The “mood and mode” of Richard Schmelzer’s interview with detectives investigating his grandmother’s slaying counter claims by Schmelzer that police coerced his statements, Kane County prosecutors wrote in a recent court filing.
In May, Schmelzer’s attorney filed a motion seeking to suppress statements his client offered to police on grounds that Schmelzer was not free to leave the South Elgin Police Department during questioning and waived his rights only because of duress and exhaustion.
Assistant State’s Attorney Bill Engerman painted a different view of the interview in his response to the motion.
“(Schmelzer) freely and voluntarily spoke with police officers at the South Elgin Police Department,” Engerman wrote. “(The) statements provided by (Schmelzer) to the police were not the product of duress or coercion. … The video record of the defendant’s interview clearly demonstrates that (Schmelzer) understood and appreciated the Miranda warnings police provided to him during the process.”
Schmelzer, 43, remains held in Kane County Jail on $5 million bail, charged with murder in the death of his grandmother, Mildred Darrington, in 2014. Darrington’s hairdresser called 911 after finding Darrington in her bed with blood near her neck and head. Investigators found no signs of forced entry to her East Dundee home, and no fingerprint or DNA evidence was recovered, according to court documents.
The Kane County Major Crimes Task Force joined the investigation and conducted a “large number” of interviews with those connected to Darrington. Schmelzer and his wife, who live in Texas, spoke with detectives while in Kane County for Darrington’s funeral. Schmelzer called one detective to indicate he “was planning on coming to see him” the following day, Engerman said.
Once at the police department, Schmelzer’s wife was interviewed for nearly 90 minutes and agreed to give a DNA sample. Schmelzer’s own session began a short time later, with detectives offering him something to drink and pointing out “he was free to leave and he was not under arrest,” Engerman’s response stated. Over roughly three hours, the conversation ranged in topics from how Schmelzer’s family was grieving Darrington to how easy it was to buy guns in Texas to Schmelzer’s finances. Detectives also asked Schmelzer about his and his family’s schedule before and after Darrington’s death, to which Schmelzer mentioned eating at a restaurant the day before his grandmother’s death and having a receipt as proof. A short time later, Schmelzer offered an unprompted explanation for an unspecified discrepancy with the receipt followed by the question, “What do you guys know so far?” Engerman’s response stated.
Over the next half-hour or so, detectives asked Schmelzer about travel routes to and from a work convention he said he attended. The detectives around that point read Schmelzer his rights because they had “more stuff to talk about” with him. Within minutes, Schmelzer said he wouldn’t continue without an attorney present, the filing stated.
“After he invokes his rights, (Schmelzer) tells detectives … that he spoke with his attorney before ‘coming up,’ ” Engerman stated.
To further his point that Schmelzer was not in custody, Engerman noted that a door to the interview room was left open through much of the conversation, that Schmelzer agreed to meet at the police department and drove himself there, and that he was not restrained at any point.
Schmelzer was arrested at his home in Texas about a month later.
Prosecutors allege Schmelzer drove from Texas to Illinois to commit the crime, leaving behind, among other things, a trail of credit card, GPS and tollway-violation records later used by investigators to determine his travels before and after Darrington was found dead, according to court documents. Additionally, prosecutors obtained Schmelzer palm-print samples for comparison to prints found inside a car rented by a man in Illinois at Schmelzer’s request. And video footage from a gas station near Darrington’s home shows the rental car shortly after the time she was killed, court records state.
A hearing on Schmelzer’s motion is scheduled for Aug. 9. The video of his interview is expected to be played during the hearing.
Dan Campana is a freelance reporter for The Courier-News.
