|
|
| TYRONE FAHNER, ILLINOIS ATTORNEY GENERAL (1980 - 1982)  Tyrone Fahner was head of the Tylenol Task Force that investigated the 1982 murders. The Task Force was made up of over 100 investigators from 15 federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies. Fahner was appointed to the Illinois Attorney General position in 1980 by Gov. James R.Thompson to fill the unexpired term of William Scott, who after twelve years as Attorney General was convicted of income tax fraud and sentenced to one-year in prison. Fahner was one of James Thompson's top prosecutors when he served as U.S. attorney in Chicago during the early 1970s. He is best known for sending to prison one of the big wheels in the Daley political machine, Thomas E. Keane. After several years in private law practice, Fahner returned to government in 1977 when Thompson, then Illinois Governor, appointed him to head the state's department of law enforcement. Tyrone Fahner's Tylenol Murder Investigation Thursday, September 30, 1982 After first learning that about the Tylenol poisonings, Tyrone Fahner went on television and urged the public to flush their Tylenol down the toilet. He later asked people to turn the bottles over to police. Johnson & Johnson dispatched public relations personnel to Chicago by corporate jet to work with authorities to establish their own laboratory. Spokesman Robert Andrews and two other Johnson & Johnson officials met for an hour and a half with Elk Grove Village detectives and evidence technicians. Andrew said his firm is "collectively shocked" He said that Johnson & Johnson had launched an investigation this morning to track down the capsules." Friday, October 1, 1982 During one of Fahner's twice daily press briefings, he stated that although no theory is being discarded, investigators believe the killer probably packed the Tylenol capsules with cyanide after the medicine reached the store shelves. According to this theory, the killer removed or purchased the bottles of Tylenol, packed the capsules with poison, and then returned them to at least three stores in three towns - Arlington Heights, Elk Grove Village and Winfield. "From everything we know so far, the tampering occurred once the drugs arrived in Illinois," said Fahner. "It seems more and more likely that the tampering was at the lower level, either at the stores or right before it got there," rather than at a central distribution or manufacturing point. Some of the contaminated capsules were manufactured in Texas, and others in Pennsylvania.
Authorities compiled a list of all employees who might have come in contact with the Tylenol along its route to the store shelves, as well as any disgruntled or recently fired employees. Investigators said they were looking for a "madman," possibly a "disgruntled employee," who has put the cyanide into the capsules, probably after their shipment to Illinois. Fahner went on to recommend that Extra-Strength Tylenol capsules should be flushed down the drain. Here was the top law enforcement officer in the entire state of Illinois telling people to flush critical evidence in a murder investigation down the toilet. Sunday, October 3, 1982 Chicago Mayor Jane Byrne called a press conference on Sunday morning to announce that she’d ordered police and health officials to remove all Tylenol products from all 2,000 stores throughout the city by 6:00 Sunday evening.
McNeil Consumer objected to the removal of any Tylenol products other than the Extra-Strength capsules. J&J attorney, Paul Noland, further responded to the city’s action by limiting J&J’s previous offer of help with the investigation of the Extra-Strength Tylenol capsules, and then only at McNeil’s own laboratory. Puppets on a string: that’s what local and state authorities were to Johnson & Johnson. When J&J decided to obstruct the investigation, the puppets just fell to the ground and played dead.
In his Sunday evening press conference, Fahner revealed that among the task force's suspects are "malcontents and weirdoes who don't act right or did something extremely out of the ordinary."
The task force of "experienced homicide investigators" from 12 local, state and federal agencies concentrated on fingerprints, chemical analyses and interviews 'with weirdoes who frequent drug stores" in an effort to track down the killer, Fahner said. ''We'll get him one way or the other,'' Fahner said. ''Even nuts make mistakes. And if it's some sort of screwball cult, they'll turn on each other for the money.''
Here, Fahner begins to manipulate the media by calling the killer(s) a "nut" or "screwball cult." Officials wanted the media to report about the killer in deragatory terms. They used the media to convince the public that the killer was some random psychotic loner whose motive could not be understood. The media gleefully obliged. But in fact, the killer was rational, his actions were calculated, and he was employed in the pharmacetuical supply chain.
Fahner said the cyanide-spiked capsules probably were placed in the stores Tuesday, apparently on the front of the shelves to ensure they would sell quickly. Investigators now believe someone acting alone obtained bottles of Extra-Strength Tylenol filled the capsules with cyanide at home and then "salted" store shelves with the deadly poison, Fahner said.
''From everything we know so far,'' said Mr. Fahner, ''the tampering occurred once the drugs arrived in Illinois.'' Investigators believe that the capsules, which were manufactured last spring and distributed to stores in August, were carefully contaminated shortly before their purchase.
This theory is based on the fact that the potassium cyanide found in the capsules is a corrosive that would soon destroy the capsule's gelatin shell. To detect approximately when the killer laced the capsules, Michael I. Schaffer, the Cook County Medical Examiner's chief toxicologist, duplicated the poison formula Friday and placed some in empty Tylenol capsules for timing.
But the results of those tests were never released. Why? Because the results of those tests contradicted the approved theory that the cyanide would cause the gel-based Tylenol capsules to deteriorate within days. Therefore, the Tylenol capsules could not have been poisoned after the bottles had been placed on the store shelves. If the capsules weren't adulterated after delivery to the retail stores, then they had to have been contaminated during distribution, by an employee, or employees, who worked for Johnson & Johnson or one of their customers.
Cook County Medical Examiner Robert Stein knew the results of his test though; and that's why Stein, on October 11, would criticize investigators for concentrating their search on a "madman," saying the killer strikes him as more of a "a rational evildoer." Fahner Failed to Understand How Tylenol was Distributed Fahner reported that thus far investigators have determined that the tainted capsules did not cross paths while they were being manufactured or in their distribution. That strengthens the theory that the killer took bottles of Tylenol containing cyanide to stores and slipped them onto shelves, said Fahner. Fahner went on to tell reporters that authorities had confirmed that cyanide-laced Extra-Strength Tylenol traced to five business locations came from "two and possibly three different places" of distribution. He said that based on what is known at this time, the adulterated capsules from three of the five locations "definitely did not come together at any time" during distribution.
"We are trying to find a common thread," said Fanner, but "we can't tie them all together in one place." Monday, October 4, 1982 In the very early days of the investigation, Fahner told the press that the task force was looking for a disgruntled employee who worked in the channel of distribution. He said that he believed there was more than one killer, and that the Tylenol capsules were probably adulterated during distribution. But by Monday, five days after cyanide laced Tylenol was linked to the sudden deaths, Fahner had been brought up to speed regarding the approved theory. "It is an act of a random murderer who filled the capsules with cyanide and then placed them in the stores," said Fahner. Evidence indicates a single person "went around the Chicago area salting the store shelves with one bottle of contaminated Tylenol at a time," he said.
Fahner said evidence indicates a single person "went around the Chicago area salting the store shelves with one bottle of contaminated Tylenol (at a time)." "Tylenol is as much a victim as those who died," he said. "Somebody just picked on this product." Fahner said investigators believe the killer bought or stole Tylenol from a store, took it home, filled the capsules with cyanide and placed the bottles in the front of store displays so they would be bought quickly.
Fahner said preliminary lab tests found no trace of cyanide in the empty Extra-Strength Tylenol capsules and powder discovered in a suburban motel parking lot by two sheriff's deputies on Sept. 28, the day before the first deaths. When police returned to the Howard Johnson parking lot to retrieve the Tylenol evidence, the boxes, bottles, and powder were gone. All that remained were a few empty capsule parts that had been run over by car tires.
Fahner, who called the incident "one of several very substantial leads" under investigation, said, "We still don't know why someone would throw out all those pills in a parking lot," adding that the material will be tested further. Tuesday, October 5, 1982 Fahner disclosed that two police officers became ill after picking up what appeared to be Tylenol capsules from a parking lot near a suburban Howard Johnson's restaurant last Tuesday. "They found these red capsules all over the parking lot" and "manually and physically picked them up," Fahner said. "The next day, the officers were ill." Cyanide "can go right through the skin," Paul Zemitzsch, Fahner's spokesman said. "They were sick for several days — nausea, headache, syndromes that can be associated with a very, very mild type of cyanide poisoning. They're running tests on those capsules now."
But then Fahner went on to say that investigators are "reasonably certain" these were not symptoms of cyanide poisoning. Officials Narrow their Theories Officials narrowed their theories on how the deadly capsules got into the hands of their victims, suggesting the killer or killers randomly selected area stores and placed one poisoned bottle at the front of each Tylenol display. "He put them in the front of the shelves so they would be the next one purchased," said Zemitzsch. Fahner re-emphasized to reporters that investigators believe the deaths are the result of one person "salting" store shelves with single bottles containing a few poisoned capsules. But then Fahner seemed to forget the official story when he reverted back to statements he'd made the prior week. State Attorney General Tyrone Fahner said evidence indicates more than one killer may have been at work spiking cyanide into capsules of Extra-Strength Tylenol that have killed seven people at random in the Chicago area. Fahner said some of the boobytrapped capsules that have been examined so far could be seen "by the naked eye" to have been tampered with, but on others there was no visible evidence that they had been opened. "This suggests more than one person was involved," said Fahner.
From here on, Fahner would stick to the official theory of the Tylenol murders as approved by J&J executives and FDA officials.
Thursday, October 7, 1982 From its research and more than 1,000 interviews, the task force has narrowed its list of possible suspects to ''eight or nine'' people, Fahner said. All are Illinois residents, he said, and some have a history of mental illness. The Attorney General refused to identify any of the suspects or characterize them too specifically. But he said: ''All were available to the location, exhibited peculiar behavior or had a grudge as a possible motive. They are not being sought. We know who they are." Asked if they knew they were suspects, Mr. Fahner replied, ''I hope not.'' He said that he was satisfied with the progress of the time consuming investigation and that computers were being used to cross reference the reams of agents' notes for easier access. ''We are not stalemated,'' Fahner said. He indicated that a psychiatric profile of a possible murderer suggested that the person wanted to be caught. The Attorney General continued to maintain that no other alleged poisonings have been linked to the Chicago cases. All of the suspects have remained in the Chicago area, he said, and none traveled to California. He said the task force was not testing its samples for strychnine. But other Chicago authorities are testing capsules for both cyanide and strychnine. After testing more than 310,000 Tylenol capsules and 170,000 tablets and after random checks on Tylenol liquid, no trace of either poison has been found. Saturday, October 9, 1982 Robert Stein said that tests Indicate cyanide-loaded Tylenol capsules could have been doctored at thelr distribution point or at the plant where they were produced. While Stein emphasized he had no evidence on the origin of the cyanide-laced pills, he said the distribution and manufacturing points could not be ruled out, and criticized investigators for concentrating their search on a "madman," saying the killer strikes him as more of a "a rational evildoer."
The results from Steins' test to determine how long it would take the cyanide used in the Tylenol murders to degrade Tylenol capsules showed that the cyanide would not have caused the capsules to deteriorate quickly, as Attorney General Tyrone Fahner, J&J executives, and FDA officials claimed. The final results of Steins' test were never released. The Tylenol capsules could not have been contaminated after they'd been placed on the store shelves. The capsules had to have been adulterated during distribution. That's why Stein knew that "the distribution and manufacturing points could not be ruled out." That's why Stein believed the killer was not some "madman," but was "a rational evildoer."
Fahner sharply criticized Cook County Medical Examiner Dr. Robert Stein, who said earlier in the day that he had completed tests indicating the capsules could have been adulterated at distribution points or at the plant where they were manufactured. Stein emphasized he had no evidence on the origin of the cyanide-laced pills but said the distribution and manufacturing points could not be ruled out, and criticized investigators for concentrating their search on a "madman," saying the killer strikes him as more of a "a rational evildoer." Fahner said he was relying on tests conducted by the FBI and Chicago police. - But Mr. Fahner; neither the FBI nor the Chicago Police conducted tests to determine the ability of cyanide to degrade gel-based capsules. Cook County Medical Examiners Robet Stein and Michael Schaeffer did those tests.
Sunday, October 10, 1982 Scientists, who have already unsuccessfully tested more than two million Tylenol capsules for poison, and found none, are studying individual contaminated capsules in two unsold bottles of Tylenol recovered from a major shopping mall Oct. 1. On the theory that only the murderer's hands could have touched the capsules, they are seeking fingerprints. Fahner reported failure so far. Monday, October 11, 1982 A Chicago man accused of trying to extort $8,000 from a hospital by threatening to poison patients with cyanide in Extra-Strength Tylenol capsules was ordered held today on bond. The man, Jerome Howard, 20 years old, went before Federal Magistrate Olga Jurco, who set bond at $100,000 and ordered him returned to the Metropolitan Correctional Center, where he has been held since his arrest Saturday night. Howard was quickly dismissed as a suspect in the poisoned Tylenol deaths, said Edward Hegarty, the special agent in charge of the Federal Bureau of Investigation office, and the Illinois Attorney General, Tyrone Fahner.
Howard was arrested after an extortion letter was received by Gottlieb Hospital. The letter, left at a reception desk Wednesday, aroused suspicions because of the small amount of money demanded and because it did not specify a deadline for the ransom payment, Mr. Fahner said. The FDA Exonerates Johnson & Johnon of any responsiblity for the Tylenol tamperings and murders Saturday, October 23, 1982 Johnson & Johnson, parent company of Tylenol's maker, announced that the federal Food and Drug Administration had conclusively determined the cyanide contamination did not occur at the company's plants. Joseph Chiesa, president of McNeil Consumer Products Company, said the company was "gratified" that the FDA's finding confirmed its own investigation. The 7th Tylenol Bottle Larry Nauman, Dominick's vice president, said it may not be easy to find the shopper who returned the bottle October 2 during a massive recall. Refunds were given to "anyone and everyone," he said, and not all customers put their names .and addresses on bottles. Tyrone Fahner said the contents already were decomposing because the cyanide was destroying the gelatin shells. 
Thurday, October 28, 1982 Fahner was quoted by the City News Bureau of Chicago as saying investigators were "closer than we have ever been" to making an arrest. However, Paul Zemitsch, spokesman for Fahner, said he doubted Fahner made such a statement. "I don't think he said that," Zemitsch said. Friday, October 29, 1982 The Seventh Bottle Fahner said the arrest of Roger Arnold, a self-described "closet chemist" who worked for the Jewel Foods chain, was another one of "those (incidents} that are unrelated." Regarding Arnold as a suspect in the poisoned Tylenol murders, Fahner said: "The lead in that case was developed by the Chicago police... and their information to us is that it's unrelated."
The Eighth Bottle Fahner reported that a fingerprint found on the most recently discovered package of cyanide-tainted Extra-Strength Tylenol capsules (the 8th bottle) does not match that of anyone being investigated in seven poisoning deaths. Meanwhile, Philadelphia officials reaffirmed that the death of a student there was a suicide and was not related to the Chicago-area deaths. In commenting on the eighth Tylenol bottle, Fahner said "We are extremely happy for several reasons; this was a bottle that did not cost a human life, and these capsules, because McNeil Laboratories was so careful, were in pristine condition. That makes it more likely we can raise prints.'' New reports stated Fahner got a poll boost in the attorney general re-election campaign due to his media exposure in the Tylenol poisonings investigation. Fahner denies exploiting poisonings for political gain.
Friday, November 19, 1982 Despite assertions that a man (Kevin Masterson) sought for questioning held a grudge against two stores where cyanide-filed Tylenol capsules were purchased, ''there's still nothing to indicate'' he was involved in the killings, a law-enforcement source said.
An affidavit for a search warrant filed in DuPage County Circuit Court indicated Kevin J. Masterson, the object of an all-points bulletin issued Monday, held grievances against Jewel Food Stores as well as Frank's Finer Foods.
But the authorities say no charges have been filed against Mr. Masterson and no arrest warrant issued.
The affidavit was filed by Joseph McQuaid, investigator for the multiagency group investigating the deaths. It said that Mr. Masterson's anger toward Jewel arose from an incident in which his former wife felt she was mistreated by Jewel security officers. Tuesday, November 23, 1982 The size of the Tylenol Task Force is reduced. Monday, November 29, 1982 With the Tylenol poisonings still unsolved, exclusive interviews are practically impossible to get with Illinois Attorney General Tyrone Fahner, 40, who was defeated this month in his reelection bid but still heads up the state's investigation. ABC's Max Robinson recently showed up at Fahner's low-key headquarters in suburban Des Plaines in a chauffeur-driven limo and, under deadline pressure, demanded a private audience with the beleaguered official. Instead, Assistant Attorney General Mort Friedman told Robinson he'd have to wait with the other reporters for a scheduled briefing. The argument escalated, but Friedman held his ground. Finally Robinson stalked back out to his limo, got on the car phone and attempted to call Fahner directly from 50 feet away. Inside, the phone was handed to Friedman, whose job includes screening all calls. "It's me again," he snapped at Robinson, "and the answer is still no." Monday, December 13, 1982 James W. Lewis, was picked up at 2 P.M. at the New York Public Library Annex in midtown after being recognized from a poster distributed by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
He was arraigned in Federal Court in Manhattan last night before United States Magistrate Ruth V. Washington on charges of extortion and unlawful flight. She ordered him held on a $5 million cash bond pending an identity hearing set for Dec. 23. He was sent to the Metropolitan Correctional Center, a Federal facility in downtown Manhattan. Kenneth Walton, the deputy assistant director in charge of the New York office of the FBI., said that there was no evidence to link Mr. Lewis or his wife, Leann, directly to the seven deaths that were caused by cyanide-filled Extra-Strength Tylenol capsules bought in Chicago area stores.
Walton said the whereabouts of Mrs. Lewis remained unknown but urged her to turn herself in. ''We're going to find her, too,'' he said. There was no word on where the Lewises may have been living since they left the Hotel Rutledge on Lexington Avenue at 31st Street, where they reportedly stayed from Sept. 6 to mid-October. The FBI received a tip from a librarian in New York who said she recognized Lewis from the pictures that had been sent of Lewis and his wife. Lewis was arrested without a struggle and underwent questioning. FBI spokesman Tony DiLorenzo said the agency had circulated posters of James Lewis to libraries because they had determined he'd been following The Chicago Tribune. ''We knew he was getting copies and we knew he wasn't getting it from newsstands,'' DiLorenzo said. ''So the logical place was from the public library. We saturated the libraries with wanted flyers." In a letter to The Chicago Tribune in October, Mr. Lewis, using one of his many aliases, denied that they had had any role in the deaths. The formal charge against Mrs. Lewis is fraudulent use of a Social Security card. SPRINGFIELD, IL - At a news conference at the Illinois State Capitol Tyrone Fahner said tonight that James Lewis ''is high on our list of people,'' but added: ''We have to determine whether or not he's responsible. I hasten to make clear: He is a suspect, but we have others as well.'' ''He is totally capable of doing these things by his prior conduct,'' Fahner said of Lewis. ''If he's not guilty of the Tylenol murders, as many people believe that he is, he can absolve himself by accounting for his whereabouts. He can prove his own innocence." He said other suspects ''had made statements to friends, or had exhibited conduct, or had made threats against one of the companies involved at a previous date, and had exhibited criminal or quasicriminal behavior that would lead us to believe they are capable of doing these terrible crimes.'' Death Threat Against President Reagan
Tuesday, December 14, 1982 Authorities said that after the cyanide laced Tylenol deaths, Mr. Lewis wrote a threatening letter to Johnson & Johnson demanding $1 million under the threat of further poisionings. Fahner said when the arrest warrant was issued that ''the nature of the extortion letter and the claims in it are such that the investigators would naturally want to talk to Mr. Lewis.'' ''We have Lewis's handwriting on the death threat to the President,'' United States Attorney Daniel K. Webb said at a news conference in Chicago. Both letters were stamped by a postage meter belonging to Lakeside Travel, a defunct Chicago agency where Mrs. Lewis worked until last spring when she was dismissed. Jeremy D. Margolis, an Assistant United States Attorney who will prosecute the Lewises' cases, said his office was considering charging the couple with threatening the life of the President, charging Mrs. Lewis as a co-conspirator in the extortion attempt and charging Mr. Lewis with involvement in his wife's Social Security case. Margolis noted that Mr. Lewis was under indictment for six months in a Missouri land fraud case and was the subject of mail fraud and Internal Revenue Service investigations in Kansas City. While he was a fugitive, Mr. Lewis disclaimed any connection to the Tylenol slayings in a series of "rambling" letters sent to The Chicago Tribune. In one, he called himself ''a victim,'' and demanded capital punishment for ''whoever poisoned those capsules.'' Richard J. Brzeczek, the Chicago Police Superintendent, said Mr. Lewis ''has not been ruled out, because we have not yet had an opportunity to talk to him; however, the possibility of his being the Tylenol killer is remote.'' Still, other investigators will not discount the possibility that Lewis may have returned to Chicago in late September, possibly using airline vouchers taken by Mrs. Lewis from her former employer. The day after her husband's arrest, Leann Lewis, 33, surrendered at to federal authorities at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport. She was takent to Chicago's Metropolitan Correctional Center where she was held on $5 million bond on a warrant accusing her of fraudulent use of a Social Security card.
Lewis Defense Fund Formed Friends of the Lewises in Kansas City, concerned that the couple may lack the financial resources to mount their own defense, have formed a defense fund for them and hope to run newspaper advertisements requesting donations to help the Lewises. ''They need all the help they can get,'' said Theodore J. Otteson, a part-time English teacher at the University of Missouri-Kansas City, who has known the couple for a decade. Mr. Otteson, a spokesman for the defense fund, deplored what he said was the news media's characterization of the Lewises as ''a modern-day Bonnie and Clyde,'' and added, ''When the contest is unequal, we feel there is a chance of unfair judgment.'' Besides aiding the Lewises financially, Mr. Otteson cited a second motive: ''To remind everyone of the principle we all profess to believe in - namely, that in this country people are presumed innocent unless they are found guilty in court.'' Sunday, December 19, 1982 The New York Times reported that in the 11 weeks since the Chicago area cyanide poisoning, investigators had picked through a haystack of possibilities and negated one lead after another. The task force investigating the murders has spent the last month trying to trace the three types of cyanide that were placed in Extra-Strength Tylenol capsules. Agents have also pored over airline, bus and train records, hoping to determine if any of their potential suspects traveled to or from Chicago in late September or early October, when the deaths occurred. Monday, December 27, 1982 Health authorities and police investigators in California searched for clues to the cyanide contamination of two bottles of Anacin-3. The California Department of Food and Drugs Monday tested 4,600 capsules from about 200 bottles of Anacin-3 in the Los Angeles area and found no trace of cyanide. About 80 percent of the bottles had the code number 229, the same code as that on bottles of cyanide-laced Anacin-3 found in San Jose and in San Pedro in suburban Los Angeles. The San Pedro bottle was turned in to authorities in the aftermath of the poisoning of a San Jose housewife in November. Police were trying to determine why bottles with the same code number found 300 miles apart were contaminated. June 19, 1983 Roger Arnold, questioned last October in the seven deaths resulting from cyanide- laced Extra-Strength Tylenol has been charged with murdering a man he evidently thought had made him a suspect, police said. Arnold, 49, was charged Saturday night in the death of John Stanisha, 46, who was shot in the chest early Saturday after leaving a North Side tavern according to Belmont District Police Sgt. E. W. Adorjan. Adorjan speculated that the shooting was "a case of mistaken identity." June 21, 1983 Roger Arnold is indicted in the murder of John Stanisha, whom the police say he may have mistaken for the informer who sought to implicate him in the deaths. He was also indicted by the Cook County grand jury on charges of armed violence. July 13, 1983
Task force starts new Tylenol death probe
A 10-man task force of FBI agents and Illinois investigators is taking another look at 60 volumes ol evidence in hopes of gaming a fresh perspective on the 1982 Tylenol murders. The group will pay particular attention to secondary leads "that may have gotten lost in the shuffle" during the hectic early days of the investigation. Despite a 9-month investigation that produced more than 20,000 pages of evidence and over 2,000 leads, investigators are no closer in their hunt for the person or persons who sabotaged the capsules than they were at the start. Thomas Schumpp, area commander of the Illinois Division of Criminal Investigatlon, said, "We have seven homicides and the individual is at large, so we obviously have to go back at it again. But it's not the result of anything new or earth-shaking "You have to look at everything to make sure nothing fell through the cracks... that may have gotten lost in the shuffle for awhile." The new 10-man squad, consists of five FBI agents and five investigators for the Division of Criminal Investigation. "These are our best people, said Schumpp. "We just hope they'll come back with a fresh perspective." Schumpp said there are no "prime suspects" in the case, but that officials intend to further check the activities of Roger Arnold and Jame Lewis. Although former Illinois Attorney General Tyrone Fanner identified Lewis as a "prime suspect," investigators now say is is not a suspect in the killings. Roger Arnold, Chicago, became a suspect after police arrested him for illegal possession of a gun and aggravated battery. Acting on a tip, police found books in Arnold's apartment about how to use cyanide to kill people and Arnold admitted possessing cyanide. Arnold also worked with the father of one victim at a Jewel Co. warehouse. Some of the tainted capsules were sold at Jewel stores. Arnold last month was charged with murder for allegedly shooting to death a man he mistakenly believed tipped off police. January 14, 1984 Roger Arnold, 49 years old, is convicted of shooting John Stanisha to death last summer outside a tavern. Prosecutors said Mr. Stanisha, 46, resembled Martin Sinclair, an informer who had told police that Mr. Arnold kept cyanide in his home. He was sentenced to 15-30 years in prison, and released in 1999. The Cook County Chief Medical Examiner Knew the Truth Cook Sounty Chief Medical Examiner, Dr. Robert Stein, knew the Tylenol Capsules were not adulterated at the local retail store by some "madman" On Monday, September 27, some Chicago area stores received shipments of Extra-Strength Tylenol capsules on. That evening, employees at Jewel Foods and other stores filled their shelves with the Extra-Strength Tylenol they'd received earlier that day. The cyanide laced Extra-Strength Tylenol capsules responsible for the deaths of the first four victims came from Jewel Foods stores in Elk Grove Village and Arlington Heights. When police inspected the victim's capsules on Wednesday, September 29, less than 48 hours after they'd been purchased, they noticed some capsules were discolored; a result of the corrosive affect of cyanide. Before dawn on Thursday morning, about 2 1/2 days after the cyanide-laced Tylenol had been placed on the store shelves, Cook County Medical Examiner Michael Schaffer inspected the remaining cyanide laced Tylenol capsules from bottles that had been purchased at the Jewel Foods stores in Elk Grove Village and Arlington Heights. When Schaeffer opened the bottles he could see that the capsules had begun to deteriorate. They were discolored and swollen. Testing the Corrosiveness of the Cyanide On September 30, Robert Stein and his staff took some of the cyanide used in the tampering, and put it into Tyelnol capsules to determine how long it would take before the capsules would show signs of deterioration. The test capsules showed no corrosion 36 hours after they were filled, Stein said.
Ten days after the the test capsules had been filled with cyanide Stein said that adulteration during distribution could not be ruled out. Ten days after Steins' test capsules were filed with cyanide, they still showed no signs of deterioration. If the victim's capsules showed signs of deterioration 2 to 3 days after they'd been delivered to Jewel Foods stores, and if the capsules were poisoned after they'd been placed on the store shelves, how is it possible that 10 days after Dr. Stein put cyanide into new Tylenol capsules, the capsules showed no signs of deterioration? Obviously, the cyanide used to murder seven Chicago area residents was put into the Tylenol capsules somewhere in the suppy chain, before the Tyenol was delivered to the Chicago area stores. Robert Stein said on Saturday October 9 that tests Indicate cyanide-loaded Tylenol capsules could have been doctored at thelr distribution point or at the plant where they were produced. While Stein emphasized he had no evidence on the origin of the cyanide-laced pills, he said the distribution and manufacturing points could not be ruled out, and criticized investigators for concentrating their search on a "madman," saying the killer strikes him as more of a "a rational evildoer."
The results from Steins' test to determine how long it would take the cyanide used in the Tylenol murders to degrade Tylenol capsules showed that the cyanide would not have caused the capsules to deteriorate quickly, as Attorney General Tyrone Fahner, J&J executives, and FDA officials claimed. The final results of Steins' test were never released. The Tylenol capsules could not have been contaminated after they'd been placed on the store shelves. The capsules had to have been adulterated during distribution. That's why Stein knew that "the distribution and manufacturing points could not be ruled out." That's why Stein believed the killer was not some "madman," but was "a rational evildoer." Fahner sharply criticized Cook County Medical Examiner Dr. Robert Stein, who said earlier in the day (October 9) that he had completed tests indicating the capsules could have been adulterated at distribution points or at the plant where they were manufactured.
Why did Fahner criticize Stein? It seems that Fahner criticized Stein's accurate assessment, because it didn't fit the approved theory, which required the public to believe that the Tylenol capsules were contaminated after they'd been placed on the retail store shelves. Fahner said he was relying on tests conducted by the FBI and Chicago police. Investigators have said the capsules blamed for the poisonings came from two different factories. Fahner has said there is no indication the capsules "crossed at any time" during distribution.
First of all, the location where the bulk Tylenol was manufactured is irrelevant - they were all packaged in the same location - and secondly, why would Fahner rely on tests conducted by the FBI and Chicago Police? They didn't test the capsules to determine how long it would take for cyanide to cause the capsules to deteriorate. Robert Stein did those tests. And Robert Stein believed the capsules were contaminated during distribution. Tyrone Fahner ignored Steins' factual quantifiable evidence, becuase it didn't fit the approved theory. Attorney General Tyrone Fahner refused to base his investigation on factual information gathered from physical evidence. Robert Stein's scientific test most certainly proved the Tylenol capsules couldn't have been laced with cyanide by some "madman" at the local retail stores; the Tylenol capsules weren't in the stores long enough to show the corrosive signs caused by cyanide (the cyanide laced Tylenol capsules used in the 1986 Tylenol murder were proven to have very long shelf life; indefinte in fact). Fahner ignored physical evidence critical to the murder investigation. He investigated what he was told to investigate. Instead of going after the real killer; the "rational evildoer," Attorney General Tyrone Fahner went after "malcontents and weirdos ". Fahner said at a news conference Sunday night, October 3, 1982, that among the task force's suspects are "malcontents ... and weirdos who don't act right or did something extremely out of the ordinary." "We're trying to understand what kind of person could do these things," said Fahner, the chief of a local, state and federal task force with more than 100 investigators looking into the string of deaths. "It is an act of a random murderer who filled the capsules with cyanide and then placed them in the stores," he said.
The goal of Tyrone Fahners' task force was to create "facts" that could be used to indict their chosen suspect; a suspect who they could offer up to the media for public persecution; an innocent suspect like James Lewis. This same flawed investigative techinique would be used in later years to wrongly accuse Richard Jewel of the Atlanta Olypmics bombing, and to wrongly accuse Steven Hatfill of the Anthrax attacks.
October 5, 1982
MAN IN THE NEWS; THE ANONYMOUS INVESTIGATOR By NATHANIEL SHEPPARD JR., SPECIAL TO THE NEW YORK TIMES
When a Chicago woman was asked what she thought of Tyrone Fahner, the Illinois Attorney General, who is heading a special force investigating seven deaths here that have been linked to cyanide-laced Extra-Strength Tylenol, she responded: Ty who?
The comment illustrated the image problem faced by the 39-year-old prosecutor who, in addition to heading the special investigation, is running for election to his first full term as State Attorney General. He was appointed to the post by Gov. James R. Thompson, a Republican, to succeed William Scott, who was convicted of income tax evasion in 1980.
Despite an impressive career in which Mr. Fahner has successfully prosecuted many political figures and others for wrongdoing and has been credited with strengthening law enforcement in the state, name recognition outside of law enforcement circles has eluded him.
In the mid-1970's it was Mr. Fahner who, as an Assistant United States Attorney, successfully prosecuted Thomas Keane, an Alderman and president of the Chicago City Council, for his involvement in a land trust scheme that shielded payoffs he received for taking care of the interests of influential Chicagoans. But it was Mr. Thompson, then the United States Attorney for the district, who received credit for the conviction.
Mr. Fahner also successfully prosecuted 36 poll judges who altered vote records in an attempt to influence Chicago elections. But that was 10 years ago, and the public's memory is fuzzy.
Having never run for office, Mr. Fahner was a political neophyte when he was appointed State Attorney General, and had voted in only one Republican primary since he moved to Illinois from Detroit.
A Chicago Tribune Poll released Sunday showed Mr. Fahner trailing former Lieut. Gov. Neil F. Hartigan, a Democrat, by 20 percentage points.
''He hates making political speeches and campaigning and would much rather be working on a challenging case like this,'' said Paul Zemitzsch, Mr. Fahner's director of policy and planning.
Ironically, a highly publicized case such as the Tylenol investigation could improve Mr. Fahner's political visibility and his standings in the polls. But he also knows that such visibility has its pitfalls, too.
Two days into the investigation, Mr. Fahner said that among the suspects was a man accused of shoplifting Tylenol. The comment proved embarrassing; however, when it turned out that the man in question was already in jail when the cyanide was believed to have been placed in Tylenol tablets in drug stores throughout the city.
Mr. Fahner's political campaign has taken a back seat to the Tylenol investigation, which now takes up about 15 hours of each day, beginning when he gives the more than 100 Federal, state and local agents who make up the special investigation force their assignments each morning at about 7:30 and ending about midnight, after he has debriefed them on their findings. For his campaign, he relies on his wife, Anne, and telegrams he sends to forums she cannot attend.
The Fahners have three children: Margaret, 8; Daniel, 6, and Molly, 4. The family resides in Evanston, a northern suburb of Chicago. He is said to have one consuming hobby: fishing with friends in Canada.
Tyrone Clarence Fahner was born in Detroit on Nov. 18, 1942, and was graduated from the University of Michigan in 1965. He received his law degree from Wayne State University Law School in 1968, and earned a master of laws degree from Northwestern University in 1971 as the recipient of a Ford Foundation grant.
As an investigator, Mr. Fahner receives high marks from his peers.
''He is highly competent and confident and has a thoughtfully creative mind,'' said Raymond Marvin, general counsel and executive director of the National Association of Attorneys General in Washington. ''Most people plan for office for months, if not years, but he stepped in and took over under very difficult circumstances, and immediately things started to click. Illinois continues to be a leader in enforcement of environmental, consumer protection and antitrust, as well as criminal areas.''
Mr. Fahner is particularly proud of two legislative initiatives for which he was responsible. One was a bill that banned ''look-alike drugs'' - high potency caffein tablets that were identical in appearance to amphetamines and were blamed for the deaths of seven teen-agers in the last 18 months.
The other was the Narcotics Profits Forfeiture Act, which allows the state to seize the assets and income of drug dealers to pay for drug enforcement efforts. He said Illinois had received more than $1 million through the program since it went into effect in July, almost equaling the $1.3 million budget for drug enforcement. However, neither of these initiatives has won him significant favor with the state's voters.
Tylenol capsules change course of Illinois race Associated Press Writer
CHICAGO, L (AP) - A handful of Extra-Strength Tylenol capsules has changed the course of the race for attorney general in Illinois. When seven Chicago-area persons died several weeks ago after taking the capsules laced with cyanide. Republican Attorney General Tyrone Fahner called a meeting of authorities to coordinate the effort to solve the case.
Fahner, who had been trailing badly in the polls in his reelection bid against Democrat Neil Hartisan, emerged as the press spokesman for the Tylenol Task Force. The position has earned him repeated, and generally flattering, exposure on television news programs, particularly in the vote-rich Chicago metropolitan area. And in the latest poll published by the Chicago Sun-Times, Fahner saw his support improve to 37 percent of registered voters, compared with 32 percent before the Tylenol story broke. Hartigan's support held firm at 49 percent in both polls. In an interview with the Associated Press, Hartigan said he did not want to "prejudice the successful outcome of the prosecution" of the case. "I think the people will make up their own minds on that aspect of it" involving Fahner, he said. But before the interview, a Hartigan aide made certain an AP reporter was supplied with several newspaper articles critical of Fahner's role in the investigation, with the most damaging phrases carefully underlined. And privately, Hartigan aides accuse Fahner of exploiting the Tylenol situation for political gain. UNDER CONSTRUCTION | |
|