![]() The State presented other evidence connecting Edwards to these offenses. The medical examiner noted that the pipe extending from the box into the open air was too long for its diameter to serve as an adequate air-exchange system. The medical examiner believed that the victim would not have survived more than three or four hours inside the enclosed box. It contained a light connected to an automotive battery, a one gallon jug of water, candy bars, gum, and a flashlight.Ī medical examiner later determined that the victim died of asphyxiation caused by suffocation. ![]() The box measured about six feet long and three feet wide, and was constructed of plywood. ![]() There, officers dug up a wooden box and found the victim's body inside. Later that day, Edwards led law enforcement officers to the site where the victim was buried. Officers carried out a search of the residence later that morning, on September 3, Rish and Edwards were arrested at that time. Edwards and a white woman with blonde hair left the car and went inside. They saw a dark-colored Buick, with its trunk partly open, arrive at the house in Bourbonnais where Edwards and Rish lived. Law enforcement officers then placed Edwards' home under surveillance. Minutes later, at 11:50 p.m., an Illinois State Police officer saw Rish's car, with its trunk partly open, driving from Kankakee toward Aroma Park. The caller accused Nancy of having notified the police and refused her offer of the ransom. The call was placed from a Marathon service station in Kankakee. Nancy Small received one more telephone call from the kidnapper, at 11:46 that night. After audio enhancement, a voice in the background could be heard threatening Small. On the tape, Stephen provided instructions for delivering the ransom. The caller played a tape recording of Stephen Small's voice. This call originated from a telephone at a Sunoco station in Aroma Park, where an FBI agent saw a white male at a telephone, and a blonde-haired woman in a car that was later identified as belonging to Nancy Rish, Edwards' girlfriend Rish had blonde hair. Nancy Small received another telephone call from the kidnapper at 11:28 that night. After telling Jean that the victim was buried, the caller threatened to kill Jean's husband. Jean said that the caller had told her that he knew that Nancy Small's telephone was tapped. Edwards was seen there at that time, in the company of a blonde-haired woman.Īt 5:40 p.m., Jean Alice Small, Stephen Small's aunt, telephoned the Small residence to tell them of a call she had just received. This call was placed from a telephone located at a Phillips 66 gas station in Aroma Park. At 5:03 that afternoon, the same person called again, asking Mrs. The matter was reported to the authorities, however, and devices were connected to the Smalls' telephone line to record incoming calls and to determine their origins. Small not to report the matter to the police. Small told his wife to obtain $1 million in cash. Around 3:30 that morning someone called the Small residence and told Stephen's wife, Nancy, "We have your husband." Nancy then heard her husband say that he had been handcuffed inside a box underground. Harley Bradley House, a property that Small owned and was in the process of renovating. on September 2, 1987, someone claiming to be a Kankakee police officer called the Small home and told Stephen Small that a burglary had occurred at the B. In 1969, he married Nancy Pedersen, with whom he had three sons.Īround 12:30 a.m. Stephen Small had received his education at Lake Forest Academy, the University of Denver and Mark Hopkins College. ![]() His great grandfather was Illinois governor Len Small. His parents, Burrell and Reva Small, owned and operated a media conglomerate called Mid America Media the Small family also owned the controlling interest in United Press International and this is where Small himself worked. ![]() Small was born in 1947 and raised in Kankakee, Illinois. As a result, Edwards was given the death penalty (later commuted) and Rish was sentenced to life in prison without parole. The conditions of his confinement caused him to die of asphyxiation. In 1987, he was kidnapped and held for ransom by Danny Edwards and Nancy Rish. Stephen Burrell Small (18 March 1947 – 2 September 1987) was a prominent businessman in Kankakee, Illinois. American businessman kidnapped and murdered in 1987 ![]()
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