The “Unknown Wanderer” was discovered dead in the Sacred Heart Church in Boise in October of 1982. He had killed himself with cyanide. For decades, the man remained unidentified. In 2019, Detective Tim Cooper with the Ada County Sheriff’s Office took a second look.
One of 30 keys found on the man’s body was engraved with a street name located in Jacksonville, Florida. Cooper says one name stood out on the property records – someone who was pronounced dead in absentia in 1989.
"Our office contacted his sole surviving family member, a brother in the Los Angeles area. A DNA sample was collected from the Los Angeles man, and it was analyzed against DNA from the unknown wanderer’s wallet," said Cooper.
The LA man's brother was Mathew Francis Betkouski, a chemist originally from California, but who also worked in New Mexico and Jacksonville, Florida. He went missing in 1982.
Throughout his life, Betkouski was described as paranoid and asocial. He sustained a traumatic brain injury detectives say hurt his mental wellbeing.
Cooper says the way Betkouski killed himself in Boise piqued his interest. Cyanide poisoning deaths are few and far between. Except in September of 1982, when seven people in Chicago died after taking cyanide-laced Tylenol.
"A fellow scientist from the White Sands Test facility recalled that before he was terminated, Dr. Betkouski made a comment about how poison could be introduced into over-the-counter capsules," Cooper said.
Ada County officials say they can’t officially determine whether Betkouski was in Chicago at the time of the Tylenol murders, but Cooper says detectives found a map of the city in Betkouski’s bedroom, and photos show Betkouski was in Chicago in 1982. But Betkouski used a different kind of cyanide that can't be traced to any Chicago pharmacies.
Dr. Park Dietz is a forensic psychiatrist who asked other forensic scientists nationwide if they believed this Boise case could be connected.
"Overwhelmingly, they regarded him as a viable suspect. A few were convinced that he was the killer," said Dietz.
The Ada County Sheriff’s office says they have given all information to the Illinois agencies involved in the Tylenol poisonings.
