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Police: Train ticket helps crack 1957 Ill. killing
Associated Press ^ | July 2, 2011 | BARBARA RODRIGUEZ

Posted on 07/03/2011 3:49:17 PM PDT by EternalVigilance

SYCAMORE, Ill. (AP) — Charles "Chuck" Ridulph always assumed the person who stole his little sister from the neighborhood corner where she played and dumped her body in a wooded stretch some 100 miles away was a trucker or passing stranger — surely not anyone from the hometown he remembers as one big, friendly playground.

And, after more than a half century passed since her death, he assumed the culprit also had died or was in prison for some other crime.

On Saturday, he said he was stunned by the news that a one-time neighbor had been charged in the kidnapping and killing that captured national attention, including that of the president and FBI chief. Prosecutors in bucolic Sycamore, a city of 15,000 that's home to a yearly pumpkin festival, charged a former police officer Friday in the 1957 abduction of 7-year-old Maria Ridulph after an ex-girlfriend's discovery of an unused train ticket blew a hole in his alibi.

Jack Daniel McCullough, 71, has been held in Seattle on $3 million bail. A judge overseeing a Saturday court appearance for him said he had been taken to a regional trauma center but did not elaborate. She rescheduled his bail hearing for 12:30 p.m. Monday.

(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...


TOPICS: Crime/Corruption; Front Page News; US: Illinois; US: Washington
KEYWORDS: coldcase; crime; dekalbcounty; donutwatch; galena; illinois; jackdanielmccullough; johntessier; kingcounty; mariaridulph; ridulph; sycamore; washington
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To: Cicero

He went on to be a cop, maybe his father was a cop?


21 posted on 07/03/2011 5:55:12 PM PDT by Christian Engineer Mass (25ish Cambridge MA grad student. Many conservative Christians my age out there? __ Click my name)
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To: EternalVigilance
She found an unused train ticket from Rockford to Chicago dated the day the girl went missing.

Something tells me that this woman knew about the ticket and about the man's possible connection to the dead little girl. She probably had her suspicions.
22 posted on 07/03/2011 6:12:34 PM PDT by adorno
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To: EternalVigilance
Something doesn't sound right. The alibi was that he got on a train to chicago for a doctors appointment for a military physical, called his girlfriend collect from Chicago, took the paperwork back to Rockford, Dad drove him home from Rockford, all on the day of the murder.

However, the police fail to check the train, fail to check the doctor's office to see if he was there, fail to check the recruiter, fail to check phone records. But over 50 years later, the police do a follow-up interview with the ex-girlfriend for an old picture and the unused train ticket magically falls out of the frame.

23 posted on 07/03/2011 6:31:37 PM PDT by Ophiucus
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To: Ophiucus

Can’t understand why they never showed the picture to the girls friend.

Anyway ,back in the day the way to deal with this would have been to leave a pistol with one bullet in it for the perp.
Today such things don’t happen, but I would see to it that he had access to a nice piece of rope in his cell. Even now he might do the right thing.


24 posted on 07/03/2011 6:50:19 PM PDT by Venturer
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To: EternalVigilance

Bump for later.


25 posted on 07/03/2011 6:57:52 PM PDT by Larry Lucido
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To: Venturer

That too... It doesn’t make sense. Too much incompetence for this story to be complete.


26 posted on 07/03/2011 7:03:06 PM PDT by Ophiucus
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To: EternalVigilance
December 3, 1957--"You Send Me" by Sam Cooke, "April Love" by Pat Boone, and "Jailhouse Rock" by Elvis Presley topped the popular music charts, Iran, Libya and Cuba were US allies, Vanguard I was being prepared to blast off into space from Cape Canaveral, and Ayn Rand's bestseller Atlas Shrugged (New York: Random House, 1957) was drawing cheers from Human Events and jeers from National Review
27 posted on 07/03/2011 7:14:01 PM PDT by Fiji Hill
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To: 1rudeboy
“we don’t catch the smart ones.”

Chapman said police never showed her a photo of McCullough in the days and months after Maria was kidnapped.

And the stupid ones don't catch anyone.

28 posted on 07/03/2011 7:33:09 PM PDT by Right Wing Assault (Dick Obama is more inexperienced now than he was before he was elected.)
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To: boop
Per the link in post #6: He was 18 at the time and fit the description of the young man who approached Ridulph and an 8-year-old friend as they played outside near their homes.
29 posted on 07/03/2011 7:34:09 PM PDT by elli1
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To: Right Wing Assault

Dude, we are talking about Sycamore, Illinois. That’s Barney Fife territory.


30 posted on 07/03/2011 7:39:21 PM PDT by 1rudeboy
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To: Ophiucus
"However, the police fail to check the train, fail to check the doctor's office to see if he was there, fail to check the recruiter, fail to check phone records."

The report says this murderer became a cop. One of the Freepers surmised that probably his father was a cop. If that was the case then we know why no checking was done.

31 posted on 07/03/2011 7:42:07 PM PDT by Spunky ( “To compel a man to subsidize with his taxes the propagation of ideas which he disbelieves and abh)
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To: EternalVigilance

hat a one-time neighbor had been charged in the kidnapping and killing that captured national attention, including that of the president and FBI chief. >>

what a story, glad the case was solved, as they say, it’s usually someone the victim knows or someone close to the family.


32 posted on 07/03/2011 7:53:36 PM PDT by Coleus (Adult Stem Cells Work, there is NO Need to Harvest Babies for Their Body Parts!)
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To: Cicero
.


I disagree ... "No one" is THAT dumb ...

Someone important was covering for Johnny Tressier ... pure and simple ...


.
33 posted on 07/03/2011 8:06:42 PM PDT by Patton@Bastogne
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To: Patton@Bastogne

“Someone important was covering for Johnny Tressier ... pure and simple ... “

I think you hit it. He had a connection someplace that prevented an investigation. Small towns often have a “Boss Hogg” type that could quash something like a murder back then.


34 posted on 07/03/2011 8:29:55 PM PDT by GenXteacher (He that hath no stomach for this fight, let him depart!)
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To: elli1

Thanks for the info. I guess he’ll die in prison.


35 posted on 07/03/2011 8:46:56 PM PDT by boop ("Let's just say they'll be satisfied with LESS"... Ming the Merciless)
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To: EternalVigilance

That’s why I always burn unused train tickets. Just in case.


36 posted on 07/03/2011 8:49:22 PM PDT by Revolting cat! (Let us prey!)
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To: EternalVigilance

Great story. Give hope that the Jack Wheeler case will be solved.


37 posted on 07/03/2011 8:58:11 PM PDT by apocalypto
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To: trumandogz
if the perp showed the police his receipt for the train, they might have accepted it as proof....there were no computer records then...and thousands of people take the train.....and no video cameras either....

I'v be happier if they had some dna...

38 posted on 07/03/2011 10:24:42 PM PDT by cherry
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To: Ophiucus

This article may answer some of your questions, especially about the dad supposedly picking him up in Rockford that night (he didn’t).

http://www.kcchronicle.com/2011/07/03/court-documents-paint-suspect-in-1957-cold-case-as-having-troubled-past/aso6c7w/

McCullough (he changed his name from Tessier) also has a long history of sex abuse claims against him, one of which cost him a job as a police officer.

http://www.thenewstribune.com/2011/07/02/1730414/police-train-ticket-helps-crack.html


39 posted on 07/03/2011 11:00:38 PM PDT by Deo volente (God willing, America will survive this Obamination.)
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To: Spunky
If that was the case then we know why no checking was done.

Not enough of a reason as if there was that much evidence, they wouldn't have covered.

40 posted on 07/04/2011 1:20:58 AM PDT by Ophiucus
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