After 23 years and five governors, former death row inmate Randy Steidl had pretty much abandoned his long-sought goal of obtaining a gubernatorial pardon based on “innocence.”
exchange for leniency. police now had enough to arrest steidl and whitlock. i think the brutal nature of the slayings, the fact that it was a double homicide, the other aggravating factors that our office will likely seek the death penalty. both herb whitlock, age 41, and randy steidl, age 35, had histories of petty crime. news of their arrests reached steidl s brother rory, an illinois state trooper. randy, he drank. be in a bar setting. if he got angry or someone started something, there was a crowd and consequently there would be problems. my master sergeant called me and said, your brother s been arrested for double murder. in my mind, the illinois state police were involved in the investigation. number one, he s got to be guilty. number two, he s going to face the death penalty. and number three, a jury in east central illinois, they re going
we re able to go through and view all of the police reports that included polygraph reports that had never been disclosed to us. a polygraph report where darrell herrington had failed the polygraph. but if reinboldt and herrington were lying, why had both of them fingered steidl and whitelock for the crime? randy thought he knew. two weeks before dike and karen were murdered, herb whitlock and myself had went to the fbi about prosecutor mike mcfatridge. they believed the state s attorney mike mcfatridge was unfairly targeting them for drug deals they had nothing to do with. and they provided information about the state s attorney. and the allegation they made to the fbi was that he was protecting drug dealers and gambling in paris, illinois. it was common knowledge to see the prosecutor out in bars every night, loaded. be up the next morning, he s in court prosecuting somebody for the same offense.