Posted on 10/07/2007 10:23:40 AM PDT by janetjanet998
Edited on 10/07/2007 10:34:41 PM PDT by Admin Moderator. [history]
Nothing seemed out of the ordinary Saturday night when Tyler Peterson met up with a bunch of friends in a parking lot behind a Crandon bank.
They talked about hunting, what to do later that night. Typical stuff. That was it. It was 8:30 p.m.
But before the sun would rise, Peterson, a 20-year-old, off-duty Forest County sheriff's deputy and part-time City of Crandon police officer, would be suspected of storming into his ex-girlfriend's house and killing her and five other young people at a party, including two of his best childhood buddies.
Another teen was critically wounded.
Peterson would later end up dead, shot by the Crandon SWAT team.
"He must have just snapped," said a close friend who had known Peterson since they were in kindergarten and talked to him in the parking lot Saturday night. "He seemed fine (at 8:30 p.m.)."
Authorities in Crandon, about 180 miles north of Milwaukee, did not release details of the killings or the names of the victims Sunday, but the Journal Sentinel learned from interviews with families and friends that the following were killed:
• Jordanne Murray, 18, Peterson's former longtime sweetheart, who graduated from Crandon High School in 2006.
• Katrina McCorkle, an 18-year-old senior at Crandon High.
• Leanna Thomas, also an 18-year-old senior at Crandon.
• Bradley Schultz, 20, a 2005 graduate of Crandon and a student at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee majoring in criminal justice.
• Aaron Smith, called "Chunk" by his friends, also a 2005 graduate of Crandon. His age was not available.
• Lindsey Stahl, 14, a freshman at Crandon.
Charlie Nietzel, 19, of the neighboring town of Pickerel was wounded. He was in critical condition late Sunday at St. Joseph's Hospital in Marshfield.
Because a local law enforcement officer was involved, the investigation is being handled by the state Department of Criminal Investigation. Officials would not disclose any information Sunday other than to say authorities responded to a report of shots fired at 2:47 a.m., and that six people and the killer were dead.
Three-term Crandon Mayor Gary Bradley expressed anger and frustration at the state's handling of the case, complaining about a lack of information for officials and families and the length of time being taken in removing the bodies from the home.
"Man, they paralyzed this town," he said.
Bradley confirmed that Peterson was shot and killed by the Crandon SWAT team Sunday afternoon, hours after the early morning shootings.
Although few in Crandon knew exactly what happened in Murray's home, in a town where the population barely pushes 2,000, seemingly everyone knew the victims or the shooter.
Fay Statezny has known the Petersons and the families of several of the other victims for 20 years or more. Statezny said Tyler Peterson was "a normal kid" who liked to hunt and fish and loved the outdoors.
He had grown up with Smith and Schultz, and they were all very close friends.
"We would all go mud-running and ice fishing," said Peterson's longtime friend from kindergarten, who didn't want his name published because of the sensitivity of the situation.
He said Peterson and Murray had been together for a long time and broke up earlier this year. He debunked rumors that Murray was dating someone else, sparking a jealous rage in Peterson.
Paul Pitts, a 17-year-old senior, said Peterson was the type of guy who was picked on by students when he was in high school.
Other friends and neighbors said Peterson, who was officially deputized in February, had recently completed special-forces-type training.
It made sense to Jenny Stahl that her 14-year-old daughter, Lindsey, should stay the night at Murray's house. After all, it was homecoming weekend; lots of kids were sleeping at friends' homes. It cut down on the late-night driving. It would be safer that way, they thought.
Lindsey Stahl and Murray both worked at an ice cream and hamburger stand called Eats and Treats in Crandon. They stopped at Stahl's home around 9 p.m. to pick up a change of clothes.
At 8 a.m. Sunday, Jenny Stahl got a knock on her door. Her neighbor told her of the slayings and took her to Praise Chapel Community Church, where she waited with the families of the other victims for word about their loved ones. Stahl hoped for the best.
"I thought maybe she wasn't there, maybe she got out," Stahl said in an interview in her driveway, where she stood with friends and neighbors hugging and drinking Pepsi.
She waited eight hours. At 4 p.m., authorities announced the names of the dead. Lindsey was on the list.
The 14-year-old's half brother, Ryan Coulter, 12, said his sister was smart and interested in issues ranging from global warming to animal rights.
"She probably would have changed the world, you know," he said.
Jenny Stahl grew up in Kenosha and moved her family to Crandon because she thought the small community would be a safer place for her children to grow up.
Elsie Murray, Jordanne's grandmother, said the family was not able Sunday to talk about what happened.
Friends said Jordanne lived in the lower level of the house and her father, Paul Murray, lived in the upper level.
Kelly Flanery, 15, a sophomore at Crandon High, knew all of the victims and said that in addition to working at the ice cream shop, Jordanne Murray worked at Subway in Crandon.
She "was like the nicest person. She was friends with everyone," said Flanery. "I didn't believe it at first. It didn't like sink in, it really hasn't."
Schultz grew up in Crandon but moved to Cudahy two years ago to attend UW-Milwaukee, where he was a junior, said his uncle Steve Bocek, who lives in Oak Creek. Schultz worked part-time at a Racine electrical supply company to pay for school.
The middle of three boys, Schultz often drove to Crandon on weekends to visit his mother, who is blind with retinitis pigmentosa, and younger brother.
"He was just always a nice kid, always polite. He just wanted to come down here to go to school so he could further his education," said Bocek, who last saw his nephew three weeks ago when Schultz visited to swim in Bocek's backyard pool.
Schultz, who had a girlfriend in the Milwaukee area, had played basketball and baseball at Crandon High School.
"He was such a good kid; who would ever expect this?" his uncle said.
McCorkle and Jordanne Murray had been "friends forever," said a former boyfriend of McCorkle's. McCorkle loved to play softball and was thinking about where to attend college, he said. And she was very tight with her family.
"Her family meant everything to her," he said.
Friends said Smith, or "Chunk," as friends called him, was into football and loved to fish.
"He was one of them guys that everybody gets along with," said a childhood friend who also grew up with Peterson and Schultz.
Smith's sister said her family was grieving and couldn't talk.
Thomas' grandfather, Roy Thomas, said his granddaughter has a twin sister, Lindsay. "She was a sweet little girl," he said tearfully before hanging up the phone.
As streets were barricaded near the shooting scene, the soul of Crandon seemed to shake with grief.
"This is affecting everybody in this small community," said Tom Vollmar, a Forest County supervisor who has lived in Crandon for 57 years. "There's no family that hasn't been touched in one way or another."
Schools Superintendent Richard Peters said the victims and Peterson were all "people who we have known or patted on the back or encouraged at one point in time."
Crandon High School's crisis team gathered twice Sunday. Counselors fanned out to area churches to help families and friends of the victims who had gathered there.
School is canceled today.
Praise Chapel Community Church Pastor Bill Farr was called by the Forest County Sheriff's Department at 6:30 a.m. Sunday and asked to open the church for victims' families and other members of the community. About 200 people showed up during the day. He said it took so long for authorities to release the names because state investigators were handling the case.
More than a dozen hours later, Farr was still at the church.
"This is going to take a long time for a community like this to get over," said Farr, who has lived in Crandon for many years.
Standing next to his pickup truck in the church parking lot Sunday night, Farr began to cry as he held hands and prayed with three other church members.
"We just really need everyone's prayers right now," he said.
And there are people here and elsewhere who will find cops guilty no matter what. We will be a lot better off as a society when we are educated enough to look at the facts in individual cases and make judgements. Do you understand what happened in the Duke Lacrosse Rapist case?
My experience doesn't alway agree with this. CNN is actually pretty accurate on breaking stories between 1 AM and 6 AM, before management is in to "properly" spin the story...
Of course, YMMV.
I like to sleep as well, but two of the people believed to be killed are close friends of my family and with my children. It was homecoming weekend in Crandon as well so people that are not the normal “party” crowd were out after the big win.
Police have not released any information to any of the families yet even though they are calling every 20 minutes. I dont know how long it will take to release information, but gosh I hope it is not much longer everyone is ready to break.
“Do you understand what happened in the Duke Lacrosse Rapist case?”
The government tried to pin crimes on innocent people. Your point?
Most of us are waiting for more information before opining on whether the shootings could possibly have been justified. However, with the sheriff’s department saying that the suspect is considered “armed and dangerous”, I sort of doubt there’s any justification forthcoming. Usually if there’s any indication that a shooting may have been justified, the applicable law enforcement agency issues platitudes about not being able to speak to that issue due to the “ongoing investigation”. When a LEO-shooter’s own department is referring to him as a “suspect” who is “armed and dangerous”, I’ll take their word for it — since they have badges :-)
*sigh* Yeah. The liberals viewed this as an act of kindness to release these lunatics from 'enforced' care.
They really aren't very good at foreseeing consequences are they?
Example: "Impeach Bush" = "I'm for President Cheney"...
Welcome to FR. Hope you’ll stick around beyond this story. The best thing about this forum is the huge web of on-the-ground reporters like you, providing information that hasn’t been sanitized by the mainstream media outlets. Debates can get a little rough-and-tumble around here, but don’t let it scare you off.
“Most of us are waiting for more information before opining on whether the shootings could possibly have been justified”
Lets see here. He’s 21, one of the victims is an ex, there were 6 shot and he ran away afterwards. How much info do you need?
‘Gun grabbers’? Where did I mention guns at all? Do you even know how to read?
Hey, it was just a hypothesis. Right underneeth that (you know, the part you didn’t quote) I said ‘or maybe not. Who knows.’
No. But thanks for caring enough to ask.
Just heard that everybody in Crandon are being ordered to stay where they are (shelter in place?), and not discuss any details with anyone (gag order).
See post #48, from a newbie who’s familiar with the area. The house was right across from the police department, so it sounds like it was in a semi-commercial area.
FYI
Thanks for the contribution to the forum. Great info.
Off topic info for anyone in the area.
Unfortunately in the case of many cops, even when the evidence is clearly against them they walk, get very reduced charges, or have the department they work in cover their crimes up.
So pardon me if I’m not confident the cops will get it done right.
Typically, a gunman on the loose in northern Wisconsin is a very temporary situation. Much of the population has experience with picking off large animals at long distances with a rifle and scope.
Wow, I’m impressed. You managed to not call me a gun grabber, druggie, or illegal alien lover. How do you manage....
No one here will “take the side” of this deputy. Often when there’s a shooting by a law enforcement officer, debates break out here between people who basically view all law enforcement officers as “jack-booted thugs” who run around brutalizing innocent citizens, and people who think we should withhold judgement until more facts are known, since police officers often have to make quick life-and-death decisions and their targets often aren’t as innocent as the target’s friends and relatives loudly start claiming. If a law enforcement officer gives a reason why he believes his shooting was justified, and his department isn’t saying otherwise, I’ll usually give him the benefit of the doubt. What’s going on here is clearly a whole different ballgame — this guy’s department is hunting for him, not defending him.
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