Randall “Madman” Miller, “enforcer” of the Outlaws Motorcycle Club, confesses to gruesome murders to get out of prison

July 3, 2024

In 2000, the Outlaws Motorcycle Club’s feared enforcer, Randall “Madman” Miller, was sentenced to life in prison in an organized crime case that targeted numerous members of the biker gang and involved a series of gruesome crimes. And U.S. District Judge JP Stadtmueller lamented that it was just too bad he could not sentence him to death.

Miller sat silently in the courtroom, shaking his head. Now, 24 years later, Miller admits to committing the three murders described in the organized crime case – including the gruesome, sensational 1993 murders of Morris and Ruth Gauger near the northwest suburb of Richmond.

“I have tried to write this letter a thousand times because it has been weighing so heavily on my heart for a very long time,” Miller wrote to the judge in his latest attempt to get out of prison, mainly because he is in poor physical shape and suffers from a number of ailments. “I must admit that I was wrong and take responsibility for the fact that my decisions have caused people pain and should never have happened.”

“I owe Ginger Blossom and Gary Gauger my sincerest apologies for their suffering and pain over the loss of their parents” – Morris and Ruth Gauger – “for the senseless act that took their lives.”

Morris and Ruth Gauger in the 1940s. Randall “Madman” Miller “slit Mr. Gauger’s throat and left him to bleed to death on the floor of his store,” prosecutors said. They said Ruth Gauger was killed by an accomplice and “left dying on the floor of the small carpet and jewelry store she operated” on the couple’s farm in McHenry County.

“Every day it eats away at me because I was not raised to be the man who made such a cold-hearted decision to act and commit this very serious transgression,” wrote Miller, now 65. “I used to blame drugs and ‘life’, but in the end I have to admit that it was me who made the decision and for that I apologize to the families, even though I know it will never be enough.”

Miller, of Pell Lake, Wisconsin, and outlaw James “Preacher” Schneider, who lived in Lake Geneva, killed the Gaugers, who ran a motorcycle parts business on their farm in McHenry County, in what has been described as both a botched robbery and a cold-blooded execution.

“Miller personally slit Mr. Gauger’s throat and left him to bleed to death on the floor of his store,” prosecutors said in a court filing. “Ms. Gauger was killed by Miller’s partner and also left to die on the floor of the small carpet and jewelry store she operated on the farm.”

“Miller showed no compassion for these two elderly people who were deliberately killed for a small amount of pocket money – about $15. Nor did he show any compassion for the Gaugers’ adult son – Gary Gauger – who was wrongfully arrested for the deaths of his parents after their murders and sentenced to death based on a coerced false confession.

“The charges against the son were only dropped after Miller’s accomplice uncovered the true circumstances of the crime, pleaded guilty and testified against Miller,” prosecutors wrote.

Excerpt from a letter from imprisoned Outlaws enforcer Randall to a federal judge "Madman" Miller makes another attempt to get out of prison. — Excerpt from a letter that imprisoned Outlaws enforcer Randall “Madman” Miller sent to a federal judge in a new attempt to get out of prison.

The McHenry County Sheriff’s Office and District Attorney’s Office were heavily criticized, but without consequences, because Gary Gauger was initially incarcerated for a crime he did not commit. He filed a lawsuit against the police department, but lost.

At his trial, Miller was also found responsible for “the murder of Donald Wagner, who was lured to a remote location by Miller and his associates and then executed by Miller by shooting him in the head with a .22 caliber pistol,” prosecutors said. “The murder was committed over a shipment of marijuana.”

In his new letter to the Milwaukee-based judge overseeing the case, Miller also addressed that murder, writing: “One event is seared into my memory and I will never forget it: the day Donald Wagner’s daughter screamed in the courtroom, ‘He killed my father.’

“Not a day goes by that I don’t hear those piercing words because I took her father away from her and that was for something senseless and should never have happened. I feel it’s important to apologize to Wagner’s daughter for denying her the opportunity to have a meaningful relationship with her father, who should be there for her first date, her driving lessons, her graduation, her wedding and the opportunity to meet his grandchildren if she had any.”

“I truly realize that these are just words and that only my actions until the end of my life will determine how truly repentant I am. I began my journey of change in 2003 when I accepted Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior and decided to live my life by His standards.”

Randall “Madman” Miller (bottom right) with some of his co-defendants in the racketeering case that sent him to federal prison for life. — Randall “Madman” Miller (bottom right) with some of his co-defendants in the racketeering case that landed him a life sentence in a federal prison.

Miller, who now uses a wheelchair and is housed in a prison medical center in Rochester, Minnesota, wrote in his letter that he takes responsibility and wants to share this with “those affected in the community and also my family, whom I have let down and disappointed.”

“I hope this will provide some closure to those I have hurt and that I will purify my heart by asking for forgiveness at this late stage of my life and praying that families and the Almighty will grant me their grace.”

Founded in McCook in 1935, the Outlaws now have branches throughout the United States and around the world. Their members portray themselves as free spirits who defy society’s norms and rules.

However, federal authorities stated that they were a gang on wheels and that their preferred motorcycles were Harley-Davidsons.

The club, which served as the inspiration for the new real-life film “The Bikeriders,” has faced several serious prosecutions for crimes involving extreme violence and drug trafficking in northern Illinois and southern Wisconsin over the past three decades.

Some of the bloodshed resulted from a turf war with the Hells Angels, who began to move into the Chicago area in the 1990s.

Some of these acts of violence also involved the Chicago Mafia, which has long used the outlaws as its rulers.

In 1997, Miller was charged with organized crime, involving 17 outlaws from Chicago, the suburbs, southeastern Wisconsin and northwestern Indiana.

To the Outlaws clubhouses in the Chicago area.

Miller “proved to be one of the most violent of the defendants charged,” prosecutors said.

Schneider is believed to have been released from prison. His cooperation with the authorities makes him a potential target for his old club, whose slogan is: “Snitches are an endangered species.”

Miller had previously requested compassionate release because his health condition had led to the amputation of his leg and he feared dying from COVID-19. Stadtmueller rejected this in 2022, saying: “Our criminal justice system has the capacity for remorse and compassion – indeed the goal of promoting it. But healing takes time and a sentence properly served.”

“Perhaps this case will one day be ripe for release on humanitarian grounds,” the judge said at the time. He added, however, that Miller’s time in prison at the time “was not yet sufficient to heal the harm to the community caused by the defendant’s actions through his sentence and to offset the harm caused by his poor health. The defendant is receiving appropriate care for his health needs in prison.”

In the new court filing, Miller states that his current “health problems” include seropositive rheumatoid arthritis, coronary artery disease, atrial fibrillation, hyperlipidemia and congestive heart failure.

Miller says he “took responsibility for his crimes” not to “impress the court” but “to ask for forgiveness from the victims, their families, his family and God” and he seeks “only mercy and compassion.”

Miller also argues that his sentence is “unequal” to that of other Outlaws members, including Randy Yager, “who fled Mexico and lived there for 18 years before being arrested.” Miller said Yager “showed no respect for the law in the years before and after the indictment” but “still received a 15-year sentence.”

Yager, once a boss of the Outlaws, was placed under house arrest, prosecutors said in an April court document.

The judge recently rejected a humanitarian release request for Outlaws co-defendant Kevin O’Neill, who is being held in a southern prison.

It is unclear when the judge will rule on Miller’s motion.

If he were released, Miller says he would live with a brother in Houston.

The medical center of the federal prison in Rochester, Minnesota, where Randall “Madman” Miller is held.

Gary Gauger says Miller should stay behind bars.

“He has created his world, he lives in it, and his thoughts and his mind, that’s all he has,” says Gary Gauger. “No, he should not be released. He says what is convenient because he wants out.”

Another son of the murdered Gaugers, Gregg Gauger, opposed Miller’s last-ditch efforts to release him from prison. But now, after reading Miller’s new letter, Gregg Gauger says he wants to take a “neutral” stance.

“I was surprised that he finally took the blame,” says Gregg Gauger. “I never thought he would ever do that. This time I’m going to take a neutral position and not oppose it. So it’s up to Stadtmüller.”