The Chicago Tylenol Murders

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Discretion is advised. This is ten
minted murder. We hear about crimes and

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murders every day. The wife that
found out her husband was having an affair

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and she shot him. The driver
that get robbed making a delivery in a

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neighborhood known for shady activity. The
man that let his anger get the best

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of him and pulled someone out of
their car in a fit of road rage

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after they cut him off. Every
incident, while terrible, both plays on

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our fears and gives us a false
sense of security. We know what to

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expect in those situations. The who, what, where, and why they

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can all be answered. But what
about when? The why was simply to

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create chaos? What about when the
who, what, when, and where

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didn't make any difference. More than
likely you've watched the Batman movies. The

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Cape Crusader that was able to solve
every crime and figure out the riddles.

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His mental capabilities even exceeded his physical
strength. But even he met a criminal

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he just couldn't make sense of.
In the movie The Dark Night, Alfred,

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who always seemed to know the right
thing to say, no matter the

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circumstances, made an observation, while
bone chilling, It's true, he said,

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some men just want to watch the
world burn. Four decades ago,

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Chicago was rocked by seemingly senseless crimes. The Chicago thailan All murders took place

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in nineteen eighty two. Seven people
died in the area as a result of

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thailan All extra strength gelatine capsules being
laced with potassium cyanide. The first death

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reported was a twelve year old girl. Her parents gave her tailan all because

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she had a sore throat, which
is what most would do. She was

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dead by the next morning. Of
course, no one knew the cause of

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death in that moment. Luckily,
no one else in her house took the

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tailan All before the paramedics got there
and bagged it up. But not every

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family was that fortunate. A twenty
seven year old polster worker took thailan All

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at home, and initially his death
was thought to be a heart attack.

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His brother and sister in law were
distraught. They rushed over to the house

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upon hearing the news, and that
day's events had their heads throbbing. The

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stress of it caused them to have
headaches, so they did what any of

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us would do. They took Taylan
All. They both died. Arlington Heights.

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Only public health official was sent to
the crime scene to look around.

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She found the bottle on the counter
and counted the capsules. There were forty

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four. Six had been taken,
probably two by each of the three victims

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in that house. The bottle made
its way to the Deputy Chief Medical Examiner.

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He immediately noticed that it had an
almond like scent common with cyanide.

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He asked the chief toxicologist to test
the capsules. All forty four capsules tested

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contained fatal amounts of cyanide. Every
single capsule in that bottle was potentially fatal.

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Police watched the graves and the funerals
and hopes that whoever committed the crime

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would show up at one of the
scenes, but no one that raised red

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flags did. The bottles purchased could
not even be linked to a single store.

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The contaminated bottles had been bought from
different businesses. Originally, they thought

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the bottles were all from the same
lot, but soon they realized that they

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were multiple lots involved. A recall
was issued on every bottle of thailan Al

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extra strength gelatine capsules in the Chicago
area. It was one of the largest

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pharmaceutical recalls at the time. Johnson
and Johnson, Thailanall's manufacturer, warned hospitals

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and distributors of the evolving crisis.
They even stopped production of the product until

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more was learned. Then a new
case popped up in California that was a

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long way from the cases they thought
were contained to Chicago. This time,

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the thailand All had STRYCT nine in
it. Johnson and Johnson made the decision

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to recall the product nationwide on October
fifth, nineteen eighty two, and estimated

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thirty one million bottles were in circulation
at the time. The cost of the

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product recall was over one hundred million
dollars equivalent to well over three hundred million

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today. They even did some advertising
to discourage people from consuming the product while

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the source of the poison was being
investigated. Market shares collapsed. The list

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of side effects and warnings on most
medications is alarming, and yet with all

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the negative possibilities, they're promoted,
advertised, and often praised. Maybe they're

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amazing, maybe they're not, but
the manufacturers have no plans to slow down

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productions and sales. Now, obviously, the situation was different since they couldn't

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pinpoint the cause of the poison and
peop were dying. But for Johnson and

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Johnson to actually put out advertising against
their own product it seemed like financial suicide.

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Yet they were praised for their response
to the crisis. Their honesty through

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public relations was something rarely seen.
They demonstrated how a major business could properly

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handle a devastating disaster, and within
a few years they once again held the

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highest market share for over the counter
analgesus in the United States. The investigation

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led to the conclusion that the bottles
had been tampered with after they had already

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been placed on shelves, not during
production. They hypothesized that someone took them

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from the shelves, added potassium cyanide
through the gelatine capsule, and returned them

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to be purchased and consumed by unknown
customers. Now, if someone had been

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trying to buy Thailand all and return
it all over town, someone would have

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noticed and questions would have been asked. So had the person or persons been

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stealing the bottles then casually placing them
back into locations. A man named James

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William Lewis sent a letter to Johnson
and Johnson, claiming responsibility for the deaths

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and demanding a million dollars to stop. He lived in New York City and

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the police couldn't connect him to the
crimes. He was, however, charged

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with extortion and spent some time in
prison. A bar owner named Marty Sinclair

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reported that one of his patrons could
be the suspect. Roger Arnold, frequented

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the bar and had made comments that
led Sinclair to believe that he was guilty

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of the crimes. When the police
searched Arnold's house, they found a book

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called The poor Man's James Bond,
which contained instructions for making potassium cyanide,

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but they didn't find anything linking him
to the actual crime. After the investigation,

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Arnold waited with a gun in hand
for Sinclair. When he stepped out,

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he shot and killed him. Only
it wasn't Sinclair, it was a

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random, innocent man. So both
possible suspects ended up in prison, but

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neither for the crimes the police were
originally investigating. With no one in custody,

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who's to say that the crisis had
ended. Over the next few years,

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hundreds of copycats emerged involving over the
counter medications perhaps all the perpetrators were

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hoping that the original individual would take
the blame for another crime committed. I'm

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sure to them it seemed like a
good plan, But instead, many of

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those murders were solved and quite a
few scorned lovers ended up in prison.

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When thailand All Extra Strength was finally
reintroduced to the market, it was triple

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sealed to prevent tampering. A terrifying
string of events led to reforms and packaging

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over the counter drugs and federal anti
tampering laws. In nineteen eighty three,

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it was made a federal offense to
tamper with products meant for consumption. In

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nineteen eighty nine, new guidelines for
packaging of products meant for consumption were put

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into place. In nineteen ninety one, Johnson and Johnson reached an undisclosed sum

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to be paid out to the family
of the individuals that died in Chicago.

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The agreement was not the business taking
responsibility for the deaths, but rather wanting

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to help the families and encouraging everyone
to put the terrible events behind them.

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In twenty ten, with new DNA
testing methods available, they once again tested

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the DNA from Arnold and Lewis against
the DNA found on the taylan All bottles.

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They were not a match. Not
only was it disappointing that they didn't

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match, but if the person that
committed the crime had ever been convicted of

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another crime, their DNA should be
in the system. So to have the

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DNA on the bottles but never being
able to link it to a person is

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a mystery in itself. Did the
individual never commit another crime or did they

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become more careful with their methods to
not leave any evidence behind. It leaves

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the big question what was the motive
behind the Chicago murders? Was therein intended

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victim and all the other casualties were
just unfortunate mishaps. There's still not a

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definite answer, though it does raise
other questions. How many items are in

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our cabinets, pantries and refrigerators that
could have been tampered with without us even

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knowing. They never did charge anyone
with the crimes. When we think about

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what it takes to get a product
from production to market, there could be

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endless possibilities. The product starts in
a facility, goes through a warehouse and

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packaging, and get shipped and delivered
and stocked and picked up and put down

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by consumers until finally purchased and handed
to a cashier. It makes you stop

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and think that our society must be
extremely trusting in people when we think about

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the amount of hands that have contact
with any given product. Maybe we should

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just hope that most people are good
and honest, because it seems that the

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hands that caused the Chicago tail in
all murders just wanted to spark chaos and

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watch it burn. That's ten minute
Murder for today, brief and bingeable true

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crime. My name is Joe.
I'm the host of this podcast, and

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I really appreciate you taking the time
to listen and stop right now what you're

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doing for a moment. Take a
look at where you're listening to this podcast.

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Are you subscribed? If you're a
brand new listener to ten minute Murder,

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that's cool. Make sure you do
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any future episodes of ten Minute Murder, and it makes it easier to go

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back and listen to previous episodes of
ten Minute Murder. Now. If you're

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an og listener of this podcast and
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to tell you. I hate telling
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you're doing things wrong. Instead of
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to listen to it, if you
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there. Now, some of the
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it easy to find the subscribe button. I'll give you that because it doesn't

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always say subscribe for some reason.
It might say collect or follow or any

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number of things, but something that
kind of means subscribe. Push that button,

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and if you've been listening for a
long time and you're already subscribed,

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I will love you for the rest
of my life. The end, And

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quickly, let me talk about something
that was on my mind during the majority

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of me telling that story. Just
now, what keeps us, us normal

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human beings from doing bad things to
other human beings? Because most of us

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don't necessarily calls harm to other people
intentionally on a day to day basis,

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But why what keeps us from doing
that? For some of us, it's

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religion. For others, it's just
because it's bad karma. For me personally,

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I think I just feel empathetic when
it comes to other people, even

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if you're a piece of trash.
I feel bad that you're a piece of

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trash. And there is a religious
element in there for me, and there's

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also a karma element for me.
And that's where I'm getting to when I'm

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talking about what was going through my
head, this entire story that I was

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telling it, and it's one line
from a song. I was singing the

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whole song in my head, but
one line of it is the reason karma

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is a relaxing thought. And yes, that's a Taylor Swift song, but

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karma is a relaxing thought because if
you believe that karma is a real thing,

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and you actively try to be a
decent person, then karma is a

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relaxing thought. You don't have to
get even with other people. You don't

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have to go out of your way
to ruin someone's day because they harmed you

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in some way. Karma is a
relaxing thought. Okay, now that I'm

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quoting Taylor Swift, I think it's
probably time to end this episode for today.

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Thank you so much for listening to
ten Minute Murder