Half a year after the shocking deaths of seven Chicago-area residents from cyanide-laced Tylenol capsules, Illinois State Police investigator Richard Tetyk wrote up his nine-page synopsis of the exhaustive probe. Authorities had narrowed their search to three suspects, but the investigation essentially had stalled.
CHICAGO - Half a year after the shocking deaths of seven Chicago-area residents from cyanide-laced Tylenol capsules, Illinois State Police investigator Richard Tetyk wrote up his nine-page synopsis of the exhaustive probe. Authorities had narrowed their search to three suspects, but the investigation essentially had stalled.
One suspect, according to the report obtained by the Tribune, was a brilliant but mentally disturbed man "prone to violence'' who lived in Lombard, Ill., and had indicated to a friend he was responsible for the killings -- something he later denied to investigators.
A second suspect worked at a Jewel warehouse in Melrose Park, where he reportedly told his supervisor he was "mad at people and wanted to throw acid at them or poison them,'' Tetyk wrote. Police searched the man's apartment and found test tubes, beakers, "left-wing literature'' and a book entitled "The Poor Man's James Bond,'' which on pages 20 to 22 outlined how to make potassium cyanide. But when investigators followed the book's instructions, they found the cyanide was unlike the poison in the capsules used in the Tylenol murders, the synopsis stated.
That left a third suspect, James William Lewis, who flashed onto investigators' radar screens in October 1982 after he wrote an extortion letter to the maker of Tylenol. In the letter, Lewis demanded $1 million to stop the killings. "The writer,'' Tetyk wrote, "virtually admitted the Tylenol killings.''
Tetyk's report provides a snapshot of a massive investigation that fell dormant for years but suddenly has received new life. Publicity over the 25th anniversary of one of the nation's most notorious unsolved crimes and Lewis' arrest in 2004 on charges he drugged a woman sparked renewed interest from law enforcement officials investigating the 1982 murders. No one has been charged.
Last week, investigators searched Lewis' home and a storage locker in Cambridge, Mass., removing boxes of records and belongings looking for possible connections to the crimes. Authorities are looking for souvenirs from the crimes and checking Lewis' computer for potentially incriminating information, a source said. The FBI also is trying to determine whether scientific advances in DNA technology could help crack the case.
Lewis, 62, could not be reached for comment last week, but over the years has steadfastly maintained his innocence, not only in the Tylenol murders case but also in a long history of violent crime allegations across the country.
Lewis' troubles began early in his life. In the 1960s, he was treated at a psychiatric facility after reportedly chasing his mother with an ax, attacking his stepfather and then trying to commit suicide by taking 36 headache tablets.
In Kansas City, Mo., in the early 1970s, Lewis opened a tax preparation business -- what his lawyer called a "mom-and-pop H&R Block.'' It was there that he met Raymond West, a client.
In the summer of 1978, Lewis was accused of murdering and dismembering West, whose decomposed body was found in the attic of his home. Lewis became a suspect after he tried to cash a $5,000 check he claimed West had given him. Police searched his home and car and found rope they said matched rope found at the scene. They thought Lewis used the rope and a pulley to hoist West's body into the attic, according to the prosecutor and defense lawyer on the case.
"I'm flat-out convinced that he murdered Raymond West,'' James Bell, the prosecutor then but now a lawyer in private practice, said in an interview. "We had a winnable case.''
CHICAGO - Half a year after the shocking deaths of seven Chicago-area residents from cyanide-laced Tylenol capsules, Illinois State Police investigator Richard Tetyk wrote up his nine-page synopsis of the exhaustive probe. Authorities had narrowed their search to three suspects, but the investigation essentially had stalled.
One suspect, according to the report obtained by the Tribune, was a brilliant but mentally disturbed man "prone to violence'' who lived in Lombard, Ill., and had indicated to a friend he was responsible for the killings -- something he later denied to investigators.
A second suspect worked at a Jewel warehouse in Melrose Park, where he reportedly told his supervisor he was "mad at people and wanted to throw acid at them or poison them,'' Tetyk wrote. Police searched the man's apartment and found test tubes, beakers, "left-wing literature'' and a book entitled "The Poor Man's James Bond,'' which on pages 20 to 22 outlined how to make potassium cyanide. But when investigators followed the book's instructions, they found the cyanide was unlike the poison in the capsules used in the Tylenol murders, the synopsis stated.
That left a third suspect, James William Lewis, who flashed onto investigators' radar screens in October 1982 after he wrote an extortion letter to the maker of Tylenol. In the letter, Lewis demanded $1 million to stop the killings. "The writer,'' Tetyk wrote, "virtually admitted the Tylenol killings.''
Tetyk's report provides a snapshot of a massive investigation that fell dormant for years but suddenly has received new life. Publicity over the 25th anniversary of one of the nation's most notorious unsolved crimes and Lewis' arrest in 2004 on charges he drugged a woman sparked renewed interest from law enforcement officials investigating the 1982 murders. No one has been charged.
Last week, investigators searched Lewis' home and a storage locker in Cambridge, Mass., removing boxes of records and belongings looking for possible connections to the crimes. Authorities are looking for souvenirs from the crimes and checking Lewis' computer for potentially incriminating information, a source said. The FBI also is trying to determine whether scientific advances in DNA technology could help crack the case.
Lewis, 62, could not be reached for comment last week, but over the years has steadfastly maintained his innocence, not only in the Tylenol murders case but also in a long history of violent crime allegations across the country.
Lewis' troubles began early in his life. In the 1960s, he was treated at a psychiatric facility after reportedly chasing his mother with an ax, attacking his stepfather and then trying to commit suicide by taking 36 headache tablets.
In Kansas City, Mo., in the early 1970s, Lewis opened a tax preparation business -- what his lawyer called a "mom-and-pop H&R Block.'' It was there that he met Raymond West, a client.
In the summer of 1978, Lewis was accused of murdering and dismembering West, whose decomposed body was found in the attic of his home. Lewis became a suspect after he tried to cash a $5,000 check he claimed West had given him. Police searched his home and car and found rope they said matched rope found at the scene. They thought Lewis used the rope and a pulley to hoist West's body into the attic, according to the prosecutor and defense lawyer on the case.
"I'm flat-out convinced that he murdered Raymond West,'' James Bell, the prosecutor then but now a lawyer in private practice, said in an interview. "We had a winnable case.''
But Bell was forced to dismiss the charges against Lewis after a judge threw out most of the evidence, as well as statements Lewis made to police. The judge found that officers did not have probable cause to take Lewis into custody or to search his home and his car.
Lewis' attorney, Albert Riederer, never believed Lewis was guilty. Although the statements to police contained incriminating details, he said, a cause of death was never established and West was elderly and sick, making a natural death plausible.
"His eccentricities made it a little difficult for him to get along like most people,'' Riederer, who later was a prosecutor in Kansas City, said of Lewis. "He probably wasn't as smart as he thought he was.''
Several years later, Lewis was convicted of fraud in Kansas City for filing tax returns using the names of dead people and having refund checks sent to rural mailboxes. He would pound the mailboxes into the ground and collect the refund checks, then pack up the mailboxes, said Jeremy Margolis, a former assistant U.S. attorney in Chicago who later prosecuted Lewis for extortion in the Tylenol case.
Lewis served more than 12 years for the Tylenol extortion and the Kansas City fraud. When he was released from federal prison in 1995, he joined his wife in the Boston area, where he took up photography and painting. He became friends with a woman who lived on his floor in a modest complex of condominiums and they started a Web site design business together, court records stated.
But their friendship soured. One morning in July 2004, as she walked down the hall, Lewis allegedly approached her and sprayed a burning substance in her eyes. He pushed her into his apartment and, for the next 24 hours, held her there, court records show. He allegedly tied her up on his bed and forced liquids into her mouth, causing her to lose consciousness. Testing showed traces of ethanol and acetone in her system, the records stated.
The alleged drugging by Lewis recently piqued the interest of investigators who saw a possible parallel with the use of cyanide in the Tylenol murders.
Police charged Lewis with rape and kidnapping, but he insisted he was innocent. After Lewis spent about 3 years in jail, prosecutors dropped the charges on the eve of trial when the victim refused to testify.
In a 2007 interview with a local journalist named Neil McCabe, Lewis said he had been wrongly accused all his life. He called the extortion letter he wrote a youthful indiscretion. To McCabe, Lewis came off as angry at the government, a man who held grudges for decades. He was angry, too, that police in Chicago had focused so much on him as the Tylenol killer, McCabe said in an interview.
That, he told McCabe, led police to ignore more likely suspects.
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