On the night of December 7, 2000, two armed robbers raided the Wingate Inn, located near Atlanta in Cobb County, Georgia. One leapt over the front counter, leaving a fingerprint behind, and shot the night manager in the chest.
The victim of the fatal gunshot wound was 36-year-old Rodney Castlin. He had been working nights so he could take daytime business classes.
Castlin’s widow, Kelley Castlin, was eight months pregnant at the time of his death; the two also shared a young son. Castlin also left behind two children from a previous relationship.
The robbers stole $304.
Hours after the murder, detective John Dawes promised Kelley Castlin the case would be solved. In 2000, Dawes handled the murder as a forensic investigator. In 2012, Dawes, then a homicide detective who also investigated cold cases, learned a federal prisoner was a potential witness in Castlin’s case. In 2014, Dawes became head of the Cobb County Cold Case Unit and continued to pursue Castlin’s killer.
Castlin’s case will be the subject of an episode of A&E’s Cold Case Files in 2023.
Dawes spoke to A&E True Crime about the investigation into Castlin’s case and the eventual conviction of Castlin’s murderer in March 2016.
Rodney Castlin’s killer left fingerprints behind when he leapt over the counter. How unusual was it to discover evidence like this in an armed robbery case?
To think that somebody came in there to commit an armed robbery and didn’t have their hands covered, was just bizarre to me. As much as fingerprints are elementary investigative work…for somebody coming into a business to commit an armed robbery, it’s just as elementary that they would have on gloves.
That print was run through the Automated Fingerprint Identification System (AFIS), beginning early in 2001, and it always came up ‘no match.’
In 2012, while I was still active duty with the Cobb County Police in the homicide unit, but able to look into cold cases as well, we started getting some information about a person who had information about this armed robbery-homicide. That person apparently had knowledge of a homicide that happened at a hotel with ‘Win’ in the name, 12 years earlier north of Atlanta.
In about June of 2012, I requested that print be scanned again, and this time we got the hit that it matched James Lorenzo Randolph. Randolph had been released from prison in South Carolina. He was arrested three weeks after Rodney was murdered. He had just completed his South Carolina Department of Corrections time, maybe a year earlier in 2010 or 2011, and was walking the streets in Columbia, South Carolina.
At that point, I knew we stood a really great chance to get the case resolved.
How would your investigation have proceeded with the fingerprint match but without the [witness] cooperation?
James Lorenzo Randolph was arrested [in late December 2000]…in Columbia, South Carolina, for a commercial armed robbery [at a restaurant]. He left his thumbprint on the cash drawer in that case. And they got him quickly on that print, so he was in custody in three weeks.
He was described to have had a weapon in his possession that was a black revolver, small caliber in appearance, and that’s what Rodney Castlin was shot with. So there were any number of things that I think we could have used to have gotten there.
However, I worked hard to pull in this guy that had the information, the guy who had been driving the car. I was able to eliminate him from even going into the Wingate based on his physical description. He provided information that we were able to corroborate and give a lot of credit to, so it worked out well.
So the deal that the driver received, you felt it was worth it?
It came down to this: We have an opportunity to grant immunity on state of Georgia charges and let this guy serve out his federal sentence, or we keep working the case with hopes that we can solve it just based on the fingerprint.
I don’t know that I could have charged him if he hadn’t provided a statement, so he would have walked anyway. So I think it was the right call.
You’d promised Rodney Castlin’s widow, Kelley Castlin, you would find the killer. As years passed and the investigation became a cold case, did the promise weigh on you in any way?
I felt like this case was going to be solved, and that stayed with me. When I got the fingerprint information and identified Randolph in 2012… You start getting frustrated because now you’ve got the evidence and you’re still not quite there.
There are nights where you don’t sleep, thinking, What have I missed? What did I need to do? What can I do different?
I was in Columbia, South Carolina, on October 6, 2014, when Randolph was arrested. I got to communicate with Kelley by phone that day. To hear her reaction and response, it just completely overwhelms you emotionally.
Did you attend the trial after testifying?
Yes, I was in the courtroom a lot, assisting—they call it ‘aid to prosecution’—the chief deputy district attorney who was in charge of prosecuting the case.
How did it feel to see justice be delivered?
When Judge Flournoy announced the sentence and it was three life sentences plus 35 years, that’s a great feeling. Because I know that Randolph is not going to get out of prison and ever rob another business, or shoot another man in the chest and ruin a family.
Rodney Castlin was an incredible man, great husband, great dad and trying to better himself in life, continuing his education while working to support his family.
Prior to being sentenced [on April 26, 2016], Randolph said of the Castlin family, ‘I apologize that they lost a loved one. I know how they feel because I lost two loved ones. I’m sorry, man.’ Do you think that he was in any way genuinely remorseful?
I was sitting there in the courtroom when he made the statement from the stand. The man doesn’t know remorse. Those words were very shallow.
It was just something he thought maybe he needed to say to try to help himself out.
Does solving a cold case like Castlin’s give hope to families who are connected to other cold cases that they might get answers?
I think they do get hope when they see one solved. They say, ‘They didn’t forget about that case. They were able to resolve that case. Hopefully they’re working on mine.’
Related Features:
The Murder of Bruce Blackwood: How a NYC Cop and a Killer’s Daughter Solved a Cold Case
The Work of a Cold Case Detective: Finding Answers Years After a Crime
Here’s How a Georgia Prosecutor Got Justice for a Man Murdered Before She Was Born
