Rolf Kaestel, an Arkansas man who served 40 years of a life sentence for using a toy gun to rob a Fort Smith restaurant of $265 in 1981, can’t seem to escape the Department of Corrections, even in death.
A crucial whistleblower in the Arkansas prison blood scandal, Kaestel died Feb 25, 2024, of cirrhosis and liver cancer. His death came less than three years after he was granted clemency by former Gov. Asa Hutchinson.
On April 16, 2025, more than a year after Kaestel’s death, his parole officer showed up at his former Sherwood residence looking for him, to the bewilderment of the home’s current inhabitants.
Gayla Hooten, a former paralegal and friend of Kaestel, happened to be in Kaestel’s former home visiting her sister, who now lives there, when parole officer Angelo Townsend showed up and asked if Kaestel was still living there.
Townsend, who was holding a white envelope, “looked very stunned” when Hooten told him Kaestel was dead, she said.
Hooten, also stunned, had already called the Arkansas Department of Corrections and informed them of Kaestel’s death more than a year ago, she said. She told Townsend this fact and asked if he wanted Kaestel’s death certificate; he declined and left, Hooten said.
“On Feb. 20, [2024], Rolf was still living and Ofc. Townsend made a text to Rolf’s phone that said, ‘I need you to come in and sign new paperwork that was generated Jan. 1, 2024,’” Hooten said. “Well, Rolf did not call him back.”
On Feb. 27, two days after Kaestel died,...
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