deepest wounds were 63/8 inches. there was a hilt on the knife. there would have been hilt marks for it to go 6 3/8 inches. i felt like wow i had this evidence that these two men were innocent. they re going to finally be freed. we re going to be able to actually conduct an investigation and try and find out who the real killers are. randy s incarceration had torn his family apart. randy s brother, state trooper rory steidl, believed randy was guilty. randy s mother wanted to see for herself, so she visited him behind bars. you see your mother s eyes, tears streaming down her cheeks. sits down. she said, you look at me right now. did you have anything to do with this at all? i looked her right in her eyes. and i said, mom, i ve done some bad things in my life, but i ve never done anything like this. you know i m not capable of
why risk all the turmoil? just turn your back to it. as long as you re not the one doing it. in 2008, mike callahan s $700,000 award was officially overturned. knowing that i m free to walk out that door anywhere i want to go, that gave me a lot of peace. i think it s supposed to be 80 today. randy puts a lot of value on our family and on family relationships. and i m glad that he s able to enjoy his life now and that i m a part of it. the reason i m here today are the people that would stand up
we gotta go. juicer! we don t have a juicer! the volkswagen tiguan. it fits everything you need, and everything you don t. randy steidl had spent almost 12 years on death row while his attorney, michael metnick, filed appeals in his case. one of metnick s main arguments was that randy s original trial attorney had been ineffective. i could best describe john muller as being a real estate attorney on monday and car
by 2001, the illinois courts had repeatedly declined to give randy a new trial. randy s last chance at freedom would now come at the federal level. it is the court of last resort. after 15 years of state court findings, most federal judges assume that those state court findings are correct. judge mike mccuskey would oversee the case, a veteran of the bench, mccuskey had never granted a petition for a new trial. you would think year after year, is somebody going to come with a case that you can look at and say this case was decided wrongly? you always wonder, if 100% of all your cases are going one way, are you looking at them correctly? fortunately, randy got the fresh eyes of a federal judge that was not connected to the prosecution in paris, illinois. was not beholden to the cops in paris.
i don t want you to die. i went up there to try to save my brother s life. randy steidl went on trial for the murders of dyke and karen rhoads in 1987. the prosecution s case was that randy and herbie were dealing drugs to dyke rhoads and that dyke owed herbie money for a drug debt that he hadn t paid. prosecutors focused special attention on the testimony of eyewitnesses darrell herrington they knew certain things in our minds that were things the town drunk wouldn t know. and debbie reinboldt who described seeing them stab the rhoads to death. she also described a broken lamp she saw in the rhoads bedroom. the prosecutor in his closing argument made repeated references to the lamp to