Murder: True Crime Stories - UNSOLVED: The Tylenol Murders, Pt. 2

Episode Date: June 18, 2024

In the fall of 1982, the Tylenol Murders had the whole city of Chicago on edge. Investigators were desperate to find the culprit. But their inability to work together threatened to derail the entire case. Murder: True Crime Stories is part of Crime House Studios. For more, follow us on Instagram @crimehouse. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The dawn of the digital age allowed people to connect and communicate faster than ever. But it took a while for high-tech systems to become widely available. In the 1980s, many law enforcement offices still relied on paper records. They didn't have virtual databases or digital fingerprints to locate suspects. That made progress much slower, and it was easier for criminals to escape undetected. In 1982, the Tylenol Task Force had to rely on a lot of grunt work and word of mouth to generate leads. They set up tip lines, searched employee records, and interviewed countless people. They had no way of knowing that the person they were after was hiding in plain sight, and was one step ahead of them.

was one step ahead of that. People's lives are like a story. There's a beginning, a middle, and an end. But you don't always know which part you're on. Sometimes the final chapter arrives far too soon, and we don't always get to know the real ending. I'm Carter Roy, and this is Murder True Crime Stories, a Crime House original powered by Pave Studios. Every Tuesday, I'll explore the story of a notorious murder or murders. At Crime House, we want to express our gratitude to you our community for making this possible please support us by rating reviewing and following murder true crime stories wherever

you get your podcasts your feedback truly matters this is the second of a three-part series on the Tylenol murders, a string of shocking deaths in the fall of 1982 that left the entire city of Chicago on edge. Last week, we told the story of seven tragic, sudden deaths that resulted from poisoned Tylenol pills in the Chicago area. Today, we'll follow two competing investigations as the Tylenol task force threatens to fall apart. Next time, we'll follow the rest of the case as it reaches an unthinkable ending. All that and more coming up. Hey everyone, it's Carter. I have a favor to ask you. If you are enjoying Murder True Crime Stories, I would be honored if you took a moment to rate and review us on Apple and Spotify. Your valuable feedback helps us improve and expand our reach so other true crime fans can find us too.

Your support means everything. On September 29th, 1982, 27-year-old Adam Janis died after experiencing sudden chest pain. Adam's brother Stanley and his sister-in-law Teresa died in a similar manner. The deaths didn't end with the Janus family. 12-year-old Mary Kellerman, 27-year-old Mary Reiner, and 31-year-old Mary McFarland also met the same fate. Their deaths were sudden and perplexing, but medical investigators quickly determined that each victim had taken Tylenol pills laced with cyanide. On September 30th, a team of local, state, and federal investigators was formed. It was known as the Tylenol Task Force.

force. By tracing lot numbers on the four bottles known to contain contaminated pills, the task force quickly determined that they were tampered with on store shelves right in their Chicago-area neighborhoods. This was a key revelation, but investigators knew it was only a start, because they still had no idea who the killer was or where they might be. In order to find that person, the task force had to narrow down motives. That task fell to FBI Special Agent Roy Lane Jr. Lane was 12 years into his FBI career. Throughout his 12-year career, Agent Lane had investigated crooked judges and mob bosses, so he knew that finding a motive was essential and that it wasn't always obvious. Lane considered every possibility. Maybe the killer was a disgruntled store employee or an angry customer. Maybe they had specifically targeted all the victims.

Or maybe they only targeted one and the rest were a cover-up. Or maybe it was totally random. He and other members of the task force interviewed everyone they could think of with ties to the stores and the victims. They even set up a tip line, and on the first day, they received 177 calls. But it was like searching for a needle in a haystack. Nothing stood out to them. To narrow things down, they attended the victims' funerals and observed the attendees, but they didn't notice any suspicious behavior. It all felt like throwing pasta at the wall to see what would stick. In need of new leads, state authorities convinced Johnson & Johnson, Tylenol's parent company, to offer a $100,000 reward to anyone with

information leading to an arrest. Meanwhile, the pile of tips only grew. In all, there'd be about 6,000 to go through. And still, nothing. No leads. Agent Lane was at a loss, and his problems were about to grow. On October 1st, Paula Prince, the flight attendant whose worried co-worker called the police, was found dead in her apartment. That brought the victim count to seven, and the number of contaminated bottles to five. Plus, Chicago PD now had jurisdiction in the case. Detectives Charlie Ford and Jimmy Gilday, who'd been called to investigate Paula's death, joined the Tylenol task force. Ford and Gilday were longtime partners and experienced officers. Ford and Gilday were longtime partners and experienced officers.

It might seem like their added manpower and resources were a blessing, but in fact, their entry into the case dredged up a deep-seated feud between the Chicago PD and the FBI. The rivalry peaked that same year when the U.S. Department of Justice convicted 10 Chicago police officers in Marquette County of accepting bribes from big-time heroin rings. The feds proved that the officers warned dealers about raids and even assaulted their competitors, all in exchange for money and goods. Because of this, Ford and Gilday felt like Agent Lane and others on the task force viewed them as, quote, crooked thugs. And they had a reason to feel scrutinized, because Lane knew about something they didn't. The FBI was currently running another undercover investigation into the Cook County Police and Court systems, which Ford and Gilday were a part of. So it wouldn't be surprising if Lane was skeptical of them.

And it didn't help that Ford and Gilday weren't exactly easy to get along with. exactly easy to get along with. They also didn't like working with suburban police officers, who they saw as amateurs who had never worked serious cases like this. That got under the suburban cop's skin. Then, according to a deputy coroner on the task force who spoke to the Chicago Tribune, all the tension eventually crept up between the suburban cops and the FBI as well. Without input from the other departments on the task force, Lane and other FBI agents asked a Chicago Tribune reporter to write a piece about the 12-year-old victim, Mary Kellerman. They wanted to lure in the killer, so they told the reporter to include the site of

Mary's grave and the Kellerman's home address. They thought the killer might use that information to contact the Kellermans. When the paper hit the stands, one of the task force's suburban police officers read the article and could tell it was planted. But no one had told him about this plan beforehand. He felt like his own team members undermined him. He confronted the FBI agents about it and they apologized, but the officer's trust was already broken. was already broken. The lack of communication only reinforced Detective Ford and Gilday's belief that everyone else was incompetent and unprofessional, and it didn't help that the dysfunction also reached the very top of the investigation. The Illinois State Attorney

General, Ty Fainer, was one of the leaders in charge of the task force. He was also running for re-election. He had about five weeks of campaigning left when the murders occurred, and he was down in the polls. As the task force's leader, Fainer conducted at least one press conference a day. To Ford and Gilday, his speeches were just fluff. After all, the task force still didn't have a suspect. As city cops, they prided themselves on keeping their heads down and doing the work. So in their eyes, Fainer was putting on a show to win over voters.

The detectives weren't having it. They were so annoyed, they packed up their things and never returned to the task force's office in the suburbs. Instead, they drove back into the city and began investigating from their own station. All of this conflict stalled progress. By October 6th, eight days after Adam Janis died, the task force still had no leads. But they were about to get one, and it would only add more questions to an already troubled investigation. or questions to an already troubled investigation. Hey there, Carter Roy here.

If you're enjoying the chilling tales of murder true crime stories, then you'll love the Crime House original, Mind of a Serial Killer. What sets Mind of a Serial Killer apart is its focus on the twisted psychology of the world's most notorious serial killers. Names like Jeffrey Dahmer, Ted Bundy, the Night Stalker, featuring expert psychological analysis from licensed clinical and forensic psychologist Dr. Tristan Engels. Mind of a serial killer will take you into their stories like never before. So get ready to uncover what drives someone to commit the unimaginable. Mind of a Serial Killer is a Crime House original. New episodes drop every Monday.

Just search Mind of a Serial Killer and follow wherever you listen to podcasts. If you're fascinated by the darker sides of humanity join us every week on our podcast serial killers where we go deep into notorious true crime cases with significant research and careful analysis we examine the psyche of a killer their motives and targets and law enforcement's pursuit to stop their spree. Follow Serial Killers wherever you get your podcasts and get new episodes every Monday. The Tylenol Task Force couldn't get along. Their infighting didn't help the fact that they had no leads in the case. Maybe the killer themselves got sick of waiting for them to make a break,

because on October 6th, 1982, a week since the first wave of deaths, something fell into investigators' laps. The day before, Johnson & Johnson had received a letter in the mail. It was neatly handwritten in all caps. It read, in part, As you can see, it is easy to place cyanide, both potassium and sodium, in the capsules sitting on store shelves. It takes so very little. So far I've spent less than $50 and it takes me less than 10 minutes per bottle. And since the cyanide is inside the gelatin, it is easy to get buyers to swallow the bitter pill. Another beauty is that cyanide operates quickly. There will be no time for countermeasures. If you don't mind the publicity, then do nothing. If you want to stop the killing, then wire $1,000,000 to bank account

84-49-597. The letter was immediately passed on to Agent Lane. He knew this was a huge break. But the letter's contents raised lots of questions. First, Lane worked with the U.S. Assistant Attorney Jeremy Margolis to figure out who the bank account belonged to. the bank account belonged to. Both men agreed that the owner of the bank account, the person who wrote the letter, and the killer weren't necessarily the same person. In other words, each new discovery could send them down a new rabbit hole. Fortunately, it wasn't hard to find the bank account's owner. It belonged to a man named Frederick Miller McKayhe. More specifically, it had belonged to McKayhe's company. McKayhe had owned a local travel agency called Lakeside

Travel. About six months earlier, before anyone swallowed a poison Tylenol pill, Lakeside Travel went out of business. It's not clear why the company folded, but there were rumors that McKayhee had used company money for personal benefit. Lane and his team needed to hear more from McKayhee, and he was happy to talk to them. Almost as soon as he opened his mouth, the investigators had a gut feeling he wasn't the killer. Something about his demeanor earned their trust. McKay also pointed out that because the company was closed, the bank account mentioned in the letter wasn't even active. So if he was extorting Johnson & Johnson, why would he have them send the money there? This wasn't their man.

But the person they were after might be connected to him. Investigators knew about the rumors surrounding McKayhe's shady business dealings. They figured that any former employee would be resentful that they lost their job because of his poor choices. The task force started speaking with McKay's former employees at Lakeside Travel, but they knew they needed to narrow things down. A thought crossed their minds. Only certain employees would know the company's bank account number. Not only that, but the envelope the letter came in had the company's unique postage ID on it.

Not every employee would have access to that number, but investigators were able to find one who did. The company's former bookkeeper, a woman named Nancy Richardson. If anyone could have known the truth about how McKay he mishandled Lakeside's funds, it would have been Nancy. And there was even more reason for her to be angry with him. After the business shut down, angry with him. After the business shut down, everyone's final paychecks bounced. But after Nancy received her check on April 23, 1982, she'd been able to cash it at a currency exchange. She walked out with about $500 in cash. It wasn't until later that the exchange realized the check was bad. They wanted their money back, and they sued Nancy for the full amount. So not only did Nancy lose her job and paycheck,

but now she was dealing with legal troubles too. And likely when investigators spoke with the company's other employees, they learned that Nancy had taken a stack of envelopes with the Lakeside's postage ID on them. So that meant she could have been the one to send the letter. But Nancy wasn't actually the biggest suspect. It was her husband, Robert Richardson. Robert Richardson Apparently, Robert seemed angrier about the company's closing than any of the former employees. He was especially furious that Nancy's check bounced.

He rallied the scorned employees and filed grievances with the Illinois Labor Department. A hearing was conducted on August 3, 1982. Robert argued that the money owed to the employees should come out of McKayhee's personal account. But Robert lost the case, leaving him and Nancy empty-handed. All of this backstory caught investigators' attention, All of this backstory caught investigators' attention, but they needed to know if Robert was angry enough to frame McKay for murder, and to do that, they needed to talk to him.

They found an address for Robert and Nancy on the north side of Chicago and made their way there. But when they arrived, the place was empty, and no one had heard from the Richardsons in over a month. Once the Tylenol Task Force identified Robert and Nancy Richardson, it seemed like maybe they'd crack the case, especially when they found out that the Richardsons had skipped town. Investigators talked to the couple's neighbors and learned that about a month prior to the murders, on September 4th, the Richardsons announced that they were moving to Amarillo, Texas. We don't know exactly when the Richardsons moved out of their building, but we do know that investigators followed a painstaking paper trail that led them nowhere. It was a huge blow to Agent Lane and the other investigators. was a huge blow to Agent Lane and the other investigators.

And to add insult to injury, the Chicago detectives had just uncovered a new lead of their own. Around the same time that investigators stood defeated on the steps of the Richardson's five-story building, a few men sat talking at a pub in Chicago. Two of the men were regulars, and the third man, Marty Sinclair, was the pub's owner. The two regulars pulled up their bar stools and, in hushed tones, explained to Marty that they were worried about another regular, a man named Roger Arnold. It all started about six months earlier, when Arnold started acting what the two men described as, quote, erratic and despondent. And then Arnold apparently told the two other men that he purchased some cyanide for a project. At the time, the men didn't think much of it. Arnold was the

kind of guy who was always up to some unusual hobby or another, and cyanide is used for non-lethal purposes like manufacturing paper and various plastics. But when the news broke about the Tylenol murders, the two men thought back to that conversation and realized that maybe Arnold's project was more sinister than they thought. After they shared their suspicions with Marty Sinclair, he immediately picked up the phone and called the Chicago PD tip line being manned by Charlie Ford and Jimmy Gilday. Marty called Chicago PD on October 6, 1982, the same day the Tylenol Task Force learned about the J&J extortion letter. So as the other investigators racked their brains to figure out how to find Robert and Nancy Richardson, Ford and Gilday told Marty to call them the next time he saw Roger Arnold.

But Marty never had to. Detectives Ford and Gilday didn't want to just wait around for his call. So for the next five days, they had officers patrol Lincoln Avenue, where Marty's pub and multiple other bars were located. Officers dug up a photo of Arnold and showed it to the employees of various bars along the street. And on October 11th, five days after Marty first contacted them, Ford and Gilday were at their desks when they got a call. Someone from one of the bars said that Arnold was there right now. The detectives sped over and when they confronted Arnold, he seemed a little off.

The detectives told Arnold that someone had called in about him. They told him what the caller said that they thought he might be the Tylenol killer. Then they handcuffed him and brought him into the station. Once they had Arnold in an interrogation room, their strategy was to schmooze Arnold, as Ford put it. They said that the Tylenol killer was a genius and a criminal mastermind. Perhaps they pegged Arnold as someone who would be flattered by these descriptions. Arnold did admit that he had purchased cyanide a few months prior. However, he claimed that he'd thrown it away well before the deaths occurred. But Ford and Gilday weren't convinced he was innocent. Over the next couple

of days, as they looked into him more, the detectives became increasingly certain that he was the killer. It turned out that Arnold worked at one of the stores that had sold a poisoned Tylenol bottle. The detective spoke to his manager, and he told them that Arnold had been in an angry mood lately. Apparently, he told his co-workers that he wanted to hurt someone. Specifically, he wanted to throw acid on them or poison them. throw acid on them, or poison them. It turned out that Arnold's anger likely stemmed from a recent divorce. A few months prior, likely around the same time he purchased cyanide,

Arnold and his wife split up, and it wasn't amicable. Upon questioning employees at the grocery store detectives learned that one of Arnold's co-workers was the father of one of the victims Mary Reiner who had given birth just days before she died it's hard to think of how or why Arnold could have targeted Mary, but his connection to her father was too much of a coincidence for detectives to ignore. Ford and Gilday needed to check Arnold's claim that he no longer possessed cyanide. They put Arnold in the back of a cruiser and drove to his home. Arnold willingly handed over the key, which was surprising considering what the detectives found inside. First, they sifted through order forms for chemical companies.

Then they went down to the basement and spotted beakers and vials. and vials. They also found a book titled The Poor Man's James Bond, which explained how to make potassium cyanide, the ingredient used to poison the Tylenol capsules. Next, Ford and Gilday came across a one-way ticket to Thailand, scheduled to depart on October 15th, just a few days away. Finally, they found four handguns and a rifle. Detective Ford was convinced that Roger Arnold was the Tylenol killer, and he didn't think Arnold's motive was very complicated. He told the Chicago Tribune that Arnold probably just wanted to prove he was a quote, criminal mastermind. Ford and Gilday arrested Arnold and brought him back to the station. However, Arnold wasn't charged with any of the murders. The state's attorney decided that the detectives had solid circumstantial evidence, but nothing concrete enough to charge

Arnold for murder. But Arnold was charged with failing to register the guns found in his home. Then, on October 13th, two days after his home was searched, Arnold was released on bond. And that evening, Ford and Gilday's rival, Agent Roy Lane, got a break in his investigation. On the night of the 13th, Kansas City Police Sergeant David Barton sat at home, watching the news as he wound down after a long day. At one point, headshots of a man and woman flashed onto the screen. The anchor explained that the couple was wanted by the FBI in relation to a million-dollar extortion letter sent to Johnson & Johnson following the Tylenol murders. The couple's names were Nancy and Robert Richardson. Barton jumped up from his seat He recognized Robert Richardson

But he knew the man by a different name James Lewis And Lewis was on Barton's radar for serious crimes Including murder Thanks so much for listening i'm carter roy and this is murder true crime stories come back next week for the final part of our series on the tylenol murders murder true crime stories is a crime house original powered by pave studios here at crime house we want to thank each and every one of you for your support. If you like what you heard today, reach out on social media at Murder True Crime Pod on Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, and YouTube.

Don't forget to rate, review, and follow Murder True Crime Stories wherever you get your podcasts. Your feedback truly makes a difference. We'll be back next Tuesday. Murder True Crime Stories, a Crime House original powered by Page Studios, is executive produced by Max Cutler. Murder True Crime Stories was sound designed by Ron Shapiro, written by Sarah Batchelor, edited by Alex Benidon, fact-checked by Catherine Barner, and included production assistance from Kristen Acevedo and Sarah Carroll. Murder True Crime Stories is hosted by Carter Roy. You may know a serial killer's crimes. Now, uncover the psychology behind them. Mind of a Serial Killer is a Crime House original.

New episodes drop every Monday. Just search Mind of a Serial Killer and follow wherever you listen to podcasts. mind of a serial killer and follow wherever you listen to podcasts. If you're fascinated by the darker sides of humanity, join us every week on our podcast, Serial Killers, where we go deep into notorious true crime cases. With significant research and careful analysis, we examine the psyche of a killer, their motives and targets, and law enforcement's pursuit to stop their spree. Follow Serial Killers wherever you get your podcasts and get new episodes every Monday.