"To have it die because of one demigod out in Waukesha?

‘What more can we do?’ ” says Hinterthuer. “Our hands were tied. We had done virtually everything we could. There was nobody else out there we could talk to, there was no additional evidence that existed.

”Hinterthuer had had enough. In May 1997, after 30 years of duty, he retired from the Milwaukee Police Department.

He still harbors resentment toward Bucher for not pushing harder on the Machan case.

Possibly Bucher was intimidated by the Outlaws, Hinterthuer speculates. Or possibly his aspirations to one day run for political office – specifically, the job of state attorney general – got in the way of pursuing a case that was risky.

“To have it die because of one demigod out in Waukesha? That’s obscene,” says Hinterthuer.