(WBBM NEWSRADIO) — Microbiologist Michael Petros can remember what he was doing 40 years ago, at the close of September 1982. He was in a city lab beneath Daley Plaza, opening bottles of Extra Strength Tylenol and examining the contents of each capsule.
Looking for cyanide.
“It was like working in the factory,” recalls Petros, 71, now a clinical assistant professor at the University of Illinois-Chicago. “You’re sitting shoulder to shoulder with your colleagues, pulling capsules apart. It was very, very unusual.”
Normally, his lab processed blood tests for marriage-license applicants or examined dead animals suspected of rabies. When seven Chicago area residents died after consuming tainted pain medication, dozens of staff members switched gears for a few frenzied days and helped screen an avalanche of discarded Tylenol.
It was simple matter of eyeballing the substances emptied from each pill, Petros recalls. Acetaminophen, Tylenol’s active ingredient, was white powder, while potassium cyanide was crystal.
During the effort in his lab, probable cyanide was detected in the contents of at least one bottle, he said. The evidence was turned over to police.
“There was no thought at the time as to what chemical terrorism might be. It just wasn't on the radar,” says Petros, who authored an article earlier this year about his experience.
The first victim — Mary Kellerman, a 12-year-old Elk Grove Village girl who complained of cold-like symptoms — fell the morning of Sept. 29, followed by a trio of adults in Arlington Heights: 27-year-old postal worker Adam Janus and his brother and sister-in-law, Stanley (25) and Theresa Janus (19). The newlyweds were at the home of Adam Janus after his abrupt death and, feeling stressed, took Tylenol from the same bottle.
Medical professionals determined the source of the poisonings within hours. Their stunning conclusion was that someone had added cyanide to Extra-Strength Tylenol to kill unsuspecting buyers.
This was before the Internet. The public learned about the unthinkable crime through news reports and old-school word of mouth. Emergency vehicles even rolled down residential streets, using PA systems to urge people not to take Tylenol.
Arlington Heights Police Sgt. Joe Murphy was a child at the time. Today, his northwest suburban police department is considered the lead municipal law enforcement agency in the unsolved case. He said his department works with police in other communities where victims died, while the FBI remains custodian of case records and physical evidence.
Officials won’t disclose details, but presumably there is DNA or fingerprint evidence — or, the potential for DNA or fingerprint evidence — that one day could be compared with a suspect to establish a match.
“We all have positive attitudes about this case,” Murphy said. “There’s been a dramatic increase in cold cases being solved in recent history, and I think some of that is thanks to the new forensic technology out there. So, we’re going to keep moving forward with the best intentions and hopes.”
Tips continue to come in, he says. “There are varying kinds of tips. It runs the gamut from potential suspects to theories and things along those lines. And they’re all being investigated.”
In his 1999 memoir Anatomy of Motive, retired FBI profiler John Douglas surmised the Tylenol killer was a grudge-holding “depressed, nocturnal loner" in his late 20s to early 30s who “constantly thinks about killing” but could not do it in person.
Douglas said some traits in the profile fit James Lewis, a suspect who left Chicago shortly before the seven deaths. Lewis served time in federal prison for writing an extortion letter to Tylenol manufacturer Johnson & Johnson, but he was never charged in the killings and has denied he was behind them. Lewis and his wife reportedly submitted court-ordered DNA and fingerprint samples to investigators in 2010.
At the time of the murders, bottles of Tylenol simply had a pop top with a wad of cotton inside. Over-the-counter medications — and U.S. consumer products in general — rapidly underwent packaging redesigns to become tamper-resistant.
Today, consumers can encounter a variety of protective barriers, including glued box tops, foil seals, metal “bubble-top” lids and perforated shrink bands when they try to open many types of goods from retail stores. If there is a silver lining of any kind in the Tylenol murders, it's that everyone is measurably safer, observers say.
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“I was shopping a couple of weeks ago and picked up a box of yogurt bars. When I got to the counter, the box was open,” says Tom Mockaitis, a DuPaul University history professor and expert on terrorism. “It could have easily popped open when I put it in the cart. Each of the individual bars was wrapped. But I did think about it.”
He was teaching in the western suburbs in 1982 and remembers the dread and fear the killings generated nationwide.
Mockaitis downplays the idea that terrorism was behind the murders because no political or ideological motive was ever conveyed publicly. He says "lone wolf" attack is probably a more appropriate characterization.
“He was targeting the world — it could be young, old, rich or poor, it didn’t make any difference,” John “Bulldog” Drummond, the legendary former WBBM-TV crime reporter, says today. “Whoever’s responsible for this obviously had to be very sick, but he also had to be very evil and crafty to kill innocent people like that.”
Also killed 40 years ago this week were United Airlines flight attendant Paula Prince, 35, of Chicago; Mary McFarland, a 31-year-old single mother from Elmhurst who collapsed at her Lombard office; and 27-year-old Mary Reiner of Winfield, who recently had given birth to her fourth child and was feeling discomfort.
Time may have dulled the edges of the Tylenol murders for most people old enough to remember them. But not for everyone, says Murphy, the Arlington Heights police sergeant.
“I can tell you after speaking to some of the families, there’s definitely still anguish and hurt over these homicides,” he said. “They are still affected, and it’s very obvious when you talk to them.”
Contributing: WBBM Newsradio's Mai Martinez
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