After a lengthy legal process that spanned for 15 years, a Nevada jury has declared Thomas Randolph guilty of masterminding his sixth wife’s murder and fatally shooting the hitman he had allegedly hired for the crime. The verdict was reached after five hours of deliberation and was accompanied by intense emotions in the courtroom.
68-year-old Randolph, who was assisted by headphones due to hearing impairment and uses a wheelchair, remained stoic as the verdict was read aloud, the New York Post reported.
Colleen Beyer, the daughter of Randolph’s sixth wife, Sharon Causse, reacted with a mix of shock and relief upon hearing the guilty verdict for the second time. “I’m so relieved, it’s unbelievable. It’s been 15 years, and it’s been a twisted nightmare,” she said.
“I’m absolutely ecstatic and thrilled and relieved that he’s off the streets – that he cannot do this to another woman again. Because he’s a predator, he’s a serious predator,” New York Post quoted Colleen Beyer as saying outside the courtroom.
The trial exposed a sequence of events from May 8, 2008, when Randolph dialed 911 to report a masked intruder shooting his wife. After killing the intruder, Randolph identified him as Michael Miller, a friend and handyman, to the police.
The killing would become the subject of Dateline’s 2021 miniseries “The Widower.”
However, prosecutors used phone records to demonstrate Randolph’s close ties with Miller, highlighting numerous phone calls exchanged between them.
The prosecution contended that Randolph had conspired with Miller to murder his wife, to gain insurance money exceeding $300,000. The trial brought to light insurance policies Randolph had taken out on his wife’s life in the two years leading up to her death.
The initial conviction and death sentence were overturned by the Nevada Supreme Court in 2020 due to concerns about prior bad-act evidence, involving his 1986 Utah arrest for the death of his second wife, Becky Gault, for which he was acquitted.
Among Randolph’s six wives, four have passed away. His fifth wife, Leona Stapleton, succumbed to cancer, as confirmed by her family’s testimony in the previous trial. The fourth wife, Francis Randolph, died in 2004 during heart surgery.
Furthermore, the court heard from another individual who informed the jurors that Randolph had approached him with an offer to pay for Francis’s murder prior to her death during surgery. This informant also stated that Randolph had proposed staging the death as a burglary.
Randolph’s living ex-wife, Gayna Allmon, provided testimony asserting that she believed Randolph had attempted to kill her. She recounted an incident during their marriage when a bullet from his gun struck the kitchen wall behind her while he was cleaning the weapon.
His first wife, Kathryn Thomas, detailed allegations of Randolph’s psychologically abusive behavior.
Randolph’s retrial focused on the events surrounding the murders of Causse and Miller in 2008.
The prosecution spotlighted inconsistencies in Randolph’s narrative to the police, pointing out a video walkthrough of the house shared with the jurors. They emphasized discrepancies in the evidence found at the scene and the trajectory of the fatal bullets.
Amidst the legal arguments, Randolph’s defense claimed that he was unfairly targeted due to his past arrest in Utah and that the crime scene hadn’t been properly preserved. The defense also argued that the traumatic nature of the incident affected Randolph’s ability to recount details accurately.
Chief Deputy District Attorney Christopher Hamner strongly positioned Randolph as the orchestrator of the crimes, dismissing the idea that Randolph was a victim. Hamner highlighted the lack of coherence in Randolph’s account, considering the physical evidence, insurance policies, and his relationship with Miller.
“It’s really, really hard to plan a perfect murder – now that you have the evidence, you can see that [Randolph] failed – because his story doesn’t add up,” Hamner said.
“It doesn’t add up with what you physically see at the scene âæ when you see the insurance policies âæ it doesn’t add up in the manner in which he discusses his wife [or] âæ when you start thinking about his relationship with Michael Miller,” he added.
Despite the defense’s efforts, the evidence presented in court appeared to contradict Randolph’s version of events. The outcome left Tomsheck, Randolph’s attorney, acknowledging that they had done their best, although they had hoped for a different verdict.
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