In the spring of 1960, three women traveled to Starved Rock State Park in Illinois for a getaway. Within hours of arriving, they were attacked and killed while hiking.
Their battered bodies were discovered in St. Louis Canyon. Chester Weger, a dishwasher at the nearby lodge, was arrested in connection with the murders and convicted the following year of killing one of the women.
Weger continued to insist he was innocent for the rest of his life. He died in June 2025, just days after a county judge rejected his petition to overturn the conviction.
His family and attorneys have carried on the legal battle. A hearing on a posthumous pardon is scheduled for October 6 before the Illinois Prisoner Review Board.
Weger’s attorneys say new DNA evidence casts doubt on the conviction. They also argue that police coerced him into making a confession, which he quickly withdrew.
A hair recovered from one victim’s finger did not match Weger or any of the three women. His lawyers contend it may have belonged to another suspect who was never identified.
Posthumous pardons are exceptionally uncommon. Fewer than 200 have ever been granted, most of them at the state level.
After reviewing the evidence, the board must submit its recommendation to Illinois Governor JB Pritzker, who will make the final decision.
Chester Weger, pictured in 2016, was granted parole in 2019 and died in 2025 after five years of freedom
Weger was convicted in the 1960 murder of Lillian Oetting. He later recanted a confession, alleging it had been coerced, and maintained his innocence for decades
Lillian Oetting, 50, Frances Murphy, 47, and Mildred Linquist, 50, were found dead at Starved Rock State Park on March 16, 1960. One of the women’s bodies is pictured being carried away
Andrew Hale, Weger’s attorney, told the Chicago Sun-Times that he believed the defense team had not received a “fair shot” at the most recent evidentiary hearing. He said he remained “hopeful” about the pardon.
“I feel like this board and the governor’s office, if they take a fresh look at this, I should win,” Hale said.
Hale told the Chicago Tribune last summer, following Weger’s death, that his friends and family were “deeply saddened that Chester’s legacy is marred by this unjust conviction.”
Weger died at 86 after spending nearly six decades behind bars. He was released in 2020 after the Illinois Prisoner Review Board voted 9-4 in favor of parole.
“They ruined my life,” he told the Chicago Tribune as he climbed into a minivan on prison grounds after his release.
“(They) locked me up for 60 years for something I’ve never done.”
Weger became a suspect almost immediately after the bodies of Lillian Oetting, 50, Frances Murphy, 47, and Mildred Lindquist, 50, were discovered.
The three women, all wives of upper-class Chicago businessmen, were last seen checking into Starved Rock Lodge, where Weger worked, on March 14, 1960.
The women were found at Starved Rock State Park in Illinois. A map of the area is pictured above
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Weger worked at the lodge where the women were staying. He was arrested for their murders in November, 1960
Frances Murphy (left), Mildred Lindquist (middle) and Lillian Oetting (right) were last seen at the Starved Rock Lodge
Their bodies were found two days later, with shocking injuries that detectives believed were from over 100 blows.
Police began investigating Weger after lodge employees reported seeing scratches on his face, and he failed multiple lie detector tests.
Investigators then found lengths of twine at the scene that resembled those in a toolshed near the lodge.
Police argued that the twine was also used to bind a teenage girl who was raped nearby months before the killings. Weger was never tried or convicted for that crime.
By September, local police kept Weger under constant surveillance until they arrested him in November.
Weger testified that he was told multiple times by the state’s attorney and deputy sheriff that if he confessed, he would get life, but if he did not, he would be sentenced to the electric chair. The state’s attorney and sheriff’s office later denied these claims.
In a 1962 opinion, Justice Harry Hershey of the Supreme Court of Illinois said two sheriff’s deputies visited Weger at his home on November 16.
He was taken in for interrogation and served with nine warrants, and confessed to the crime. Weger recanted his confession two days later. He claimed that threats of electrocution forced him to confess to the murder.
Weger pleaded not guilty to the triple murder. He denied during his trial that he was involved in the heinous crime, but was convicted on March 3, 1961.
Murphy’s station wagon was seen parked outside the lodge after she and her friends were found beaten to death in St Louis Canyon
Weger told reporters after he was released that his life had been ruined. He tried multiple times to get parole and appeal his conviction while behind bars
Weger, pictured above in handcuffs, was given life imprisonment. His current attorney is attempting to get him a posthumous pardon
Prosecutors ultimately decided to prosecute him for Oetting’s murder instead of all three women, citing that he had already been given a life sentence. He appealed, but Justice Hershey upheld his conviction.
DNA evidence was not discovered until 2004. He asked for clemency three years later but was again denied.
On his 24th try, he was finally granted parole and was released to live with his family in 2020, where he lived in freedom for five years until his death.
Descendants of the three victims have maintained that they believe he was guilty of the crime.
The Daily Mail has reached out to Weger’s attorney and the governor’s office for comment.