debbie reinboldt. debbie s testimony was a little bit of a revelation. she was vivid, convincing, and you ve got to remember, in champaign county, i m used to having drug addicts, prostitut s s testify on behalf of the state. those are the people who are present when homicides occur. after a one-week trial, the jury was out for just six and a half hours. i sat down next to my attorney, the judge ordered the jury to come in. i don t see their faces because they re looking at the tops of their shoes, and i know it s not going to be good. your stomach and your heart s in your throat because i m listening for two words, not guilty. and i only hear one word. it doesn t sink in until i hear my mother wailing behind me. i never will forget that. and i realize just then they just convicted me for double
forensically that that lamp had to have been broken by firefighters as they entered the room and after they suppressed the fire, not during the murders. that meant debbie reinboldt s testimony about the lamp had been false. even more troubling were facts callahan learned about the purported murder weapon. the knife that deborah reinboldt presented was a folding knife, where the knife bends over. that knife had a blade of 5 and some inches long. one of the things the pathologist did was measure the depth of the wounds. on both bodies, the wounds were more than 6 inches deep. we then took it to michael baden, a forensic pathologist and he provided us with an affidavit and analysis. what board certifications do you have? three areas of pathology. anatomical pathology,
unknown box of records from the paris police department. 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 whitlock for the crime? randy thought he knew. two weeks before they were murdered, herb whitlock and myself had went to the fbi about prosecutor mike mcfatridge. they believed the state s attorney 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
randy and herbie and randy s vehicle drove to dyke and karen rhoads house the night of the murder, brought darrell herrington with them. asked him to wait in the car. as herrington stayed in the car, steidl and whitlock went to the front door to confront dyke rhoads. darrell herrington said he heard them arguing about money. when they argued, they could get very heated. herrington later heard screams. inside, he discovered the crime scene. what happened when you went in the bedroom, darrel? there was a body laying there. i seen the body on the bed, a female. darrell encountered randy and herbie, bloody, and was told you didn t see this or the same thing will happen to you. but police reports show debbie reinboldt also claimed to have been with steidl and
will be the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth so help you god? i do. proceed. thank you, mrs. reinboldt, my name is michael metnick. and i am the attorney for randy steidl. do you understand that? yes, i do. why is it that you re here today? because there were some things that didn t weren t truthful in the testimonies and were you there? at the rhoads house the night they were killed? no. that s when i was done with the state s case. she was either there or she wasn t. who s she lying to? in either way, she s not credible. why did you mention randy steidl? why did i? yes. at that point? yes. because that s who everybody was saying did it. okay. around the time of reinboldt s recantation, bill clutter obtained a previously