Other copy-cat poisonings, involving Tylenol and other over-the-counter medications, cropped up again in the 1980s and early 1990s but these events were never as dramatic or as deadly as the 1982 Chicago-area deaths. All Rights Reserved. And I would wake them up just to say good night, you know?. Joe Murphy told NBC Chicago last year. (Stacey Wescott / Chicago Tribune), John Fellmann at his home in Huntley in September. The task force knew the mechanism behind the murders, Fellmann said. In the first year alone, the task force used it to track more than 35,000 individuals and 15,000 companies contacted as part of the investigation. Chicago police Superintendent Richard Brzeczek talks about the Tylenol investigation on Oct. 7, 1982, about a week after the seven deaths. They looked at accused shoplifters, including a man charged with attempting to steal 28 Tylenol bottles from a Wheaton pharmacy in August. A photograph of a television screen shows the specific lot number for a batch of Extra-Strength Tylenol that was the first to be recalled. Before the 1982 crisis, Tylenol controlled more than 35 percent of the over-the-counter pain reliever market; only a few weeks after the murders, that number plummeted to less than 8 percent. When Ford and Gildea arrived at the North Side flophouse where the man lived, he was still on the phone with a company operator and was promising to punish Hormel just like he had in the Tylenol case. The killer may have salted the bottles with cyanide-laced capsules while standing in the store aisle, investigators thought. But for something like this, for looking at a pill, it never would even cross our mind., Former DuPage County Coroner Pete Siekmann, who in 1982 was a deputy coroner, handled the Tylenol bottles from Mary "Lynn" Reiner and Mary McFarland. Seven people between the ages of 12 and 35 years old died in 1982 after ingesting extra-strength Tylenol capsules that were found to have been laced with cyanide, a deadly chemical. In Illinois, some towns began pulling bottles from the store shelves and sent police officers down the street with bullhorns encouraging people to throw out their Tylenol. A native of the south suburbs, Gutowski received a master's degree in public affairs reporting from the University of Illinois at Springfield and is a graduate of Southern Illinois University. The Unsolved Tylenol Murders of 1982: The Unabomber Theory Written by C.W.S. His task force partners the FBI and state police had blindsided the Elk Grove Village detective, and he was angry. Lab technicians Nlada Marzette, left, and Lynn Pilaggi inspect the contents of Extra-Strength Tylenol capsules for cyanide contamination at the Illinois Department of Public Health in 1982. In an attempt to paint a more detailed portrait of the killer, the FBI turned to a relatively new technique at the time called criminal profiling, in which agents try to identify the personality and behavioral characteristics of an offender based on an analysis of the crime. (Stacey Wescott / Chicago Tribune). Mary was dead by 7 a.m. Medicare Pharmacy employee Mary Butler, right, shows a box of Extra-Strength Tylenol to Officer Michael Miljan in Arlington Heights. Product tampering would become a crime in 1983 as a result of these murders, but in 1982 there was no federal law against it. The Tylenol murders: The story of a 40-year-old unsolved case begins with a terrifying medical mystery. . But the police chief of the Chicago suburb where Adam Janus lived, Joe Murphy, told CNN he hopes forensic technology used to analyze DNA could eventually produce the break they need to conclusively identify whoever was responsible for the Tylenol killings. John Fellmann, whose last name was misspelled on his ID from 1980, was a young Arlington Heights police detective when he was assigned to the Tylenol murders. Every agency imaginable attended, many of them represented by their top leaders. She rarely heard how the tips panned out. The Chicago detectives shared that worry. He received the assignment by default, and then it became part of a national news story. Editors note: This report has been updated to remove the reported amount of cyanide used. The agencies, at times, clashed with each other. They had a lot of questions and I didnt have any answers at all., Mike Severns, a former Elk Grove Village police detective assigned to Mary Kellerman's murder, says it still bothers him that officials neglected to update her grieving parents in the early days of the investigation. Conspiracy theories about motives and suspects for all these heinous acts continue to be bandied about on the Internet to this day. The 18-page investigative summary also provides key evidence, including the names of the three main suspects, during the first seven months of the case. But she said years of therapy and yoga have helped her overcome her anger and guilt, and shes hopeful there will be justice in the killings of her father as well as her aunt and uncle. Even after he retired from the FBI in 1996, he didnt let it go. In this op-ed, he reflects on his experiences leading the public health response to the Tylenol murders of 1982. But when she opened the . Authorities already considered the womens deaths to be cyanide related by the time they contacted Fahner during his campaign event. They told stories of information hoarding, turf wars and glory seeking even when there was none to be had. The company also introduced price reductions and a new version of their pills called the caplet a tablet coated with slick, easy-to-swallow gelatin but far harder to tamper with than the older capsules which could be easily opened, laced with a contaminant, and then placed back in the older non-tamper-proof bottle. NBC News has not reviewed that evidence. Im just being honest, Siekmann said. I stepped off that dais, Fahner told the Tribune this year. Before that she reported for the Daily Herald, the Dayton Daily News and The Topeka Capital-Journal. J.J. Bittenbinder a tough-talking, mustachioed detective who would later gain fame as a TV safety expert served as a liaison to Fahners task force in Des Plaines. America was gripped by paranoia and fear. Elmhurst police Detective Herb Hogberg interviewed a chemist who had been laid off from the company in recent months. 1: Poisoning the Well: Directed by Travis Clark. The FBI put about three dozen agents on the case, under the premise that the agency needed to determine whether Johnson & Johnson had violated federal law by failing to list potassium cyanide among the active ingredients in Tylenol. We used every single technique available to us. The investigation would fork, taking the FBI and Chicago police down vastly different paths. I think its pretty important, the aide replied. I had people dropping dead all over the place.. The task force didnt know who or why.. Her parents gave permission. The state police memo indicates fingerprints were found on at least one of the bottles, as well as a full print on the inside of a different bottles box. (Michael Budrys / Chicago Tribune). On that day, two unrelated things happened: A pub owner made a phone call to police, and an extortion letter arrived at a Johnson & Johnson subsidiary. Within 48 hours of the murders, the task force used this information to conclude publicly that the pills could not have been poisoned during production. When the column ran, Severns knew instantly that the authorities had planted the story. In fact, so many big dogs were present, Fellmann said he couldnt find a free chair inside his own 60-seat roll call room. The profilers believed the killer was likely to visit one of those named places to see the heartbreak he had caused. (Don Casper / Chicago Tribune), People were terrified, Fahner said. Margolis, who later became director of the Illinois State Police, says multiagency efforts always endure allegations of infighting and spotlight stealing. Fahner thought state officials needed to be even more aggressive, despite the consequences for the investigation. Marquette 10 is one of a thousand reasons why theres tension, personal jealousy, personal ambition, jurisdictional turf fights. newsletter for analysis you wont find anywhereelse. These other men were all worried about his chances. The man hurriedly told the Hormel operator that he had to go and he would call her back later. The Tylenol murders: How we reported this story. And then there are agents who dont. They were particularly concerned that something happened during the manufacturing or the shipping or storage, Wolnik said. Security cameras were scarce in 1982, but investigators checked the images that existed, including this photograph from a drugstore camera showing Paula Prince, center, buying a bottle of tainted Tylenol. (Charles Knoblock / AP). Following the same theory, investigators took pictures . Roger Arnold worked at a jewel warehouse with the father of one of the victims named Mary Reiner. This Oct. 18, 1982, column by Tribune columnist Bob Greene included specific details at the request of the FBI, such as the home address of Tylenol victim Mary Kellerman. Many people who handled potential evidence in 1982 didnt wear gloves because it wasnt protocol at the time. You know, its a hackneyed phrase, but we left no stone unturned., Former Assistant U.S. Attorney Jeremy Margolis, shown in his Chicago office in July, was part of the original Tylenol task force in 1982. A new book by a former Johnson & Johnson employee suggests the Tylenol poisonings, which killed seven people in the Chicago area in 1982, took place in the company's production or distribution. Nothing was being solved.. There was little evidence to go on, no inkling of a motive and five people dead. Some of the investigators started using it privately, too. And Fahner wasnt the only source of tensions. Not just the hours, but the frustration. (Fred Jewell/AP). The Chicago Tylenol murders were a series of poisoning deaths resulting from drug tampering in the Chicago metropolitan area in 1982. Severns worked on the case for three days before he realized no one had offered an update to young Mary Kellermans grieving parents. My theory is that Anna is a diabetic and had just come home from a . Indeed, the Johnson & Johnson recall became a classic case study in business schools across the nation. Siekmann drove to a state laboratory in the city with the bottle on the seat next to him. A casket is carried out of St. Hyacinth Roman Catholic Church after the funeral Mass for three members of the Janus family in 1982. It all goes to them, and you get nothing in return., Chicago police Superintendent Richard Brzeczek talks about the Tylenol investigation on Oct. 7, 1982, about a week after the seven deaths. He needed to be there, no matter how much he hated campaigning. Fahner had worked for James Thompson in the U.S. attorneys office, handling some of the citys biggest federal corruption cases. And you know, some agents are better than other agents and can really do a good job. As the de facto leader of the task force, he would come to be known in the media as "Tylenol Ty.". https://www.pbs.org/newshour/health/tylenol-murders-1982, Why Eleanor Roosevelts civics book for kids is making a comeback. Within a year, and after an investment of more than $100 million, Tylenols sales rebounded to its healthy past and it became, once again, the nations favorite over-the-counter pain reliever. The red cap was easily flipped open, with nothing but a little piece of cotton left to cover the capsules. Many people who handled the evidence in 1982 told the Tribune they didnt wear gloves because it wasnt part of their agencys protocol at the time. Ford and Gildea arrived at the campus with hopes of a break in the case, only to find out the so-called professor was a high school boy pretending to work at UIC so he could pick up college girls. Sadly, the tragedies that resulted from the Tylenol poisonings can never be undone. Subscribe to our Science Newsletter to explore the He already had a new job. Two main suspects in this unsolved case are James Lewis and Roger Arnold, who had both been linked to this occurrence in some way. The coppers and the FBI guys that I knew all worked together. And by days end, flight attendant Paula Princes body would be discovered and tests would show that a Tylenol bottle inside her home contained four cyanide-laced capsules. By 2011, the FBI was ready to reexamine the evidence. Im absolutely sure about that. That box had been turned in, along with an unused bottle, a couple weeks after the murders by the wife of a DuPage County judge. The new timeline suggests Lewis wrote the letter before the public knew the deaths were linked to the tainted Tylenol pills, according to the Chicago Tribune. The Tylenol investigation began as a loose collaboration among detectives in Arlington Heights and Elk Grove Village, the towns where the first three deaths were identified. (Stacey Wescott / Chicago Tribune). (Chicago Tribune archive). Ford said Stein encouraged him to smell the pills, but the detective refused and pushed away the pathologists hand. I said, Agent, agent. It sounds like an urban legend, but it was chillingly real in 1982. Male murderers are more likely, in general, to kill randomly and on a large scale. It marked the first mass recall in U.S. history, involving more than 31 million bottles. As the de facto leader of the task force, he would come to be known in the media as "Tylenol Ty." The bottle's cap was easily opened. Over the next few days, three more strange deaths occurred: 35-year-old Mary McFarland of Elmhurst, Illinois, 35-year-old Paula Prince of Chicago, and 27-year-old Mary Weiner of Winfield, Illinois.. The FBIs counterintelligence unit even reached out to their Soviet counterparts to see if they had any spy satellite images that could help, according to former FBI agent Grey Steed. Some expressed surprise at how casually other people treated the poisoned bottles. Kasia said she still remembers hearing her mother scream when she couldnt wake her father up the next day, 29 September 1982. So he thought hed maybe get a lifetime supply of ham. John Fellmann, whose last name was misspelled on his ID from 1980, was a young Arlington Heights police detective when he was assigned to the Tylenol murders. Paramedics came and took Adam Janus to a nearby hospital, where doctors pronounced him dead from what they suspected may have been a heart attack. Several people had died within the last day in the Chicago suburbs after ingesting Extra-Strength Tylenol capsules laced with cyanide and the situation needed attention. FBI agent Shari Kouba, one of the few women on the task force, ran the tips desk. Jose Rosa, right, was one of hundreds of Chicago city employees and volunteers to distribute warnings about cyanide-laced Tylenol in fall 1982. Arlington Heights police Chief Rodney Kath, second from left, works with other members of the Tylenol task force in an old state police bunker in Des Plaines. With fears mounting, Johnson & Johnson recalled all over-the-counter Tylenol capsule products on Oct. 5, nearly a week after Mary Kellermans death. The latest Tribune poll showed he was down by about 20 points in the upcoming election. Police Officer Michael Miljan leaves an Arlington Heights pharmacy after making sure bottles of Extra-Strength Tylenol were being removed from shelves. The guy was a little wimpy, but his ham did stink.. And as soon as we got the word out that Tylenol had been laced, people said, What do we do? I said, Well, if youve got any in your medicine cabinet either put it in a plastic bag and keep it or throw it away. Seven people between the ages of 12 and 35 years old died in 1982 after ingesting extra-strength Tylenol capsules that were found to have been laced with. (Don Casper / Chicago Tribune), Obviously, Johnson & Johnson didnt put cyanide in their own product. They gave her one extra-strength Tylenol capsule that, unbeknownst to them, was laced with the highly poisonous potassium cyanide. Every Tylenol bottle had a lot number that offered specific details about the batch those capsules came from. Chicago police Detective Charlie Ford, assigned to the Prince murder, recalled being stunned when Cook County Medical Examiner Robert Stein showed up at the victims Old Town condo and immediately asked to see the Tylenol. A photograph of a television screen shows the specific lot number for a batch of Extra-Strength Tylenol that was the first to be recalled. Extra-Strength Tylenol, shown in a Tribune studio photograph, once was packaged in a paper box with an unglued lid. (Chicago Tribune), Look, like any other series of government bureaucracies, theres always tension between agencies, he said. But on this unseasonably warm October morning, during a separate meeting between the FBI and state police, Lane was one of several investigators who gathered to brainstorm possible motives behind the crime. 1996 - 2023 NewsHour Productions LLC. We didnt get anything, but we were kicking around ideas like that.. Most working detectives really dont trust the FBI, and the FBI doesnt trust us, Ford said. Critics who had prematurely announced the death of the brand Tylenol were now praising the companys handling of the matter. And so the Department of Justice just looked up a law and by a little bit of a hook and a crook said the FBI has jurisdiction because of an FDA law (about) truth in labeling.. His brother and sister-in-law, Stanley, 25, and Theresa, 19, of Lisle, Illinois, rushed to his home to console their loved ones. Four decades later, task force leaders downplay accusations of tensions among the agencies, suggesting history has been revised in an effort to explain why no one has been charged with the murders. And 35 years later, this murder mystery is still . And I want people to know that, yeah, this was my family, and it has changed all of us.. Following the same theory, investigators took pictures of everyone who attended the victims funerals and set up time-lapse cameras at grave sites to see if they could capture anyone acting unusual. I think we ended up charging that guy with a misdemeanor, some disorderly conduct or some nonsense, he said. Later, Lewis was arrested,. The task force investigating the Tylenol killings doubted that James Lewis would be reckless enough to stay in Manhattan after mailing an extortion letter to Johnson & Johnson demanding $1 million . The FBIs involvement puzzled some because, as far as anyone knew, the federal agency didnt have jurisdiction in the case. Please check your inbox to confirm. The task force opted to work out of an Illinois state police bunker in Des Plaines, a central location that would be home to a tip line, twice-a-day investigator briefings and news conferences for the scores of reporters camped outside the building. Pero quin fue el asesino? [[Para leer en espaol] Los asesinatos de Tylenol, parte 2: Tylenol mezclado con cianuro fue el arma homicida. Severns, who had two young children, heard the undeserved guilt in her voice. When Thompson, a Republican, became governor in 1977, Fahner followed him to Springfield to lead the Illinois state police. Lane would think of that line a year later when, without prompting, a suspect called him and offered to help solve the case. He goes, It smells like burnt almonds. . Some investigators on the case, including a few still involved with it, considered the rendered profile too vague to be of any real use. 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