to you then. Take care, everyone.