Tulsa Police seeking help in solving a 1999 murder

Did a neighborhood dispute lead to the murder of a 33-year-old father of two? Tulsa Police detectives say Mike Randell's murder is still unsolved partly because that neighborhood is so tight-lipped.

Tuesday, May 21st 2002, 12:00 am

By: News On 6


Did a neighborhood dispute lead to the murder of a 33-year-old father of two? Tulsa Police detectives say Mike Randell's murder is still unsolved partly because that neighborhood is so tight-lipped.

News on Six crime reporter Lori Fullbright says Mike Randell was sitting in an elementary school parking lot in his truck, arm out the window, eating a bag of Doritos. His family said this was a special place to Mike because he'd gone to school here and he often came here to relax, but on July 7th, 1999, it became his final resting place.

We've teamed up exclusively with the cold case squad in hopes of generating new leads in this old homicide. Michael Randell was the third of four children; he played sports in school, grew up to be a husband and father of a son and daughter and worked in the landscaping business. Mary Randell, victim's mother: "Mike was outgoing, friendly and he liked to talk. He would say he was leaving and then, stand in the doorway and talk for another hour and I understand he did that everywhere he went."

Randell was sitting in the parking lot of Carl Sandberg Elementary School when someone walked up and shot him in the head. Tulsa Police detective Mike Eubanks, "He was caught completely by surprise. By the way he was positioned in the truck, he obviously didn't have a chance to react to someone pointing a gun at him."

Detectives never found the bullet or the murder weapon, they do believe at least two people were standing right there and witnessed the killing. "Did come up with a; dispute that had occurred and did come up with a possible motive of revenge for that dispute." This community is close-knit and no one would tell police what they knew. Detectives hope now that four years have passed, that fear or peer pressure is no longer and issue and someone will finally talk. Linda Brockman, victim's sister: "If they have any kind of conscience or any kind of human feeling, it's gotta be eating them alive and the thing I would say is, they gotta come forward."

Mike's mother has one prayer, that this case will be solved during her lifetime. She knows an arrest can't erase her family's grief or devastation, but it will give them some measure of comfort. "I want them to pay for what they did and not to kill someone else. If they can kill my son in cold blood, they could kill anyone else."

There were all kinds of rumors that this was a drug deal or that Mike had assaulted someone's sister, but, his family says those aren't true and police could never turn those rumors into facts. Detectives would like to talk to people who knew a man known as Tell. The family has always supported leniency for any witness who comes forward, as long as the shooter is put behind bars.

Police believe lots of people in the neighborhood know what happened. They say as long as those people stay quiet, they are condoning cold-blooded murder.
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