Thursday, May 19, 2011

Unabomber Does Not Fit Tylenol Murderer's Profile

I'm highly skeptical about today's news re:  the FBI seeking DNA samples from Ted Kaczynski, possibly connecting him to the unsolved Tylenol poisoning murders in 1982. Here's why...


1. Motive and modus operandi. The Unabomber targeted his victims, basing his actions on his own twisted moral code. The Tylenol killer's victims were the definition of random.

2. DNA revelations. Investigators have long said that they had no biological evidence connecting anyone to the crime. Has DNA technology advanced enough to uncover new evidence? The lack of specificity is troubling.

3. Does this mean James Lewis is no longer a suspect? Over the past few years, the FBI has raided the Cambridge, MA home of long-time suspect James Lewis, seizing computers and other materials. Later, Lewis, too, was asked to provide DNA samples. Yet nothing has come of any of that. And all court records related to those searches and seizures have been kept under seal by the courts. Or at least that was the case when I attempted to obtain the text of the search warrants issued.

4. How does this connect with the OTHER unsolved Tylenol murder? Investigators maintain their "one-guy" theory about the Chicago case. That someone took possession of capsules via retail stores, replaced the Tylenol with cyanide, then put the tampered Tylenol back on the shelves where it would later be purchased and consumed by unwitting victims. 

What if the tampering occurred somewhere else along the supply chain? Perhaps at the manufacturing facility? That theory received traction in 1986 when a young woman named Diane Elsroth died in Yonkers, New York, after consuming cyanide-laced Tylenol. Additional tampered boxes of Tylenol were discovered on store shelves subsequent to her death. 

It's all a bit strange. Like everything connected to this unsolved mystery.