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Law

FBI chief vows to catch killer of judge's family

Visits cut off for jailed white supremacist leader


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Matthew Hale speaks to the press in 2003, when he was arrested for trying to arrange the judge's murder.
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Hundreds bid farewell to the judge's slain husband.
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Joan Humphrey Lefkow
Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)

CHICAGO, Illinois (CNN) -- Jailers cut off outside contact with imprisoned white supremacist Matthew Hale after he denied any role in the deaths of the husband and mother of a federal judge he was convicted of plotting to kill, Hale's father said Tuesday.

In Washington, meanwhile, FBI Director Robert Mueller vowed that the killers of Judge Joan Humphrey Lefkow's family "will do time."

The bodies of Michael Lefkow, 64, and Donna Grace Humphrey, 89, were found in the judge's Chicago home February 28.

Hale was convicted in 2004 of charges he tried to have Lefkow killed over a ruling in a trademark dispute, and he is scheduled to be sentenced next month.

The judge ordered Hale's group to stop using the name World Church of the Creator, which belonged to another religious group with no ties to Hale.

Police and federal agents are looking into whether there is any connection between the killings at Lefkow's home and Hale's case, though they say that is only one of several avenues they are investigating.

Hale, 33, issued a statement last week through his mother that condemned the killings and called them a "heinous crime."

His father, Russell Hale, said a counselor at the federal prison where Hale is being held told him Monday night that phone calls from and visits with his son have been curtailed indefinitely.

"I was so upset and shocked, I didn't have the sense to ask why," he told Chicago television station WLS. "I'm sure he wouldn't have told me."

A U.S. Bureau of Prisons representative did not return a telephone call seeking comment on Hale's case. But Russell Hale said he believes his son is being punished for releasing the statement, which was dictated to his mother.

"He did it because he wanted people to know that he had nothing to do with it, but apparently they don't like that too well," Hale said. He said his son is "beside himself," because the killings "can only hurt him."

Hale's parents are divorced. His mother, Evelyn Hutcheson, said her son was the victim of a vendetta by a "Jewish-controlled" government.

"If he was a violent person, which he's not, there's no way that he'd be stupid enough to have someone kill Judge Lefkow's family just before his sentencing, which is April the 6th, because the prosecutor has been looking for something to enhance Matt's sentence," she told Peoria, Illinois, television station WHOI.

The FBI has offered a $50,000 reward for information in the case, and police released sketches of two men wanted for questioning after witnesses reported seeing them in the area the day of the killings. (Full story)

But an investigation by the FBI, the U.S. Marshals Service and Chicago police has yielded no arrests so far.

A law enforcement official in Washington told CNN that genetic material taken from cigarette butts found in Lefkow's home were tested at the FBI laboratory, but did not positively match any other sample on file. The official, who refused to provide specifics, said DNA tests also failed to find a match for samples taken from "a couple of other items."

Testifying before a House Appropriations subcommittee Tuesday, Mueller said he is confident those responsible will be found.

"We will leave no stone unturned, no piece of forensic evidence unanalyzed," he said. "Every lead will be tracked down, and ultimately, I absolutely believe that we will identify the individual -- that person will be arrested and prosecuted, definitely."

CNN's Kevin Bohn contributed to this report.


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