June 21, 2025 • 46 mins
Join us for Part 2!
In the fall of 1982, ordinary medicine cabinets across Chicago became the stage for one of the most terrifying unsolved crimes in American history. Seven people, including a 12-year-old girl, suddenly collapsed and died after taking Extra-Strength Tylenol capsules — each one unknowingly laced with lethal cyanide. As fear spread nationwide, shelves were emptied, public trust was shattered, and investigators scrambled to catch a killer who seemed to vanish into thin air.
In this special two-part Chillworthy series, we dive deep into the Tylenol Murders: the victims’ heartbreaking stories, the frantic investigation that gripped the nation, the baffling suspect list, and the mystery that remains unsolved more than 40 years later. We also explore how this case forever changed the way we shop, the way companies protect consumers, and how the Tylenol killer may have pulled off one of the most perfect — and chilling — crimes in modern history.
Buckle up. The safety seal was broken. The ripple effects are still being felt.
Click here to see all listening options and links
Find us on socials:
Instagram: @chillworthypodcast
Bluesky: @chillworthypodcast
Skylight: @chillworthypodcast
Youtube: @chillworthypodcast
Click here to leave a donation to support the podcast
DISCLAIMER The content presented on Chillworthy, including all episodes, transcripts, social media posts, and associated materials, is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only. The podcast does not offer legal, medical, psychological, or professional advice of any kind. While the hosts—Brent and Talia—make a good faith effort to ensure that the information shared is based on publicly available sources and is as accurate as possible at the time of recording, Chillworthy does not guarantee the completeness, timeliness, or reliability of any statements made. Listeners should be aware that cases may involve ongoing legal proceedings or developments that evolve over time. The hosts are not licensed attorneys, journalists, law enforcement professionals, or forensic experts. Opinions expressed in the podcast reflect the personal views of the hosts and do not represent factual determinations or official findings. All individuals named or discussed are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Any resemblance to real individuals or entities, outside of those explicitly named, is purely coincidental. The podcast is not affiliated with or endorsed by any legal authority, news outlet, or investigative body. By listening to Chillworthy, you acknowledge and accept these terms and agree not to hold the hosts or producers liable for any inaccuracies, misstatements, or interpretations derived from the content.
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/chillworthy--6229613/support.
In the fall of 1982, ordinary medicine cabinets across Chicago became the stage for one of the most terrifying unsolved crimes in American history. Seven people, including a 12-year-old girl, suddenly collapsed and died after taking Extra-Strength Tylenol capsules — each one unknowingly laced with lethal cyanide. As fear spread nationwide, shelves were emptied, public trust was shattered, and investigators scrambled to catch a killer who seemed to vanish into thin air.
In this special two-part Chillworthy series, we dive deep into the Tylenol Murders: the victims’ heartbreaking stories, the frantic investigation that gripped the nation, the baffling suspect list, and the mystery that remains unsolved more than 40 years later. We also explore how this case forever changed the way we shop, the way companies protect consumers, and how the Tylenol killer may have pulled off one of the most perfect — and chilling — crimes in modern history.
Buckle up. The safety seal was broken. The ripple effects are still being felt.
Click here to see all listening options and links
Find us on socials:
Instagram: @chillworthypodcast
Bluesky: @chillworthypodcast
Skylight: @chillworthypodcast
Youtube: @chillworthypodcast
Click here to leave a donation to support the podcast
DISCLAIMER The content presented on Chillworthy, including all episodes, transcripts, social media posts, and associated materials, is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only. The podcast does not offer legal, medical, psychological, or professional advice of any kind. While the hosts—Brent and Talia—make a good faith effort to ensure that the information shared is based on publicly available sources and is as accurate as possible at the time of recording, Chillworthy does not guarantee the completeness, timeliness, or reliability of any statements made. Listeners should be aware that cases may involve ongoing legal proceedings or developments that evolve over time. The hosts are not licensed attorneys, journalists, law enforcement professionals, or forensic experts. Opinions expressed in the podcast reflect the personal views of the hosts and do not represent factual determinations or official findings. All individuals named or discussed are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Any resemblance to real individuals or entities, outside of those explicitly named, is purely coincidental. The podcast is not affiliated with or endorsed by any legal authority, news outlet, or investigative body. By listening to Chillworthy, you acknowledge and accept these terms and agree not to hold the hosts or producers liable for any inaccuracies, misstatements, or interpretations derived from the content.
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/chillworthy--6229613/support.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:08):
You're listening to Chillworthy.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
A podcast where two best friends discuss mysteries, murders, and
anything in between for your enjoyment.
Speaker 1 (00:16):
So if you're ready to hear some chilling and unsettling cases,
you're in the right place. Happy listening.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
Hi, everybody, welcome back to chow Worthy, our podcast with
Talia and Brent.
Speaker 1 (00:35):
Hello doesn't exactly roll off the tongue for you, doesn't,
but that's all right.
Speaker 3 (00:48):
Hi.
Speaker 1 (00:48):
Hi everyone, This is our podcast with me, Talia and Brent.
I guess I should have given you cards anyway, everybody.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
Uh, oh my god.
Speaker 1 (01:07):
We are in part two of the Thailand All Murders.
We're bick So we are back and we're doing back
to back being back.
Speaker 2 (01:17):
Yeah, we're still here.
Speaker 1 (01:19):
Yeah from last time. We never left. But a whole
week has happened in everybody else's world. So isn't that fascinating?
Speaker 2 (01:26):
It's nice? And really, when this goes up, another week
will have transpired in our lives.
Speaker 1 (01:35):
Oh my god, So a very sweet thing just happened.
Actually what one of my friends who I went camping with. Yeah,
he told me he just got home, right, and he
said I wanted to say thank you, so much for
telling me about Chilworthy exclamation point. I listened to almost
two shows on the way home.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
God love them.
Speaker 1 (01:57):
I know. I absolutely vibe with you guys. I love
it exclamation part part exclamation mark, exclamation mark. And I
laughed so hard when Taliga hit her tooth on the
mic because I could tell exactly that was what happened there.
Sure is.
Speaker 2 (02:20):
Oh I love him. This is so lightful. Yes, what
a sweet man.
Speaker 1 (02:26):
All right, So we're going to jump right back into
the Yes, what.
Speaker 2 (02:33):
What jump We're jumping? Man?
Speaker 1 (02:45):
I don't even think I said that, but we're going
to jump back in shuckle. So all right. So last
week we left off right, we base. We talked about
the victims, the timeline as to when these people were
(03:08):
unfortunately passing away, what they were doing right beforehand, how
everybody did everything right, everything that was falling together into place.
Halloween was canceled because I was very upset about that. Right,
you know, they're serious, you said the police were going
around neighborhoods with bullhorns telling people throughout their time, all
(03:29):
of this stuff is happening. So to jump back in
now more a little bit about the investigation. Now we're
going to talk about the early theories and the realization
of the product tampering that was happening. So in the
first days, once the cyanide laced tailanol was identified as
the cause, investigators had to determine how these poisoned pills
(03:52):
were happening. So one initial theory was that the tailanol
might have been contaminated at the factory, which is what
you had thought, or or during distribution. But this quickly
looked like it was unlikely because the tainted bottles came
from different production lots. So for instance, Mary McFarlane's bottle
(04:15):
was a different lot number than Mary Kellerman's and two
separate manufacturing plants. So one was from Pennsylvania and one
was from Texas.
Speaker 2 (04:25):
Oh wow, wow, very far apart from each other, got
that right? And not near Illinois? I don't think.
Speaker 1 (04:32):
Right, No, I don't think sex is at the bottom.
Speaker 2 (04:35):
Pa is to the right.
Speaker 1 (04:37):
And Texas is closer to California. In California is if
you keep going, Hawaii's over there?
Speaker 2 (04:45):
Why's over there? Oh my god?
Speaker 1 (04:49):
So anyway, but the only common point was that the
retail shelves, like the retail shelves were all in the
Chicago area. That was the common denominator. Not right, the manufacturer,
not the plant, but the point of purchase got it.
So this led to the working theory that somebody had
(05:10):
taken the bottles off of the shelves in the local
stores opened up the capsules one by one. Keep in mind,
because when you were saying they were just like injecting
the bottle, no, they were literally like opening the capsules.
Speaker 2 (05:24):
I'm trying to remember what tilanoll like looked like back
in the eighties. Well, they're just capsules, right, But if
you look at chilanol nowadays, you cannot separate it.
Speaker 1 (05:37):
Are you sure?
Speaker 2 (05:38):
I am positive? No, I'm not positive.
Speaker 1 (05:41):
Are you talking about like the liquid gels? You're right, No,
I'm not.
Speaker 2 (05:46):
Talking about that. I'm fucking about the norm I don't
know what the hell you.
Speaker 1 (05:52):
Call them, but you know what I mean, the red
and white pills. Yes, we'll look into this more later.
It doesn't matter right.
Speaker 2 (05:58):
Now because back then they did it right.
Speaker 1 (06:02):
We can't change history.
Speaker 2 (06:04):
We can't sh't.
Speaker 1 (06:07):
So where was I hear? Oh about? Okay, So that
he was taking these things, he was opening up the capsules,
he was adding the cyanide and then putting the bottles
back on the shelf. So and they were like it,
you know, they were thinking, it's just this random poisoning
scheme because there was no rhyme or reason to it.
So essentially product tampering, like he was doing it in
(06:29):
the He was basically a serial killer in the form
of product tampering, is what we're saying. So yeah, so
investigators coined the phrase the Tailan all killer or Thailand
all Man, which I don't like that one as much,
same like Quailman.
Speaker 2 (06:48):
Oh my god, Doug, do you know, by the way, Douglas,
mister Dink, mister Dink, Skeeter.
Speaker 1 (06:58):
Walk. No, that was that was Fazzy Bear.
Speaker 2 (07:03):
I never knew him well enough to know. Back to Doug,
I loved pork Chop. Of course. I wanted to say
to you earlier, and this just reminded me again when
you mentioned Rugrats when you were referring to something else
we were talking about from the weekend, and I wanted
to tell you, And then now with Doug and that reference,
(07:26):
same thing, Rugrats and Doug and actually hate Arnold and.
Speaker 1 (07:31):
Yeah, all right, what is it?
Speaker 2 (07:32):
Pluto has all of them? Oh, and it's still like
I love to put it on his background, and that's
all I had to say. Right, it's nice.
Speaker 1 (07:42):
You heard her go. That's all I had to say. Well,
that's a lot to say, actually said a lot, all right.
So this idea that a person would just kill strangers
by random, just by poisoning pills was virtually unheard of
at this point, and it terrified the public and the police,
which of course it did, right, So Chicago police and
(08:05):
the FBI formed a joint task force to find this
crazy person.
Speaker 2 (08:10):
Teamwork.
Speaker 1 (08:11):
So the investigation was chaired by the Illinois Attorney General's office,
and literally hundreds of investigators were involved, from local detectives
to federal agents. So authorities collected every piece of evidence
that they could. They so that like the remaining capsules
from the victim's bottles, the packaging, the lot numbers, the
store receipts, and even something like that seemed unrelated items
(08:34):
from the victim's home, but just to rule out that
there were any other sources of cyanide, because you know,
I just had a thought like, could you imagine like
a toothpaste just.
Speaker 2 (08:43):
That would be an easy one, And if you think
about how toothpaste is packaged, you can.
Speaker 1 (08:48):
I did think about it.
Speaker 2 (08:49):
You can absolutely get in there. We're just giving ideas
left to try.
Speaker 1 (08:56):
Well, we're not endorsing any of that.
Speaker 2 (08:59):
No, So.
Speaker 1 (09:02):
Crime labs tested the capsules and they found that each
poison capsule contained, like I said, a massive dose of cyanide,
far more than actually that was that would be needed
to kill one person. So this was indicating that the
killer wanted to ensure death or maybe even kill multiple
people per bottle, which I think makes sense. Yeah, for sure.
(09:22):
So they also tested for finger prints on the bottles
and the capsules, but no usable fingerprints were found of anybody,
so the killer might have wiped the bottles clean, or
he wore gloves. Fibers and other trace evidence were not
really present either. One bit of forensic evidence that would
(09:42):
become important later was DNA, so in nineteen eighty two,
DNA profiling wasn't available, but in later years some tiny
DNA samples from I guess saliva or sweat maybe which
was left on one of the bottles by the perpetrator
were recovered for modern testing. Investigators also looked at store records.
(10:06):
They identified seven stores where tampered tailand all bottles had
been either purchased by victims or were found on the shelves.
So two Jewel grocery stores, one Osco drug store which
was the Jewel Osco Yes, one Walgreens, one Domini's Supermarket,
(10:27):
and one Frank's Finer Foods. So all of them were
in the Chicago metropolitan area, and this clustering of them,
like location wise, suggested that the killer likely lived in
or was familiar with Chicago. The way you looked at
me like yeah, I get on with it. I'm just
(10:49):
I'm just trying to report.
Speaker 2 (10:52):
I'm sorry.
Speaker 1 (10:56):
So using these maps, they tried to see if the
stores formed in a pattern. I'm picturing them using like
those like little thumb tacks with like the strings and
then they go to another one, right, So because some
people were thinking like, well, are these like along certain
maybe like a highway or whatever, But no obvious pattern
(11:18):
came up by looking at this. So the stores were
somewhat spread out, indicating that the killer might have driven
around the region just in randomly picked places to put
these bottles. So as the investigation proceeded, officials also had
to deal with the public reaction and because people were
freaking panicking and the rumors were flying like again, I said,
(11:39):
it's somebody poisoning other products. Whatever. The task force regularly
updated the media to maintain transparency and to try to
keep everybody calm. Ironically, Johnson and Johnson's candid, an active
approach to informing the public became a textbook example of
a good crisis management, so keep that in mind. But
(12:02):
in Chicago in the early October of eighty two, it
was anything but calm. Police were dispatched to guard drug
store stocks so like so like, literally officers were stationed
at pharmacies in case the killer tried to plant more
of the poison in, you know, in pills, right, So
(12:26):
in tips from the public started to pour in, So
anyone seen buying cyanide, any local weirdos who were around
talking about poisoning.
Speaker 2 (12:37):
Where are you buying cyanide?
Speaker 1 (12:39):
Though I don't freaking know, you know, They were looking
into any kind of disgruntled employees, any of those things.
So one early tip led to an arrest in a
different state, which turned out to be unrelated. Unfortunately. Another
lead pointed to a guy who owned a chemistry set
like as he was making.
Speaker 2 (13:00):
His own his own cyanide.
Speaker 1 (13:04):
So it was a huge amount of leads, but one
soon rose above the rest. There was a letter that
was received by Johnson and Johnson that took responsibility for
the killings and demanded money to stop.
Speaker 2 (13:18):
Just like a serial killer, except not the money, like
wanted the notoriety.
Speaker 1 (13:22):
Say this again.
Speaker 2 (13:23):
Oh I don't hear about it?
Speaker 1 (13:24):
Oh oh yeah, yeah, yeah, I gotcha. The letter demanded
one million dollars oh gosh to stop the killings.
Speaker 2 (13:33):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (13:34):
Effectively, this was their way of attempting to extort the company.
So the letter's postmark was traced to Chicago, and later
it was determined that the postmark was from October first.
The author gave instructions for you know where the money
to be dropped to be dropped, interestingly, directing that it
be deposited in a particular bank account in New York,
(13:57):
New York.
Speaker 2 (13:58):
Not Chicago. Yeah, not that that wouldn't work, but you
know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (14:06):
Yeah. Investigators traced that bank account and found it belonged
to a man named James William Lewis.
Speaker 2 (14:14):
Well, that was a dumb move, but Lewis.
Speaker 1 (14:16):
Was not the account owner. It was an old account
of his wife's former employer that he apparently was trying
to implicate. So this was pretty bizarre because it was like,
was the killer trying to frame somebody or was this
letter just to complete hoax by somebody taking advantage of
the situation? Right, So, the FBI had seen extortion letters
(14:38):
in product tampering cases before, but given the details, they
took this one very seriously. So they quickly identified James W. Lewis,
a thirty six year old man who at one time
did live in Chicago, but who had fled to New
York City earlier that year due to unrelated legal troubles. So,
in fact, James Lewis had a bit of a checkered past.
(15:02):
You're kidding. He was charged in nineteen seventy eight with
the murder and dismemberment of a man in Missouri. I
guess he was a former client of his accounting business.
What But that case was dismissed on a technicality, so
he got away with it. You got that right, sister.
(15:25):
He also had fraud charges in his history. Essentially, Lewis
was a very educated but pretty troubled man with a
propensity for scams and a history of violence.
Speaker 2 (15:38):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (15:39):
So by nineteen eighty two, he and his wife Leanne
were living on the East Coast and at the time,
at the time of the Taialenthal murders, like that, they
were living on the East Coast when that started to
hit the news. Lewis was actually a fugitive wanted for
an unrelated fraud charge, and the extortion letter was his
grand entrance into this case. So October thirteenth, nineteen eighty two.
(16:04):
I love how I keep repeating the date, not the
date the year James Lewis was arrested in New York City. Wow,
they get him after a nationwide manhunt. He had gone
on the run once his letter became public knowledge, but
was eventually caught at the New York Public Library. Oh
(16:25):
my god, the poor library.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
Oh yes, I hate that they were tangled up in this.
Speaker 1 (16:31):
Where Carrie got married right, well, didn't not actually spoilers.
Speaker 2 (16:35):
God, I love that scene so freaking.
Speaker 1 (16:38):
Somebody give me a phone, Give me a phone, all right?
Speaker 2 (16:43):
Anyway, Wait, he must have been a reader.
Speaker 1 (16:47):
I don't freaking know.
Speaker 2 (16:48):
I guess not. He must he doesn't.
Speaker 1 (16:50):
It said he was well educated.
Speaker 2 (16:53):
Well not everybody who's well educated.
Speaker 1 (16:54):
We're moving on.
Speaker 2 (16:55):
Reading for fun funsies.
Speaker 1 (16:59):
Well, yeah, but he could have been reading on how
to make cyanide for all we know, perfecting his crypt
an alchemist. Under questioning, Lewis admitted to writing the extortion letter,
but he said I'm not the taileanhal killer.
Speaker 2 (17:15):
So he was helping a friend.
Speaker 1 (17:17):
Say that again, what does that mean? Well, he said, yeah,
I wrote the letter. I wanted a million bucks, but
I didn't actually do it. Oh, so no, he wasn't
helping a friend, thank you. It wasn't being just a
nice guy.
Speaker 2 (17:34):
I believe him.
Speaker 1 (17:36):
Well, he claimed that he was trying to exploit the
news of the poisonings to get money, and that the
idea to deposit in his wife's ex bosses account was
a scheme to embarrass that person.
Speaker 2 (17:48):
I see, he's like an ass.
Speaker 1 (17:50):
I guess he held a pretty big grudge against this man.
I'll say investigators were understandably a little bit like, I
don't know about this. So Lewis had some connections to Chicago, because,
like I said, he did live there in the early eighties,
and he also studied science in school in college, so
maybe he could make cyanide. The letter did include details
(18:14):
that felt authentic. However, no physical evidence ever tied Lewis
to the actual poisonings. Lewis insisted that he was in
New York at the time and offered an alibi, but
it was pretty hard to verify. So ultimately James W.
Lewis was never charged.
Speaker 3 (18:33):
Wow with the murders, but he was charged with extortion
for the letter, and in nineteen eighty three he was
convicted of that and sentenced to ten years in federal prison,
no longer than I was thinking, so Lewis served about
twelve years. He got additional time for other frauds that
he tried to do. He continued, though, to adamantly maintain
(18:56):
his innocence in the Tailantal murders for the rest of
his life, even after his release. I feel like he
was sitting around with the dB coopster.
Speaker 2 (19:07):
Dare you bring that man's name? Do you bring this filth? D? B.
Cooper was a gentle gentleman, he certainly, and he didn't
kill anybody.
Speaker 1 (19:24):
He was very polite, he was very mindful. So eventually Lewis,
I guess, after getting out of prison, he moves to
Boston and and in later interviews a self made like
he made a website where he argued that he couldn't
have been the killer, and then he decided to offer
(19:45):
his own theories, pointing out that you know, he liked
to theorize and act as like a consultant.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
See that's nice, very helpful of him.
Speaker 1 (19:57):
So investigators, though they had they long considered that Lewis
was the prime suspect. If they could ever pin it
on somebody, it wasn't going to be him. So over
the years they scrutinized his past. They searched his home.
In two thousand and nine, the FBI seized items from
his Massachusetts residence when the investigation was reopened, and even
tried new forensic tests. However, as of today, no direct
(20:22):
evidence links James Lewis to the actual poisonings. It's entirely
possible he was just an opportunist who saw those headlines
and thought, let's do something about this. If he was involved,
writing that letter so quickly could indicate some fore knowledge,
but we are never going to know. James Lewis died
(20:45):
in July twenty twenty three, recent at the age of
seventy six, and at the time of his death, he
was still never officially charged with the time that all murders,
so there are a few other people So while James
Lewis was in the spotlight for a lot of this,
the task force did investigate dozens of other leads. So
(21:07):
one significant suspect was Roger Arnold, a forty eight year
old Chicago man who worked as a doc supervisor for
Jewel Osco well for a warehouse that handled the Jewel
Osco things. Arnold had bragged in a bar about being
able to kill people with cyanide.
Speaker 2 (21:30):
That's oddly specific.
Speaker 1 (21:32):
It is, And he was acting very erratically after the
Tailanol murders. I guess his marriage had just fallen apart
and he was mentally unstable. A local bartender, Marty Sinclair.
Marty tipped the police about Arnold's statements. When officers questioned
(21:54):
Roger Arnold, he bizarrely told him that he did have
cyanide at home forgetting rid of pests.
Speaker 2 (22:01):
What kind of pest do you.
Speaker 1 (22:02):
Have, critters? I guess, geez, cyanide. So this did raise
some pretty big flies, some pretty big flags. Yes, they
found some unregistered firearms and books on explosives and poison
and poisons, including one called the poor Man's James Bond,
(22:23):
which contained instructions on making cyanide poison.
Speaker 2 (22:27):
Kind of sounds like we have our man.
Speaker 1 (22:28):
I was gonna say, I don't know why they were
focused so well, I guess because he wrote the letter
saying I did it.
Speaker 3 (22:35):
So.
Speaker 1 (22:35):
Furthermore, investigations found some connections between Arnold and at least
two of the victims. Arnold had once worked with Mary
Reiner's father at a liquor store warehouse, and Arnold's wife
had been treated at the hospital across the street from
the Winfield store where Mary Reiner bought her Tylol.
Speaker 2 (22:55):
Also strange coincidences to the victim, like I don't know,
there's like a lot with this guy.
Speaker 3 (23:03):
So.
Speaker 1 (23:04):
Arnold was arrested on a weapons charge for illegal guns,
but there was no direct evidence tying him to the
title in all capsules. He was held and interrogated multiple times,
but he never confessed, nor was he charged with the poisonings.
Roger Arnold's story took a bizarre and tragic turn. Oh
(23:24):
The intense scrutiny made him resent the man who tipped
off police Marty. Don't forget me Martina. In the summer
of nineteen eighty three, Arnold snapped. He went looking for
the bar owner, Marty Sinclair to exact revenge. But in
the case of mistaken identity, oh my god, Arnold shot
(23:46):
and killed an innocent man named John Stanisha, whom he
mistook for Sinclair. Stanisha was a random victim of Arnold's rage,
and he had no connection to Thailanol at all. Arnold
was convicted of that murder in January of nineteen eighty
(24:07):
four and sentenced to thirty years. He served fifteen years
in prison. In a prison interview, Arnold expressed remorse for
killing the wrong person and spoke of choices he could
have made differently. Importantly, even after all of that, the
Tailanhol Task Force still harbored suspicions about Arnold. In twenty ten,
(24:29):
after Arnold had died, so he had died in two
thousand and eight, investigators actually exhumed his body to obtain
a DNA sample from his remains. Jesus, They compared Arnold's
DNA to the DNA found on the bottles. Remember I
said it was like sweat or something yea or saliva.
Speaker 2 (24:52):
He was crying in the aisle.
Speaker 1 (24:55):
It was not a match.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
Oh shit.
Speaker 1 (24:58):
So that conclusively ruled him out.
Speaker 2 (25:02):
Now, what about Lewis? Did they do the DNA test
on him as well.
Speaker 1 (25:05):
You know, it didn't say that.
Speaker 2 (25:07):
That just dawned on me.
Speaker 1 (25:08):
So but why wouldn't they right, But then if they did,
that would have just ruled them out. So who the
hell knows? So anyway, he's now supposed to be ruled out.
Most officials now believe that Roger Arnold was not the
tilan All killer either, just an unstable man who talked
too much and tragically committed a different murder now here
(25:29):
is an interesting one. A woman. Oh oh, Laurie Dan.
Laurie Dan was a woman. Years later, in nineteen eighty eight,
she poisoned several people and shot children in a school
in a Chicago suburb. What Because she had a pattern
of poisoning refreshments she gave to people, some wondered if
(25:52):
she could have been the tailn All killer back in
eighty two. However, in nineteen eighty two, Laurie Dan, who
was then known as Laurie Wasserman, was only twenty five
and not known to be violent yet yet, right.
Speaker 2 (26:11):
I mean, it has to start somewhere, you know what
I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (26:13):
Well, it does no evidence linking her to the tail
in All case that they had, and she later died
in nineteen eighty eight after her own crime spree took place.
So that remains just kind of like an internet rumor. Yeah,
there is one more wild lead. In twenty and eleven,
(26:34):
the FBI actually requested DNA from Ted Kazinski.
Speaker 2 (26:42):
The freaking Oklahoma City bomber.
Speaker 1 (26:45):
The unibomber.
Speaker 2 (26:46):
Yees, he may not be Oklahoma City. I might be
wrong about that.
Speaker 1 (26:50):
Well, it says he was the notorious unibomber.
Speaker 2 (26:53):
Wasn't that Oklahoma City?
Speaker 4 (26:56):
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (26:56):
Look, no, I swore that's what he bombed. Shit, I'm wrong.
The Oklahoma City bombing was Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols.
I was completely off. I don't know why. And I
could see him, I can. Do you remember what tegaz
inc He looks like, oh, very like Rofo and unkept,
(27:16):
like in his you know, wild world cabin in the world.
Speaker 1 (27:24):
Well, so anyway, they did request DNA from him, and
because it's like, well, why him, Well, I guess. Kazinski's
early bombings in the late nineteen seventies happened in the
Chicago area, and he occasionally stayed at his parents' home
in Lombard, Illinois. The same town where Mary McFarlane worked
during nineteen eighty two. Some in the task force thought
(27:45):
the tailand All murders could be an act of domestic terror,
sort of like what the Unibomber's methods were for random
targets to basically just cause a bunch of fear. However,
Kazinski denied having any cyanide or involvement, and there's no
solid evidence tying him to it.
Speaker 2 (28:01):
Having any cyanide.
Speaker 4 (28:05):
So funny, Okay, The FBI likely was being thorough due
to just recent advances in forensic technology.
Speaker 1 (28:17):
I guess that would be a kind of exciting thing,
like all of a sudden, you have the ability to
like take DNA that you've got and take DNA from
somebody who you think and like see like is it
or isn't it true? I feel like that would be
exciting because it's like, hey, you come over here, taste this.
That's a Golden Girls quote, all right. But it appears
(28:41):
that Kazinski's DNA also did not match anything in the
Tail and All killer evidence, so he was never officially
a prime suspect, but at least we know he was checked.
Speaker 2 (28:56):
Absolutely.
Speaker 1 (28:58):
So the original Tailanol task force was one of the
largest ever assembled in Illinois, but by the mid nineteen eighties,
with no charges filed, it eventually wound down. However, the
case had never been truly cold, so in two thousand
and seven, authorities formally reopened the case with a fresh
task force, including the FBI, Illinois State Police, and the
(29:21):
affected local departments. They digitized all of the old case files,
which they had boxes and boxes of at this point,
They reinterviewed witnesses with modern techniques, whatever the hell that means,
and submitted evidence for new forensic tests. This led to
the DNA comparisons we mentioned, Like I said, when they
(29:43):
oh it does say that they tested Arnold and Lewis,
Oh okay, and that both that happened both in twenty ten.
So like we said, there was no profile match.
Speaker 2 (29:55):
Well, so then, yeah, Lewis was solidly ruled out. It
wasn't just that they didn't have anything and then he.
Speaker 1 (30:00):
They wanted them, Was that right? So the re nude
efforts also saw searches like the one in two thousand
and nine. I think I thought you were literally just leaving.
Where are you off to? I was like, I thought,
I saw tell you put down her mic pick up
(30:22):
her little bag. I thought, I guess we're done here,
but I'm not quite done here, so I threw you
for a loop, like I said. In two thousand and nine,
that's when they went into James Lewis's home in Cambridge
to like grab some stuff and see if they could
(30:42):
pin anything on them. So the agencies computers and documents,
but apparently they found nothing conclusive. Then in twenty twenty two,
on the fortieth anniversary, Local Chicago News reported that multiple
agencies continue to work on the case, meaning that it's
still an active, open investigation. So investigators often say they
just need one piece of in convertible evidence or a
(31:07):
confession to finally solve it. Well, they got a confession already, is.
Speaker 2 (31:11):
Ish, and I mean they need a freaking DNA match.
Speaker 1 (31:15):
So there have been individuals who again falsely confessed over
the years, but they are always proven to be liars. Liar, liar,
pants on fire, that fat fat water rat fishing bullets
in your hat. So each time it stoked a brief
media frenzy and then it was like, eh, false alarm everybody.
(31:39):
So the actual killer, to our knowledge, has never come forward,
So whether out of fear or maybe they just died, right,
or maybe they're just sitting around thinking, well, I got
away with it, everybody.
Speaker 2 (31:53):
That's insane.
Speaker 1 (31:54):
I'm just saying insane.
Speaker 2 (31:57):
Clearly they got away with it. Whether it's clearly now
passed away or not, it's just insane to me. Ow,
I just broke my hip.
Speaker 1 (32:10):
So, like I said, back to Johnson and Johnson, the
public authorities, they moved quickly when this happened, like they
were trying to protect the consumers and stuff. So, and
I mentioned this earlier, their response in nineteen eighty two
that actually went down as a legendary example of corporate responsibility,
like under fire. So what they did was they did
(32:36):
an immediate recall and then they had those open communications
with like the media, and it was just like people
were using this as such a good example of like
how to take measures to restore public trust. I didn't
freaking know Johnson and Johnson ever had this happen. So
they obviously did a good job.
Speaker 2 (32:57):
Johnson Johnson has dipped through the years.
Speaker 1 (33:02):
Dipped.
Speaker 2 (33:03):
Yeah, what do you mean with their products?
Speaker 1 (33:06):
And like, aren't they the baby powdered people? Or am
I they sure are? Yeah? I like baby powder.
Speaker 2 (33:11):
It's very harmful. Their ingredients and their products. They've come
under like a lot of scrutiny. Not back then.
Speaker 1 (33:19):
I used to take their baby powder, like when I
was little, and I would just throw it up in
the air like it was pixie dust. I think probably
like from Peter pan Oh. I was going to say, like,
what would have I thought you got the chills?
Speaker 2 (33:33):
No, not too worthy? What would happened to it? Then
somebody would have to vacuum it up?
Speaker 1 (33:39):
I'm assuming my parents. I think I would do it
in their room mostly. I don't know why.
Speaker 2 (33:46):
They're such patient people.
Speaker 1 (33:47):
Mm hmm, All right, well then I guess Johnson and
Johnson shitty right comparison to what Tally is saying. I
don't know. I wasn't I wasn't aware of this. I mean,
I'm tell me what you're trying to say, and hopefully
we don't get sued.
Speaker 2 (34:05):
I know that they have really harmful ingredients, which I mean,
so did them and everybody else exactly. I think they
really came over like a ton of screwtiny. I think
even they've had products pulled because of it. Like I
don't think you can get the baby lotion anymore, can't.
Speaker 1 (34:20):
You the baby powder, not the powder.
Speaker 2 (34:25):
You were very stuck on the pattern. Think they make them?
Speaker 1 (34:27):
Do you mean baby oil?
Speaker 2 (34:29):
No, well they make that too, so yeah, maybe they
pulled that. But I'm talking those like bottles of the
pink lotion. I guess it is or cream or something
baby lotion, Isn't it called that they had it? They
had like purple and pink. I think yellow was I
(34:50):
don't wear.
Speaker 1 (34:51):
All right, Well, well let's just talk about them back then, fine,
all right, great. As soon as it became apparent that
there was cyanide laced tailanol capsules and that they were
killing people, right, they go into emergency mode. So they
famously put customer safety first, and on September thirtieth, within
(35:13):
hours of confirming this, the company alerted the doctors, the hospitals,
the distributors nationwide. They stopped selling or using tailanol capsules.
They halted all advertising for thailanol. So and thailanol was
a top product, so they yanked all ads, no commercials, nothing.
They also dispatched teams to assist investigators and to start
(35:35):
figuring out which lots were affected. Initially, as mentioned, they
started to recall that one lot number MC two eight
eight zero in the Chicago area, but as more tampered
bottles were found from other lots, the company made a
dramatic and pretty costly decision. There was a nationwide where
(35:55):
recall of all tailanol capsules on October fifth, nineteen eighty two.
Johnson and Johnson approximately pulled how many millions do you
think of dollars? No bottles? Oh shit, like nationwide they're
pulling blank amount of bottles off the shelves. Two million,
(36:19):
thirty one million. Wow, So that cost them over one
hundred million dollars in nineteen eighty.
Speaker 2 (36:28):
Of the loss, yeah, gone wasted product gonzo, which is
had to be just such like just killed them because
you know the majority of those bottles were not affected.
Speaker 1 (36:40):
Oh hell yeah. So at that time it was the
largest consumer product recall in US history. And like I said,
then they actually started to take out ads and make
public statements saying don't take any of our tile at all.
Speaker 2 (36:55):
Which costs them money, you know what I mean, Like
they're losing money, and then they're spending more money for
those messages going out those alerts.
Speaker 1 (37:05):
Now, they did offer to exchange the capsules already purchased
for tailanyl tablets because those were solid pills and they
were considered safe. I'd say no Ethan thanks so Johnson
and Johnson's chairman, James Burke. He went on television talk shows,
he went on news programs. He expressed sympathy for the
(37:26):
victims' families and to assure the public that the company
was doing everything possible to prevent further harm. They also
fully cooperated with law enforcement. They offered a one hundred
thousand dollars reward for information leading to the capture of
the poisoner, and of course, when money's involved, a lot
of tips came in, but again nothing and so in
(37:48):
the Chicago area, people started to lose all trust in
over the counter medicines. So people returned tilan All bottles
and stores in droves, which oh yeah. Pharmacies reported that
sales of tailan All went basically to zero overnight. Hospitals
(38:08):
switched to alternative pain relievers for patients. Other companies that
made similar capsule medicines, like etcedrin advil, they also saw
dips in sales. As consumers said, I don't think so.
Speaker 2 (38:22):
They were lately they were cautious, right, more than cautious.
Speaker 1 (38:26):
The media's coverage was very extensive, and sometimes it was
almost too effective in spreading fear because there were reports
of people dumping medicine down their toilets. They were supposed
to do that, they refused, Well could you You're basically
you could be putting cyanide right back into the whatever. Right.
(38:48):
They refused to buy anything that wasn't sealed, and they
even started to avoid grocery products that the packaging looked
to be tampered. So, I mean not good. They were weary.
So then though, Johnson and Johnson had to rebuild, like
how do they get tilan al back? How do we
(39:09):
go back up? Because many experts at the time were like,
tilan All's done, Like you ain't ever bringing this back now? Quick, quick,
quick question for you. Here's a quick question. Yeah, what
is your go to pain reliever?
Speaker 2 (39:28):
I love a nice sadvill.
Speaker 1 (39:29):
Yeah, that's my favorite.
Speaker 2 (39:31):
Yeah. I try to not take it though, like and
I almost always if I have a headache, Yes, it
can be stress related, but I pretty much always assume
it's my water intake.
Speaker 1 (39:43):
I know, you play a game of chicken with your headache,
right and you never win?
Speaker 2 (39:48):
That's not true.
Speaker 1 (39:50):
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (39:51):
You need to just guzzle and hope for the best.
And I think sometimes more effort needs to put in
be put into to turn that corner. But I start
to feel like I have the flu.
Speaker 1 (40:05):
I tried Etceterrin ones did nothing. And that's the one
with that girl from the Handmaid's Tail. Oh, I know
she's the commercial girl.
Speaker 2 (40:13):
I was gonna say when you were talking about Thailand
All commercials, that was her name, Elizabeth Moss. Yes, I
was gonna say, I've never seen a commercial for pain reliever,
but you're seeing them for Etceterron.
Speaker 1 (40:26):
Well, this is also like twenty five years ago.
Speaker 2 (40:30):
You remember that, yea, the Excedrin commercial.
Speaker 1 (40:33):
I think it was black and white. If I'm not mistaken,
you had to hear. I'll look it up later.
Speaker 2 (40:38):
Wow, how do you remember that?
Speaker 1 (40:39):
I don't know. So, like I said, people were thinking
this is never coming back. But within a year, tiland
All was back on the top of the pain reliever market,
thanks largely to how Johnson and Johnson did that. They
reintroduced tailand all capsules and new tamper evident packaging with
(41:02):
heavy emphasis on safety. So they started to have safety
seals on all medicine bottles or food and I mean,
now it's universal. So what they instituted was by nineteen
eighty three, they were selling tailnl and other things in
packages with shrink wrapped plastic seals around the bottle, foil
(41:25):
safety seals over the bottle mouth, and even glued sealed boxes.
So they were all like little extra layers of protection. Yeah,
So obviously people have, like not only law enforcement, but
a bunch of people have looked into this and like
(41:49):
made docuseries about it. And as I said, that's when
I came across the one on Netflix. So in May
twenty twenty five, Netflix released the documentary called Cold Case
the Murders, which brought this story to an even wider audience,
including the Chilworthy audience. So this docuseries featured old footage
(42:11):
and interviews, including interviews with James Lewis because he was
alive during the filming he wanted to clear his name
and with law enforcement. The fact that Netflix put out
in twenty twenty five, like this documentary just shows that
there's still like a lot of public interest in it.
Speaker 2 (42:29):
Well, and I feel like not knowing who did it
is those sorts of circumstances always keep those cases like,
you know, just very interesting topics for people. Yeah, they're
just most likely always going to be unsolved.
Speaker 1 (42:43):
So in conclusion to this, the Thailand all murders basically
changed like the public's relationship with buying consumer products. So
although it was horrible, it did lead to safer packaging,
and it led to laws that likely did prevent similar
crimes or at least, like at the very least made
(43:04):
them more difficult to do. It also taught corporate America
like lessons in handling crisises like this. So this remains
a go to case in discussions about unsolved crimes. It
usually gets mentioned alongside cases like the Zodiac Killer or
Jack the Ripper in terms of notoriety. So you know,
(43:29):
it's just it's like still very I guess highly talked about.
Speaker 2 (43:34):
There was a case recently and it was a teenager,
if I'm not mistaken, that was tampering with meds. I'm
almost certain.
Speaker 1 (43:41):
Well, well you're looking that up. The seven victims, like
I said, Mary Kellerman, Adam Janice Stanley, Janis, Theresa Janis,
Mary Reiner, Mary McFarlane, and Paula Prince. You know, their
deaths were not in vain at least in the sense
that all of these changes implemented afterwards. I am sure
must have saved a bunch of people like from this
(44:04):
happening again, so, you know, and it's just unfortunate that
they never fully got the justice that they deserved because
nobody was ever actually found to you know, like who
did it. But as of twenty twenty five, the Tailant
All murder case remains open, unsolved, and just as chillworthy
as ever.
Speaker 2 (44:22):
May all of the victims rest in peace.
Speaker 1 (44:27):
So did you find anything?
Speaker 2 (44:28):
No, And I'm almost certain it was with teenagers, but
nothing even comes up when I google, you know a
few keywords. But that's going to drive me nuts. I
don't know.
Speaker 1 (44:44):
Well, you can let us know next time if you
find it.
Speaker 2 (44:47):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (44:49):
So that is the conclusion of part two of the
Thailant All Murders. Thank you everybody for tuning back, Thank
you telling you for not leaving mid show.
Speaker 2 (45:04):
Absolutely I remained seated, ish you did.
Speaker 1 (45:08):
Get up a little bit. But so all right, everybody,
we will catch you then in next week episode. I'm
not even you know what, I'm not even editing that out.
We will catch you a next week episode, you know,
when I believe Talia will be presenting. She told me,
(45:29):
I will a little Birdie told me, and by that
I mean tell you so until then, everybody stay safe
and stay chill.
Speaker 2 (45:38):
Bye everybody, All right, bye everyone.
Speaker 1 (45:44):
You've just listened to Chilworthy. Thank you for joining us
on this latest episode. While we strive to keep our
discussions engaging and lighthearted, we also wanted to take a
moment to acknowledge the real lives and events that are
at the heart of these stories.
Speaker 2 (45:58):
We try to approach each topic with a sense of
curiosity and respect fully, aware of the impact these events
have had on the individuals and their reloved ones. Our
goal is to honor their memories by keeping their stories
alive and shedding light on the mysteries that surround them.
Speaker 1 (46:14):
If you enjoyed this episode, please remember to subscribe, rate,
and leave a review, and don't forget to join us
on the next episode of Chilworthy.
You're listening to Chillworthy.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
A podcast where two best friends discuss mysteries, murders, and
anything in between for your enjoyment.
Speaker 1 (00:16):
So if you're ready to hear some chilling and unsettling cases,
you're in the right place. Happy listening.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
Hi, everybody, welcome back to chow Worthy, our podcast with
Talia and Brent.
Speaker 1 (00:35):
Hello doesn't exactly roll off the tongue for you, doesn't,
but that's all right.
Speaker 3 (00:48):
Hi.
Speaker 1 (00:48):
Hi everyone, This is our podcast with me, Talia and Brent.
I guess I should have given you cards anyway, everybody.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
Uh, oh my god.
Speaker 1 (01:07):
We are in part two of the Thailand All Murders.
We're bick So we are back and we're doing back
to back being back.
Speaker 2 (01:17):
Yeah, we're still here.
Speaker 1 (01:19):
Yeah from last time. We never left. But a whole
week has happened in everybody else's world. So isn't that fascinating?
Speaker 2 (01:26):
It's nice? And really, when this goes up, another week
will have transpired in our lives.
Speaker 1 (01:35):
Oh my god, So a very sweet thing just happened.
Actually what one of my friends who I went camping with. Yeah,
he told me he just got home, right, and he
said I wanted to say thank you, so much for
telling me about Chilworthy exclamation point. I listened to almost
two shows on the way home.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
God love them.
Speaker 1 (01:57):
I know. I absolutely vibe with you guys. I love
it exclamation part part exclamation mark, exclamation mark. And I
laughed so hard when Taliga hit her tooth on the
mic because I could tell exactly that was what happened there.
Sure is.
Speaker 2 (02:20):
Oh I love him. This is so lightful. Yes, what
a sweet man.
Speaker 1 (02:26):
All right, So we're going to jump right back into
the Yes, what.
Speaker 2 (02:33):
What jump We're jumping? Man?
Speaker 1 (02:45):
I don't even think I said that, but we're going
to jump back in shuckle. So all right. So last
week we left off right, we base. We talked about
the victims, the timeline as to when these people were
(03:08):
unfortunately passing away, what they were doing right beforehand, how
everybody did everything right, everything that was falling together into place.
Halloween was canceled because I was very upset about that. Right,
you know, they're serious, you said the police were going
around neighborhoods with bullhorns telling people throughout their time, all
(03:29):
of this stuff is happening. So to jump back in
now more a little bit about the investigation. Now we're
going to talk about the early theories and the realization
of the product tampering that was happening. So in the
first days, once the cyanide laced tailanol was identified as
the cause, investigators had to determine how these poisoned pills
(03:52):
were happening. So one initial theory was that the tailanol
might have been contaminated at the factory, which is what
you had thought, or or during distribution. But this quickly
looked like it was unlikely because the tainted bottles came
from different production lots. So for instance, Mary McFarlane's bottle
(04:15):
was a different lot number than Mary Kellerman's and two
separate manufacturing plants. So one was from Pennsylvania and one
was from Texas.
Speaker 2 (04:25):
Oh wow, wow, very far apart from each other, got
that right? And not near Illinois? I don't think.
Speaker 1 (04:32):
Right, No, I don't think sex is at the bottom.
Speaker 2 (04:35):
Pa is to the right.
Speaker 1 (04:37):
And Texas is closer to California. In California is if
you keep going, Hawaii's over there?
Speaker 2 (04:45):
Why's over there? Oh my god?
Speaker 1 (04:49):
So anyway, but the only common point was that the
retail shelves, like the retail shelves were all in the
Chicago area. That was the common denominator. Not right, the manufacturer,
not the plant, but the point of purchase got it.
So this led to the working theory that somebody had
(05:10):
taken the bottles off of the shelves in the local
stores opened up the capsules one by one. Keep in mind,
because when you were saying they were just like injecting
the bottle, no, they were literally like opening the capsules.
Speaker 2 (05:24):
I'm trying to remember what tilanoll like looked like back
in the eighties. Well, they're just capsules, right, But if
you look at chilanol nowadays, you cannot separate it.
Speaker 1 (05:37):
Are you sure?
Speaker 2 (05:38):
I am positive? No, I'm not positive.
Speaker 1 (05:41):
Are you talking about like the liquid gels? You're right, No,
I'm not.
Speaker 2 (05:46):
Talking about that. I'm fucking about the norm I don't
know what the hell you.
Speaker 1 (05:52):
Call them, but you know what I mean, the red
and white pills. Yes, we'll look into this more later.
It doesn't matter right.
Speaker 2 (05:58):
Now because back then they did it right.
Speaker 1 (06:02):
We can't change history.
Speaker 2 (06:04):
We can't sh't.
Speaker 1 (06:07):
So where was I hear? Oh about? Okay, So that
he was taking these things, he was opening up the capsules,
he was adding the cyanide and then putting the bottles
back on the shelf. So and they were like it,
you know, they were thinking, it's just this random poisoning
scheme because there was no rhyme or reason to it.
So essentially product tampering, like he was doing it in
(06:29):
the He was basically a serial killer in the form
of product tampering, is what we're saying. So yeah, so
investigators coined the phrase the Tailan all killer or Thailand
all Man, which I don't like that one as much,
same like Quailman.
Speaker 2 (06:48):
Oh my god, Doug, do you know, by the way, Douglas,
mister Dink, mister Dink, Skeeter.
Speaker 1 (06:58):
Walk. No, that was that was Fazzy Bear.
Speaker 2 (07:03):
I never knew him well enough to know. Back to Doug,
I loved pork Chop. Of course. I wanted to say
to you earlier, and this just reminded me again when
you mentioned Rugrats when you were referring to something else
we were talking about from the weekend, and I wanted
to tell you, And then now with Doug and that reference,
(07:26):
same thing, Rugrats and Doug and actually hate Arnold and.
Speaker 1 (07:31):
Yeah, all right, what is it?
Speaker 2 (07:32):
Pluto has all of them? Oh, and it's still like
I love to put it on his background, and that's
all I had to say. Right, it's nice.
Speaker 1 (07:42):
You heard her go. That's all I had to say. Well,
that's a lot to say, actually said a lot, all right.
So this idea that a person would just kill strangers
by random, just by poisoning pills was virtually unheard of
at this point, and it terrified the public and the police,
which of course it did, right, So Chicago police and
(08:05):
the FBI formed a joint task force to find this
crazy person.
Speaker 2 (08:10):
Teamwork.
Speaker 1 (08:11):
So the investigation was chaired by the Illinois Attorney General's office,
and literally hundreds of investigators were involved, from local detectives
to federal agents. So authorities collected every piece of evidence
that they could. They so that like the remaining capsules
from the victim's bottles, the packaging, the lot numbers, the
store receipts, and even something like that seemed unrelated items
(08:34):
from the victim's home, but just to rule out that
there were any other sources of cyanide, because you know,
I just had a thought like, could you imagine like
a toothpaste just.
Speaker 2 (08:43):
That would be an easy one, And if you think
about how toothpaste is packaged, you can.
Speaker 1 (08:48):
I did think about it.
Speaker 2 (08:49):
You can absolutely get in there. We're just giving ideas
left to try.
Speaker 1 (08:56):
Well, we're not endorsing any of that.
Speaker 2 (08:59):
No, So.
Speaker 1 (09:02):
Crime labs tested the capsules and they found that each
poison capsule contained, like I said, a massive dose of cyanide,
far more than actually that was that would be needed
to kill one person. So this was indicating that the
killer wanted to ensure death or maybe even kill multiple
people per bottle, which I think makes sense. Yeah, for sure.
(09:22):
So they also tested for finger prints on the bottles
and the capsules, but no usable fingerprints were found of anybody,
so the killer might have wiped the bottles clean, or
he wore gloves. Fibers and other trace evidence were not
really present either. One bit of forensic evidence that would
(09:42):
become important later was DNA, so in nineteen eighty two,
DNA profiling wasn't available, but in later years some tiny
DNA samples from I guess saliva or sweat maybe which
was left on one of the bottles by the perpetrator
were recovered for modern testing. Investigators also looked at store records.
(10:06):
They identified seven stores where tampered tailand all bottles had
been either purchased by victims or were found on the shelves.
So two Jewel grocery stores, one Osco drug store which
was the Jewel Osco Yes, one Walgreens, one Domini's Supermarket,
(10:27):
and one Frank's Finer Foods. So all of them were
in the Chicago metropolitan area, and this clustering of them,
like location wise, suggested that the killer likely lived in
or was familiar with Chicago. The way you looked at
me like yeah, I get on with it. I'm just
(10:49):
I'm just trying to report.
Speaker 2 (10:52):
I'm sorry.
Speaker 1 (10:56):
So using these maps, they tried to see if the
stores formed in a pattern. I'm picturing them using like
those like little thumb tacks with like the strings and
then they go to another one, right, So because some
people were thinking like, well, are these like along certain
maybe like a highway or whatever, But no obvious pattern
(11:18):
came up by looking at this. So the stores were
somewhat spread out, indicating that the killer might have driven
around the region just in randomly picked places to put
these bottles. So as the investigation proceeded, officials also had
to deal with the public reaction and because people were
freaking panicking and the rumors were flying like again, I said,
(11:39):
it's somebody poisoning other products. Whatever. The task force regularly
updated the media to maintain transparency and to try to
keep everybody calm. Ironically, Johnson and Johnson's candid, an active
approach to informing the public became a textbook example of
a good crisis management, so keep that in mind. But
(12:02):
in Chicago in the early October of eighty two, it
was anything but calm. Police were dispatched to guard drug
store stocks so like so like, literally officers were stationed
at pharmacies in case the killer tried to plant more
of the poison in, you know, in pills, right, So
(12:26):
in tips from the public started to pour in, So
anyone seen buying cyanide, any local weirdos who were around
talking about poisoning.
Speaker 2 (12:37):
Where are you buying cyanide?
Speaker 1 (12:39):
Though I don't freaking know, you know, They were looking
into any kind of disgruntled employees, any of those things.
So one early tip led to an arrest in a
different state, which turned out to be unrelated. Unfortunately. Another
lead pointed to a guy who owned a chemistry set
like as he was making.
Speaker 2 (13:00):
His own his own cyanide.
Speaker 1 (13:04):
So it was a huge amount of leads, but one
soon rose above the rest. There was a letter that
was received by Johnson and Johnson that took responsibility for
the killings and demanded money to stop.
Speaker 2 (13:18):
Just like a serial killer, except not the money, like
wanted the notoriety.
Speaker 1 (13:22):
Say this again.
Speaker 2 (13:23):
Oh I don't hear about it?
Speaker 1 (13:24):
Oh oh yeah, yeah, yeah, I gotcha. The letter demanded
one million dollars oh gosh to stop the killings.
Speaker 2 (13:33):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (13:34):
Effectively, this was their way of attempting to extort the company.
So the letter's postmark was traced to Chicago, and later
it was determined that the postmark was from October first.
The author gave instructions for you know where the money
to be dropped to be dropped, interestingly, directing that it
be deposited in a particular bank account in New York,
(13:57):
New York.
Speaker 2 (13:58):
Not Chicago. Yeah, not that that wouldn't work, but you
know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (14:06):
Yeah. Investigators traced that bank account and found it belonged
to a man named James William Lewis.
Speaker 2 (14:14):
Well, that was a dumb move, but Lewis.
Speaker 1 (14:16):
Was not the account owner. It was an old account
of his wife's former employer that he apparently was trying
to implicate. So this was pretty bizarre because it was like,
was the killer trying to frame somebody or was this
letter just to complete hoax by somebody taking advantage of
the situation? Right, So, the FBI had seen extortion letters
(14:38):
in product tampering cases before, but given the details, they
took this one very seriously. So they quickly identified James W. Lewis,
a thirty six year old man who at one time
did live in Chicago, but who had fled to New
York City earlier that year due to unrelated legal troubles. So,
in fact, James Lewis had a bit of a checkered past.
(15:02):
You're kidding. He was charged in nineteen seventy eight with
the murder and dismemberment of a man in Missouri. I
guess he was a former client of his accounting business.
What But that case was dismissed on a technicality, so
he got away with it. You got that right, sister.
(15:25):
He also had fraud charges in his history. Essentially, Lewis
was a very educated but pretty troubled man with a
propensity for scams and a history of violence.
Speaker 2 (15:38):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (15:39):
So by nineteen eighty two, he and his wife Leanne
were living on the East Coast and at the time,
at the time of the Taialenthal murders, like that, they
were living on the East Coast when that started to
hit the news. Lewis was actually a fugitive wanted for
an unrelated fraud charge, and the extortion letter was his
grand entrance into this case. So October thirteenth, nineteen eighty two.
(16:04):
I love how I keep repeating the date, not the
date the year James Lewis was arrested in New York City. Wow,
they get him after a nationwide manhunt. He had gone
on the run once his letter became public knowledge, but
was eventually caught at the New York Public Library. Oh
(16:25):
my god, the poor library.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
Oh yes, I hate that they were tangled up in this.
Speaker 1 (16:31):
Where Carrie got married right, well, didn't not actually spoilers.
Speaker 2 (16:35):
God, I love that scene so freaking.
Speaker 1 (16:38):
Somebody give me a phone, Give me a phone, all right?
Speaker 2 (16:43):
Anyway, Wait, he must have been a reader.
Speaker 1 (16:47):
I don't freaking know.
Speaker 2 (16:48):
I guess not. He must he doesn't.
Speaker 1 (16:50):
It said he was well educated.
Speaker 2 (16:53):
Well not everybody who's well educated.
Speaker 1 (16:54):
We're moving on.
Speaker 2 (16:55):
Reading for fun funsies.
Speaker 1 (16:59):
Well, yeah, but he could have been reading on how
to make cyanide for all we know, perfecting his crypt
an alchemist. Under questioning, Lewis admitted to writing the extortion letter,
but he said I'm not the taileanhal killer.
Speaker 2 (17:15):
So he was helping a friend.
Speaker 1 (17:17):
Say that again, what does that mean? Well, he said, yeah,
I wrote the letter. I wanted a million bucks, but
I didn't actually do it. Oh, so no, he wasn't
helping a friend, thank you. It wasn't being just a
nice guy.
Speaker 2 (17:34):
I believe him.
Speaker 1 (17:36):
Well, he claimed that he was trying to exploit the
news of the poisonings to get money, and that the
idea to deposit in his wife's ex bosses account was
a scheme to embarrass that person.
Speaker 2 (17:48):
I see, he's like an ass.
Speaker 1 (17:50):
I guess he held a pretty big grudge against this man.
I'll say investigators were understandably a little bit like, I
don't know about this. So Lewis had some connections to Chicago, because,
like I said, he did live there in the early eighties,
and he also studied science in school in college, so
maybe he could make cyanide. The letter did include details
(18:14):
that felt authentic. However, no physical evidence ever tied Lewis
to the actual poisonings. Lewis insisted that he was in
New York at the time and offered an alibi, but
it was pretty hard to verify. So ultimately James W.
Lewis was never charged.
Speaker 3 (18:33):
Wow with the murders, but he was charged with extortion
for the letter, and in nineteen eighty three he was
convicted of that and sentenced to ten years in federal prison,
no longer than I was thinking, so Lewis served about
twelve years. He got additional time for other frauds that
he tried to do. He continued, though, to adamantly maintain
(18:56):
his innocence in the Tailantal murders for the rest of
his life, even after his release. I feel like he
was sitting around with the dB coopster.
Speaker 2 (19:07):
Dare you bring that man's name? Do you bring this filth? D? B.
Cooper was a gentle gentleman, he certainly, and he didn't
kill anybody.
Speaker 1 (19:24):
He was very polite, he was very mindful. So eventually Lewis,
I guess, after getting out of prison, he moves to
Boston and and in later interviews a self made like
he made a website where he argued that he couldn't
have been the killer, and then he decided to offer
(19:45):
his own theories, pointing out that you know, he liked
to theorize and act as like a consultant.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
See that's nice, very helpful of him.
Speaker 1 (19:57):
So investigators, though they had they long considered that Lewis
was the prime suspect. If they could ever pin it
on somebody, it wasn't going to be him. So over
the years they scrutinized his past. They searched his home.
In two thousand and nine, the FBI seized items from
his Massachusetts residence when the investigation was reopened, and even
tried new forensic tests. However, as of today, no direct
(20:22):
evidence links James Lewis to the actual poisonings. It's entirely
possible he was just an opportunist who saw those headlines
and thought, let's do something about this. If he was involved,
writing that letter so quickly could indicate some fore knowledge,
but we are never going to know. James Lewis died
(20:45):
in July twenty twenty three, recent at the age of
seventy six, and at the time of his death, he
was still never officially charged with the time that all murders,
so there are a few other people So while James
Lewis was in the spotlight for a lot of this,
the task force did investigate dozens of other leads. So
(21:07):
one significant suspect was Roger Arnold, a forty eight year
old Chicago man who worked as a doc supervisor for
Jewel Osco well for a warehouse that handled the Jewel
Osco things. Arnold had bragged in a bar about being
able to kill people with cyanide.
Speaker 2 (21:30):
That's oddly specific.
Speaker 1 (21:32):
It is, And he was acting very erratically after the
Tailanol murders. I guess his marriage had just fallen apart
and he was mentally unstable. A local bartender, Marty Sinclair.
Marty tipped the police about Arnold's statements. When officers questioned
(21:54):
Roger Arnold, he bizarrely told him that he did have
cyanide at home forgetting rid of pests.
Speaker 2 (22:01):
What kind of pest do you.
Speaker 1 (22:02):
Have, critters? I guess, geez, cyanide. So this did raise
some pretty big flies, some pretty big flags. Yes, they
found some unregistered firearms and books on explosives and poison
and poisons, including one called the poor Man's James Bond,
(22:23):
which contained instructions on making cyanide poison.
Speaker 2 (22:27):
Kind of sounds like we have our man.
Speaker 1 (22:28):
I was gonna say, I don't know why they were
focused so well, I guess because he wrote the letter
saying I did it.
Speaker 3 (22:35):
So.
Speaker 1 (22:35):
Furthermore, investigations found some connections between Arnold and at least
two of the victims. Arnold had once worked with Mary
Reiner's father at a liquor store warehouse, and Arnold's wife
had been treated at the hospital across the street from
the Winfield store where Mary Reiner bought her Tylol.
Speaker 2 (22:55):
Also strange coincidences to the victim, like I don't know,
there's like a lot with this guy.
Speaker 3 (23:03):
So.
Speaker 1 (23:04):
Arnold was arrested on a weapons charge for illegal guns,
but there was no direct evidence tying him to the
title in all capsules. He was held and interrogated multiple times,
but he never confessed, nor was he charged with the poisonings.
Roger Arnold's story took a bizarre and tragic turn. Oh
(23:24):
The intense scrutiny made him resent the man who tipped
off police Marty. Don't forget me Martina. In the summer
of nineteen eighty three, Arnold snapped. He went looking for
the bar owner, Marty Sinclair to exact revenge. But in
the case of mistaken identity, oh my god, Arnold shot
(23:46):
and killed an innocent man named John Stanisha, whom he
mistook for Sinclair. Stanisha was a random victim of Arnold's rage,
and he had no connection to Thailanol at all. Arnold
was convicted of that murder in January of nineteen eighty
(24:07):
four and sentenced to thirty years. He served fifteen years
in prison. In a prison interview, Arnold expressed remorse for
killing the wrong person and spoke of choices he could
have made differently. Importantly, even after all of that, the
Tailanhol Task Force still harbored suspicions about Arnold. In twenty ten,
(24:29):
after Arnold had died, so he had died in two
thousand and eight, investigators actually exhumed his body to obtain
a DNA sample from his remains. Jesus, They compared Arnold's
DNA to the DNA found on the bottles. Remember I
said it was like sweat or something yea or saliva.
Speaker 2 (24:52):
He was crying in the aisle.
Speaker 1 (24:55):
It was not a match.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
Oh shit.
Speaker 1 (24:58):
So that conclusively ruled him out.
Speaker 2 (25:02):
Now, what about Lewis? Did they do the DNA test
on him as well.
Speaker 1 (25:05):
You know, it didn't say that.
Speaker 2 (25:07):
That just dawned on me.
Speaker 1 (25:08):
So but why wouldn't they right, But then if they did,
that would have just ruled them out. So who the
hell knows? So anyway, he's now supposed to be ruled out.
Most officials now believe that Roger Arnold was not the
tilan All killer either, just an unstable man who talked
too much and tragically committed a different murder now here
(25:29):
is an interesting one. A woman. Oh oh, Laurie Dan.
Laurie Dan was a woman. Years later, in nineteen eighty eight,
she poisoned several people and shot children in a school
in a Chicago suburb. What Because she had a pattern
of poisoning refreshments she gave to people, some wondered if
(25:52):
she could have been the tailn All killer back in
eighty two. However, in nineteen eighty two, Laurie Dan, who
was then known as Laurie Wasserman, was only twenty five
and not known to be violent yet yet, right.
Speaker 2 (26:11):
I mean, it has to start somewhere, you know what
I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (26:13):
Well, it does no evidence linking her to the tail
in All case that they had, and she later died
in nineteen eighty eight after her own crime spree took place.
So that remains just kind of like an internet rumor. Yeah,
there is one more wild lead. In twenty and eleven,
(26:34):
the FBI actually requested DNA from Ted Kazinski.
Speaker 2 (26:42):
The freaking Oklahoma City bomber.
Speaker 1 (26:45):
The unibomber.
Speaker 2 (26:46):
Yees, he may not be Oklahoma City. I might be
wrong about that.
Speaker 1 (26:50):
Well, it says he was the notorious unibomber.
Speaker 2 (26:53):
Wasn't that Oklahoma City?
Speaker 4 (26:56):
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (26:56):
Look, no, I swore that's what he bombed. Shit, I'm wrong.
The Oklahoma City bombing was Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols.
I was completely off. I don't know why. And I
could see him, I can. Do you remember what tegaz
inc He looks like, oh, very like Rofo and unkept,
(27:16):
like in his you know, wild world cabin in the world.
Speaker 1 (27:24):
Well, so anyway, they did request DNA from him, and
because it's like, well, why him, Well, I guess. Kazinski's
early bombings in the late nineteen seventies happened in the
Chicago area, and he occasionally stayed at his parents' home
in Lombard, Illinois. The same town where Mary McFarlane worked
during nineteen eighty two. Some in the task force thought
(27:45):
the tailand All murders could be an act of domestic terror,
sort of like what the Unibomber's methods were for random
targets to basically just cause a bunch of fear. However,
Kazinski denied having any cyanide or involvement, and there's no
solid evidence tying him to it.
Speaker 2 (28:01):
Having any cyanide.
Speaker 4 (28:05):
So funny, Okay, The FBI likely was being thorough due
to just recent advances in forensic technology.
Speaker 1 (28:17):
I guess that would be a kind of exciting thing,
like all of a sudden, you have the ability to
like take DNA that you've got and take DNA from
somebody who you think and like see like is it
or isn't it true? I feel like that would be
exciting because it's like, hey, you come over here, taste this.
That's a Golden Girls quote, all right. But it appears
(28:41):
that Kazinski's DNA also did not match anything in the
Tail and All killer evidence, so he was never officially
a prime suspect, but at least we know he was checked.
Speaker 2 (28:56):
Absolutely.
Speaker 1 (28:58):
So the original Tailanol task force was one of the
largest ever assembled in Illinois, but by the mid nineteen eighties,
with no charges filed, it eventually wound down. However, the
case had never been truly cold, so in two thousand
and seven, authorities formally reopened the case with a fresh
task force, including the FBI, Illinois State Police, and the
(29:21):
affected local departments. They digitized all of the old case files,
which they had boxes and boxes of at this point,
They reinterviewed witnesses with modern techniques, whatever the hell that means,
and submitted evidence for new forensic tests. This led to
the DNA comparisons we mentioned, Like I said, when they
(29:43):
oh it does say that they tested Arnold and Lewis,
Oh okay, and that both that happened both in twenty ten.
So like we said, there was no profile match.
Speaker 2 (29:55):
Well, so then, yeah, Lewis was solidly ruled out. It
wasn't just that they didn't have anything and then he.
Speaker 1 (30:00):
They wanted them, Was that right? So the re nude
efforts also saw searches like the one in two thousand
and nine. I think I thought you were literally just leaving.
Where are you off to? I was like, I thought,
I saw tell you put down her mic pick up
(30:22):
her little bag. I thought, I guess we're done here,
but I'm not quite done here, so I threw you
for a loop, like I said. In two thousand and nine,
that's when they went into James Lewis's home in Cambridge
to like grab some stuff and see if they could
(30:42):
pin anything on them. So the agencies computers and documents,
but apparently they found nothing conclusive. Then in twenty twenty two,
on the fortieth anniversary, Local Chicago News reported that multiple
agencies continue to work on the case, meaning that it's
still an active, open investigation. So investigators often say they
just need one piece of in convertible evidence or a
(31:07):
confession to finally solve it. Well, they got a confession already, is.
Speaker 2 (31:11):
Ish, and I mean they need a freaking DNA match.
Speaker 1 (31:15):
So there have been individuals who again falsely confessed over
the years, but they are always proven to be liars. Liar, liar,
pants on fire, that fat fat water rat fishing bullets
in your hat. So each time it stoked a brief
media frenzy and then it was like, eh, false alarm everybody.
(31:39):
So the actual killer, to our knowledge, has never come forward,
So whether out of fear or maybe they just died, right,
or maybe they're just sitting around thinking, well, I got
away with it, everybody.
Speaker 2 (31:53):
That's insane.
Speaker 1 (31:54):
I'm just saying insane.
Speaker 2 (31:57):
Clearly they got away with it. Whether it's clearly now
passed away or not, it's just insane to me. Ow,
I just broke my hip.
Speaker 1 (32:10):
So, like I said, back to Johnson and Johnson, the
public authorities, they moved quickly when this happened, like they
were trying to protect the consumers and stuff. So, and
I mentioned this earlier, their response in nineteen eighty two
that actually went down as a legendary example of corporate responsibility,
like under fire. So what they did was they did
(32:36):
an immediate recall and then they had those open communications
with like the media, and it was just like people
were using this as such a good example of like
how to take measures to restore public trust. I didn't
freaking know Johnson and Johnson ever had this happen. So
they obviously did a good job.
Speaker 2 (32:57):
Johnson Johnson has dipped through the years.
Speaker 1 (33:02):
Dipped.
Speaker 2 (33:03):
Yeah, what do you mean with their products?
Speaker 1 (33:06):
And like, aren't they the baby powdered people? Or am
I they sure are? Yeah? I like baby powder.
Speaker 2 (33:11):
It's very harmful. Their ingredients and their products. They've come
under like a lot of scrutiny. Not back then.
Speaker 1 (33:19):
I used to take their baby powder, like when I
was little, and I would just throw it up in
the air like it was pixie dust. I think probably
like from Peter pan Oh. I was going to say, like,
what would have I thought you got the chills?
Speaker 2 (33:33):
No, not too worthy? What would happened to it? Then
somebody would have to vacuum it up?
Speaker 1 (33:39):
I'm assuming my parents. I think I would do it
in their room mostly. I don't know why.
Speaker 2 (33:46):
They're such patient people.
Speaker 1 (33:47):
Mm hmm, All right, well then I guess Johnson and
Johnson shitty right comparison to what Tally is saying. I
don't know. I wasn't I wasn't aware of this. I mean,
I'm tell me what you're trying to say, and hopefully
we don't get sued.
Speaker 2 (34:05):
I know that they have really harmful ingredients, which I mean,
so did them and everybody else exactly. I think they
really came over like a ton of screwtiny. I think
even they've had products pulled because of it. Like I
don't think you can get the baby lotion anymore, can't.
Speaker 1 (34:20):
You the baby powder, not the powder.
Speaker 2 (34:25):
You were very stuck on the pattern. Think they make them?
Speaker 1 (34:27):
Do you mean baby oil?
Speaker 2 (34:29):
No, well they make that too, so yeah, maybe they
pulled that. But I'm talking those like bottles of the
pink lotion. I guess it is or cream or something
baby lotion, Isn't it called that they had it? They
had like purple and pink. I think yellow was I
(34:50):
don't wear.
Speaker 1 (34:51):
All right, Well, well let's just talk about them back then, fine,
all right, great. As soon as it became apparent that
there was cyanide laced tailanol capsules and that they were
killing people, right, they go into emergency mode. So they
famously put customer safety first, and on September thirtieth, within
(35:13):
hours of confirming this, the company alerted the doctors, the hospitals,
the distributors nationwide. They stopped selling or using tailanol capsules.
They halted all advertising for thailanol. So and thailanol was
a top product, so they yanked all ads, no commercials, nothing.
They also dispatched teams to assist investigators and to start
(35:35):
figuring out which lots were affected. Initially, as mentioned, they
started to recall that one lot number MC two eight
eight zero in the Chicago area, but as more tampered
bottles were found from other lots, the company made a
dramatic and pretty costly decision. There was a nationwide where
(35:55):
recall of all tailanol capsules on October fifth, nineteen eighty two.
Johnson and Johnson approximately pulled how many millions do you
think of dollars? No bottles? Oh shit, like nationwide they're
pulling blank amount of bottles off the shelves. Two million,
(36:19):
thirty one million. Wow, So that cost them over one
hundred million dollars in nineteen eighty.
Speaker 2 (36:28):
Of the loss, yeah, gone wasted product gonzo, which is
had to be just such like just killed them because
you know the majority of those bottles were not affected.
Speaker 1 (36:40):
Oh hell yeah. So at that time it was the
largest consumer product recall in US history. And like I said,
then they actually started to take out ads and make
public statements saying don't take any of our tile at all.
Speaker 2 (36:55):
Which costs them money, you know what I mean, Like
they're losing money, and then they're spending more money for
those messages going out those alerts.
Speaker 1 (37:05):
Now, they did offer to exchange the capsules already purchased
for tailanyl tablets because those were solid pills and they
were considered safe. I'd say no Ethan thanks so Johnson
and Johnson's chairman, James Burke. He went on television talk shows,
he went on news programs. He expressed sympathy for the
(37:26):
victims' families and to assure the public that the company
was doing everything possible to prevent further harm. They also
fully cooperated with law enforcement. They offered a one hundred
thousand dollars reward for information leading to the capture of
the poisoner, and of course, when money's involved, a lot
of tips came in, but again nothing and so in
(37:48):
the Chicago area, people started to lose all trust in
over the counter medicines. So people returned tilan All bottles
and stores in droves, which oh yeah. Pharmacies reported that
sales of tailan All went basically to zero overnight. Hospitals
(38:08):
switched to alternative pain relievers for patients. Other companies that
made similar capsule medicines, like etcedrin advil, they also saw
dips in sales. As consumers said, I don't think so.
Speaker 2 (38:22):
They were lately they were cautious, right, more than cautious.
Speaker 1 (38:26):
The media's coverage was very extensive, and sometimes it was
almost too effective in spreading fear because there were reports
of people dumping medicine down their toilets. They were supposed
to do that, they refused, Well could you You're basically
you could be putting cyanide right back into the whatever. Right.
(38:48):
They refused to buy anything that wasn't sealed, and they
even started to avoid grocery products that the packaging looked
to be tampered. So, I mean not good. They were weary.
So then though, Johnson and Johnson had to rebuild, like
how do they get tilan al back? How do we
(39:09):
go back up? Because many experts at the time were like,
tilan All's done, Like you ain't ever bringing this back now? Quick, quick,
quick question for you. Here's a quick question. Yeah, what
is your go to pain reliever?
Speaker 2 (39:28):
I love a nice sadvill.
Speaker 1 (39:29):
Yeah, that's my favorite.
Speaker 2 (39:31):
Yeah. I try to not take it though, like and
I almost always if I have a headache, Yes, it
can be stress related, but I pretty much always assume
it's my water intake.
Speaker 1 (39:43):
I know, you play a game of chicken with your headache,
right and you never win?
Speaker 2 (39:48):
That's not true.
Speaker 1 (39:50):
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (39:51):
You need to just guzzle and hope for the best.
And I think sometimes more effort needs to put in
be put into to turn that corner. But I start
to feel like I have the flu.
Speaker 1 (40:05):
I tried Etceterrin ones did nothing. And that's the one
with that girl from the Handmaid's Tail. Oh, I know
she's the commercial girl.
Speaker 2 (40:13):
I was gonna say when you were talking about Thailand
All commercials, that was her name, Elizabeth Moss. Yes, I
was gonna say, I've never seen a commercial for pain reliever,
but you're seeing them for Etceterron.
Speaker 1 (40:26):
Well, this is also like twenty five years ago.
Speaker 2 (40:30):
You remember that, yea, the Excedrin commercial.
Speaker 1 (40:33):
I think it was black and white. If I'm not mistaken,
you had to hear. I'll look it up later.
Speaker 2 (40:38):
Wow, how do you remember that?
Speaker 1 (40:39):
I don't know. So, like I said, people were thinking
this is never coming back. But within a year, tiland
All was back on the top of the pain reliever market,
thanks largely to how Johnson and Johnson did that. They
reintroduced tailand all capsules and new tamper evident packaging with
(41:02):
heavy emphasis on safety. So they started to have safety
seals on all medicine bottles or food and I mean,
now it's universal. So what they instituted was by nineteen
eighty three, they were selling tailnl and other things in
packages with shrink wrapped plastic seals around the bottle, foil
(41:25):
safety seals over the bottle mouth, and even glued sealed boxes.
So they were all like little extra layers of protection. Yeah,
So obviously people have, like not only law enforcement, but
a bunch of people have looked into this and like
(41:49):
made docuseries about it. And as I said, that's when
I came across the one on Netflix. So in May
twenty twenty five, Netflix released the documentary called Cold Case
the Murders, which brought this story to an even wider audience,
including the Chilworthy audience. So this docuseries featured old footage
(42:11):
and interviews, including interviews with James Lewis because he was
alive during the filming he wanted to clear his name
and with law enforcement. The fact that Netflix put out
in twenty twenty five, like this documentary just shows that
there's still like a lot of public interest in it.
Speaker 2 (42:29):
Well, and I feel like not knowing who did it
is those sorts of circumstances always keep those cases like,
you know, just very interesting topics for people. Yeah, they're
just most likely always going to be unsolved.
Speaker 1 (42:43):
So in conclusion to this, the Thailand all murders basically
changed like the public's relationship with buying consumer products. So
although it was horrible, it did lead to safer packaging,
and it led to laws that likely did prevent similar
crimes or at least, like at the very least made
(43:04):
them more difficult to do. It also taught corporate America
like lessons in handling crisises like this. So this remains
a go to case in discussions about unsolved crimes. It
usually gets mentioned alongside cases like the Zodiac Killer or
Jack the Ripper in terms of notoriety. So you know,
(43:29):
it's just it's like still very I guess highly talked about.
Speaker 2 (43:34):
There was a case recently and it was a teenager,
if I'm not mistaken, that was tampering with meds. I'm
almost certain.
Speaker 1 (43:41):
Well, well you're looking that up. The seven victims, like
I said, Mary Kellerman, Adam Janice Stanley, Janis, Theresa Janis,
Mary Reiner, Mary McFarlane, and Paula Prince. You know, their
deaths were not in vain at least in the sense
that all of these changes implemented afterwards. I am sure
must have saved a bunch of people like from this
(44:04):
happening again, so, you know, and it's just unfortunate that
they never fully got the justice that they deserved because
nobody was ever actually found to you know, like who
did it. But as of twenty twenty five, the Tailant
All murder case remains open, unsolved, and just as chillworthy
as ever.
Speaker 2 (44:22):
May all of the victims rest in peace.
Speaker 1 (44:27):
So did you find anything?
Speaker 2 (44:28):
No, And I'm almost certain it was with teenagers, but
nothing even comes up when I google, you know a
few keywords. But that's going to drive me nuts. I
don't know.
Speaker 1 (44:44):
Well, you can let us know next time if you
find it.
Speaker 2 (44:47):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (44:49):
So that is the conclusion of part two of the
Thailant All Murders. Thank you everybody for tuning back, Thank
you telling you for not leaving mid show.
Speaker 2 (45:04):
Absolutely I remained seated, ish you did.
Speaker 1 (45:08):
Get up a little bit. But so all right, everybody,
we will catch you then in next week episode. I'm
not even you know what, I'm not even editing that out.
We will catch you a next week episode, you know,
when I believe Talia will be presenting. She told me,
(45:29):
I will a little Birdie told me, and by that
I mean tell you so until then, everybody stay safe
and stay chill.
Speaker 2 (45:38):
Bye everybody, All right, bye everyone.
Speaker 1 (45:44):
You've just listened to Chilworthy. Thank you for joining us
on this latest episode. While we strive to keep our
discussions engaging and lighthearted, we also wanted to take a
moment to acknowledge the real lives and events that are
at the heart of these stories.
Speaker 2 (45:58):
We try to approach each topic with a sense of
curiosity and respect fully, aware of the impact these events
have had on the individuals and their reloved ones. Our
goal is to honor their memories by keeping their stories
alive and shedding light on the mysteries that surround them.
Speaker 1 (46:14):
If you enjoyed this episode, please remember to subscribe, rate,
and leave a review, and don't forget to join us
on the next episode of Chilworthy.
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