Heirens case revisited

Every so often, his name appears in the Chicago papers. William Heirens has filed a new lawsuit or has applied again for parole. And for middle-aged and older Chicagoans, the memories come back of that awful time in 1945 and 1946.

Over an eight-month period, two women and a child had been killed on the north side. The women were found shot or stabbed in their apartments. In one, a mes­sage was scrawled in lipstick on the wall: "For heaven's sake catch me before I kill more. I cannot control myself." Then, little 6-year-old Suzanne Degnan was abducted from her bed and strangled, her body dismembered. Five months later, William Heirens, a 17-year-old University of Chicago freshman, was arrested and charged with all three crimes. Amid massive publicity by the city's sensational newspapers, he pleaded guilty and was given three life sentences.

On November 15, Heirens will be 60. He has been in prison 42 years, longer than anyone in Illinois. In 1972 he became the first Illinois prison inmate to earn a college degree while incarcerated. He has been a model prisoner. And he wants out.

The Cook County state's attorney routinely opposes Heirens' requests for parole, as do the relatives of his victims. Who could blame them? A minority view — definitely a minority — is that regardless of the nature of their crimes, consideration should be given to the release of rehabilitated criminals.

Heirens' case has yet another element: He pleaded guilty under the most questionable of circumstances. He was given an injection of sodium pentothal, the so-called "truth serum," without his consent, and made a confession while under the drug's influence. His lawyers pressured him into making a subsequent confession. His plea was made in a circus-like atmosphere created by the hysterical press. And no hearing was ever held to determine his competence to enter a plea.

These issues were raised — in appeals to the Illinois Supreme Court in 1954 and to the federal district and appellate courts in 1968 — and Heirens' conviction was upheld. And under our criminal justice system, once an issue has been resolved, it can't be raised again. The doctrine is known as res judicata (literally, "a matter adjudicated" can't be readjudicated).

Heirens has recanted his confessions and maintains he's innocent. He says he confessed and pleaded guilty because his lawyers told him if he didn't, he'd be convicted and executed. However, although there was fingerprint evidence against Heirens, the prosecutor conceded at his sentencing hearing that there was "small likelihood of a successful murder prosecution."

The Illinois Supreme Court said that the use of sodium pentothal, the search of Heirens' dormitory room without a warrant and other actions by the police were "flagrant violations of his rights," deserving "the severest condemnation," but that the conduct of the police and the state's attorney "had no substantial connection with the pleas of guilty."

An attempt by Heirens to obtain release from prison was rejected by a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals, with the late Judge Luther Swygert filing a strongly worded dissent. Swygert cited the record of the case, which showed Heirens first agreeing to make a confession, then changing his mind, whereupon his lawyers "implored his parents to pressure their son into making a confession." Swygert said one of the lawyers testified that after Heirens refused to confess, he told Heirens, "I was provoked and he had no right to embarrass me." Heirens subsequently agreed to confess, and the confession, "as extracted from him, was handed in relays to reporters outside the prosecutor's door," Swygert said.

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"The case presents the picture of a public prosecutor and defense counsel, if not indeed the trial judge, buckling under the pressure of a hysterical and sensation-seeking press bent upon obtaining retribution for a horrendous act," Swygert said. "The state's attorney and defense counsel usurped the judicial function, complying with a community scheme inspired by the press to convict the defendant without his day in court."

But the Appeals Court majority and the Supreme Court both found no link between the press coverage and the guilty pleas. Swygert's principal argument was that substantial doubt existed as to Heirens' sanity, and that a hearing should have been held on his competency to enter a plea. The judge pointed in particular to psychiatrists' findings that Heirens had a split personally and had claimed that a mythical person named George Merman had committed the crimes.

"To me it is morally and legally repugnant to hold that a questionably sane individual by entering a plea of guilty which may be without meaning to him thus waives forever the opportunity to have his incompetency established," Swygert said.

But the Appeals Court majority held that there was not enough evidence to create a bona fide doubt as to Heirens' ability to plead.

I asked a Cook County circuit court judge, Shelvin Singer, how he thought today's courts would have handled the Heirens case. "The use of drugs to obtain a confession is illegal, and that tainted the subsequent confession," he said. "And without a confession, he apparently wouldn't have been convicted. I'm convinced from what I know of the case that he didn't want to plead guilty. His lawyers forced him to. This wasn't a voluntary plea. The attorneys broke the canons of ethics. Their conduct would not normally be tolerated."

On the other hand, as "enlightened" as we are today, a whole lot of improper conduct still is tolerated when someone is being prosecuted for an especially heinous crime. Sometimes, in our haste to establish blame, we may even miss the real criminal.

I won't presume to say whether William Heirens deserves parole, and it would be difficult to argue that he deserves yet another day in court. But it is troubling to study the way his case was handled — especially considering the prosecutor's statement that he didn't have enough evidence to convict.

Was Heirens guilty? Probably — but maybe not. Was he competent to plead guilty? Maybe not, according to Swygert. Maybe not.□

Ed McManus is an assistant financial editor for the Chicago Tribune.

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