Chester Weger and the Starved Rock Murders

[AmyStrange]

Murder at Starved Rock quoted a memo written by Harland Warren in March of 1960. "1. Notice sheriff and chief. 2. Take handwritten statement, take Dr. look at [before] and after, take photos showing no duress. 3. Take over to [State's Attorney for court reporter] statement. 4. Re-enact crime at scene, movies by Dummett. 5. Take [before] Sexton or Goetsch for arraignment. Take to Kruglik for psycho exam. 7.Take suspect to motel or hotel."

Sexton was a part time police magistrate, and Goetsch was a part time justice of the peace. This memo was written seven months before Chester Weger gave a coerced confession.

I read that book, and even had a good friend get me a signed copy a few years ago. It was interesting to say the least

 

[Chris_Halkides]

You may be thinking of a different book. Jim Ridings is the author, and this book was published very recently. My point was that the memo was eerily similar to how the events went down. Steve Stout's book has a similar title, but it reached a very different conclusion.

 

[AmyStrange]

You may be thinking of a different book. Jim Ridings is the author, and this book was published very recently. My point was that the memo was eerily similar to how the events went down. Steve Stout's book has a similar title, but it reached a very different conclusion.

Could be, because the book I read was authored by someone on the ground. Unfortunately, I lost the book years ago, but I did actually have a Yahoo group that was all started by an article in Look magazine that showed a picture from one of the cameras owned by one of victims that asked (paraphrasing a little), "Is the murderer in this picture?"

I think I still have the picture somewhere, but I'm not sure. I might be able to find it, but it could take a while.

 

[Chris_Halkides]

Murder at Starved Rock quoted a memo written by Harland Warren in March of 1960. "1. Notice sheriff and chief. 2. Take handwritten statement, take Dr. look at [before] and after, take photos showing no duress. 3. Take over to [State's Attorney for court reporter] statement. 4. Re-enact crime at scene, movies by Dummett. 5. Take [before] Sexton or Goetsch for arraignment. Take to Kruglik for psycho exam. 7.Take suspect to motel or hotel."

Author Jim Ridings had this to say (p. 113) about the memo of 20 March quoted above: "The plan was to have a suspect give a statement and then have a doctor look at him with pictures to be taken before and after the confession to show there was no physical abuse..Then take the suspect to Dr. Kruglik for a psychological exam. This was to have the suspect declared sane so he cannot claim an insanity defense." Dr. Kruglik did examine Mr. Weger many months later. John Reid (of the Reid technique) was one of the people involved in this case.

Starting on p. 127 Mr. Ridings also provided some valuable information about an alleged robbery and rape that happened nine months prior to the murders in nearby Matthiessen State Park. Jean Kapps and James Suppan claimed that they were the victims of these crimes, but the veracity of their statements has been questioned (I am not taking a position). This incident occasionally comes up in discussions about Chester Weger, who was identified in a faulty lineup after his confession (sixteen months after the alleged crime), but he not charged. Mr. Ridings reported that the day after the crime, Officer Dummett, another officer, and Mr. Suppan were looking for clues, and they happened to meet Chester Weger fishing. Mr. Suppan did not recognize Mr. Weger during this encounter. Given the lack of certainty that the robbery and rape occurred, the passage of time, and the poor quality of the lineup, the proposition that Mr. Weger was guilty of these crimes is open to question.

 

[AmyStrange]

My study of the case was so long ago that the following statements may not be 100% accurate, so please bear with me:

The one thing that really ticks me off about this whole case was when a judge ordered the clothes of the victims to be checked for DNA, low and behold, his clothes had been bagged with them.

I always wondered if that had really been done at the time of the original trial or after the clothes had been ordered to be tested.

Not only that but the confession's collaborative evidence of the plane flying overhead seemed suspicious to me, especially since one of the investigators who worked the case was a member of a flying club at the nearby airport.

Mr. Weger was so small, that I found it very difficult to believe he was able to subdue the three victims.

The thread evidence is circumstantial at best, and we all know how easy it is to get someone to confess to something they didn't do.

 

[Chris_Halkides]

According to Mr. Ridings' book, one of the three husbands had a mistress who was pregnant. His wife would not grant him a divorce, so he had her killed, along with her two companions. He later married his alleged mistress and adopted the son.

Chester Weger's cousin was murdered many years later, and Mr. Ridings believes that it was because he was trying to exonerate Chester and confronted someone in organized crime.

 

[AmyStrange]

According to Mr. Ridings' book, one of the three husbands had a mistress who was pregnant. His wife would not grant him a divorce, so he had her killed, along with her two companions. He later married his alleged mistress and adopted the son.

Chester Weger's cousin was murdered many years later, and Mr. Ridings believes that it was because he was trying to exonerate Chester and confronted someone in organized crime.

I'm going to have to get that book and read it.

I just checked on the Steve Stout book and Amazon wants 90$ for it. Wow!

The Riding book is 26$ but Amazon doesn't sell it.

​

 

[AmyStrange]

I don't know if this has been discussed in this thread before (I really should read the whole thing again), but another interesting fact is that Weger was given six polygraph test and passed them all, but unfortunately, I don't think they were admitted as evidence in court because they aren't considered exactly 100% accurate, but that's still pretty much an unusual fact that also makes me wonder.

 

[AmyStrange]

Now of course, this is all speculation on my part, but I'm thinking that these three women weren't killed by one person, so I've started looking through my Encyclopedia of Serial Killers by Michael Newton, and the first interesting entry that I found was that the Chicago Rippers were actually working the area a couple decades later, although they weren't old enough to have committed the Starved Rock murders.

As a matter of fact, the oldest (Robin Gecht) was only around seven or eight at the time, and their MO (Modus Operandi or Method of Operation) doesn't seem to fit anyway, but I still have a lot more names to go through.

When I have more time, I'll do a little more research in this area.

If Weger isn't the murderer, it's hard for me to believe that the "real" murderer(s) stopped afterwards, but like I've said many times before, this is just my opinion, and your mileage may vary of course.

TBH, the only reason I'm now looking into this is because I'm actually spending time doing research for my This Day in the History of the Unexplained (and other historical events) calendar, and I've always been interested in this specific crime anyway.

 

[Chris_Halkides]

The young couple who were the alleged victims at Matthiessen State Park supposedly failed lie detector tests. However, I don't put much stock in lie detectors in general; taking the accuracy of Mr. Ridings' accounts of how they were used in this case as a given, I have even less confidence in them. John Reid later testified that they were 99 percent accurate in the hands of a competent examiner, but I have no idea how he arrived at that number. The existence of bloody fingermarks on the victims' clothing and the hair that was recently tested are problems for the prosecution's case. Even the prosecutor did not believe that the crime happened as Mr. Weger confessed to it. The March memo left me shaking my head. There is also the account of a telephone conversation about bloody clothes from the murderers that were in a car trunk and needed to be disposed of.

 

[AmyStrange]

Yeah, I trust polygraph test as much as I trust confessions, and it's pretty obvious that the cops didn't trust the polygraph either, because otherwise why would they have worked on Weger to get a confession out of him if they did, but three wealthy women being murdered did make it a high-profile case. The pressure to solve it must've been pretty intense.

IMO, the whole case falls apart without the confession, and I still can't imagine how one small guy was able to overpower three women, tie them up, and then beat them to death.

I mean if Weger had a gun, I might be able to see it, but then how did he get the scratches on his face?

That whole scenario just doesn't make any sense to me, but I'd sure like to read that confession to see how he did it.

Does Riding give it word for word in his book?

 

[AmyStrange]

I'm going to have to get Ridings book just to acclimate myself with the whole case again, but I can't afford it right now.

I guess the best I can do is reread this thread again and check the sources in the Wikipedia article, because that's all I can do right now.

 

[Chris_Halkides]

Can your library obtain the book for you? Ridings devotes a whole chapter to the confession, which I think is verbatim. Regarding the scratches, why didn't anyone notice them at the time, as opposed to many months later? Could the police have cajoled one or more witnesses into remembering them? Enquiring minds want to know.

As for the local police, Ridings believes that organized crime made it clear to them to keep their hands off the perpetrators. Moreover, several people within the criminal justice system shared in the reward money, which would explain why Mr. Weger was framed.

 

[AmyStrange]

Can your library obtain the book for you? Ridings devotes a whole chapter to the confession, which I think is verbatim. Regarding the scratches, why didn't anyone notice them at the time, as opposed to many months later? Could the police have cajoled one or more witnesses into remembering them? Enquiring minds want to know.

As for the local police, Ridings believes that organized crime made it clear to them to keep their hands off the perpetrators. Moreover, several people within the criminal justice system shared in the reward money, which would explain why Mr. Weger was framed.

Thanks for the suggestion about getting the book from the library, but it is weird about the scratches, and the organized crime scenario is interesting to say the least.

 

[AmyStrange]

Crap, neither of my libraries has a copy. Maybe the U of Washington has a copy. I'll have to go and get a card there, but I think you have to be a student, and unfortunately, I haven't been a student there for a few years.

 

[AmyStrange]

I'll have to see if I can get it through the interlibrary system, but that sometimes takes months, and I can buy the damn book before then. I get my SSI in three weeks, so I'll just wait until then.

 

[Chris_Halkides]

IIRC Mr. Ridings discussed the scratches, the twine, and many other putative indicators of Mr. Weger's guilt. This is a portion of a talk that Mr. Weger's attorney Andy Hale did.

 

[AmyStrange]

IIRC Mr. Ridings discussed the scratches, the twine, and many other putative indicators of Mr. Weger's guilt. This is a portion of a talk that Mr. Weger's attorney Andy Hale did.

Oh, this is some good stuff, Chris. Thank you. The one you linked to was Part 2. There was also a Part 1 listed on the same YouTube page. I don't have time to watch them right now, but I will this weekend. Thank you once again.

 

[AmyStrange]

IIRC Mr. Ridings discussed the scratches, the twine, and many other putative indicators of Mr. Weger's guilt. This is a portion of a talk that Mr. Weger's attorney Andy Hale did.

I watched the first ten minutes of the video that you linked to, Chris, and I plan on watching the rest of it later, including part one.

There were things in there that I was very slightly aware of, but the one that did impress me was the description of the log that was considered the alleged murder weapon.

It was described as so rotted in places that if it had really been used to bludgeon these women to death, it would have fallen apart and not been in the shape it was in when it was found.

A doctor (forensic scientist) who examined it even said that the blood found on it had not gotten there by a blow to the head.

First of all, I just want it to be known that I don't hate cops or LE (Law Enforcement) in general. I have a lot of respect for those who try to do a decent job of protecting us from evil. As a matter of fact, I was a member of a group that was called the Doe Network who worked hand in hand with them to identify and match up unidentified bodies with missing persons. I go into this in much more detail in a thread I started about missing person cold cases and anti-abduction tips.

I'm not an expert on forensics or LE (Law Enforcement) techniques, but I have learned a lot about them by reading novels written by Erle Stanley Gardner, the creator of Perry Mason.*

Anyway, my point being that it's not unusual for prosecutors to ignore evidence if it doesn't fit in with their perception of who the guilty person is.

IOW, the fact that they ignored this evidence makes me even more suspicious of the guilt of Chester Weger than I was before, especially if it was part of his "confession".

There is more that I could say about these first ten minutes, but I'll stop here for now.


*Some folks may complain that Perry Mason was a fictional character, and anything I learned from the novels about him (written by Esle Stanley Garner) was also fictional, but the fact is that Mr. Gardner was also a lawyer, and the information about forensics, ballistics, fingerprinting, post-mortem lividity, legal intent, MO (Modus Operandi, or Method of Operation), courtroom procedure, LE techniques etc. are all based on facts supported by many references that he gives in these novels. I actually learned a lot from all that, and I've read all of them at least a dozen times.

Also, I consider him the father of organizations like the Innocence Project. If you research an organization he started in the late 1940s, The Court of Last Resort, you'd understand why I believe that.

And on top of that, I've studied and researched missing persons and serial killers for years, starting in the 1970s, so I'm not exactly a newbie at any of this.

Sorry for the long post and for any errors in grammar and spelling anyone may encounter. It's almost midnight, and I'm tired.

 

[AmyStrange]

Here are three screenshots of the Part Two video I watched on YouTube.

The first one is about the alleged murder weapon, the second is about the blood found on it, and the third is from the interview of the operator, Lois Zelensek, who overheard the conversation about the bloody pants: