Law-enforcement officials say Eyler is just trying to escape execution. They also fear that a deal would effectively reward a death-row inmate for committing multiple murders. To improve his credibility - and avoid a second death sentence - Eyler pleaded guilty last month to the 1982 killing of Steven Agan, a 23-year-old car-wash worker from Terre Haute, Ind. He also named an accomplice: 52-year-old Robert Little, a former professor at Indiana State University. Eyler claims Little exerted a Manson-like influence, pushing him to find victims for bondage and murder. (Little will stand trial April 2 in the Agan case.) Eyler is giving the state until the end of January to accept his offer or he’ll take his secrets “to the grave.” That puts the state in a strange predicament: to let a multiple murderer escape the death penalty - or let 20 alleged homicides go completely unpunished.
