I had an interesting morning.

The crisis du jour was a call at 4:04 am from DS21 who was at O'Hare International Airport attempting to board a flight for Atlanta where a connecting flight would take him to Cancun for an all expenses paid trip compliments of the company he worked for this past year.

He applied for his passport 10 weeks ago and paid for expedited service. When it did not arrive before departure day, he went to the DOS website (travel.state.gov) and followed the directions concerning printing out his application information and read that he needed that and a photo ID issued by a government agency in order to travel today. His state ID card and DL meet the requirements, so off he went. (off WE went, since I drove him to a friend's apartment and got home at around midnight)

When he arrived at the airport, he found out that the airlines don't have to settle for what is on the DOS website and can, if they choose, to require additional documentation. Delta does require this and refused him boarding for not having his notarized birth certificate, the last copy of which he had left at the county courthouse when he applied for his passport.

He went to airport police HQ and was told that it wasn't their decision, but Delta could require what ever they wanted.

He called the travel company that he worked for and got new flight info and then rode a train downtown to the Federal Building in Chicago. He got in line with 350 people two hours before the doors opened, then stood there till someone got his info and found that his passport was ready and had been for a couple of weeks, but had not yet been mailed because the mail-room was backed up.

This woman, name unknown, but deserving of an award for common sense, found his passport and got it to him. His mother had already gone to the county courthouse and driven the nearly 50 miles into Chicago and was driving around waiting for him with a new copy of his birth certificate.

Mom got him to the airport and he boarded a flight and was underway around 1:30 pm after the same moronic security people unpacked his bag and questioned his Armani aftershave since they'd never heard of it before.

I think he took it all in stride and did pretty well considering that his Dad (me) would have been arrested around 5:45 this morning.

As all of this began and while I was calling my congressman at 5:30, we heard sirens go by a couple blocks away. An hour later, we had helicopters hovering over our neighborhood and found that they were a mix of IL State Police and various news media outlets.

As my wife drove off to go to the courthouse, I switched on the television and heard the breaking news.

At a cell phone tower about 2 blocks and twenty yards from my front door, along a road where on a typical morning my wife would have been walking the dog between 4:45 and 5 am, the bodies of three children and a woman thought to be their mother were found in an SUV along with a man, thought to be her husband, who was still alive and taken to an area hospital by ambulance.

Last I was able to find out the names were still being withheld pending NOK notification. Details were still sketchy as of the last time I looked, but I would almost bet, somebody was having an affair...

The story can be found at Woman and Three Children Dead

It all just reminded me that nothing is ever so bad it can't get worse.

I think I need a (fishing) vacation.

Maybe Unalakleet... <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/crazy.gif" alt="" />

Mark

Holy cow!

I won't complain about a bad day ever again!

(Well maybe not ever again - but for a while....)

JinGA

Maybe my weekend wasn't so bad. At least we are all still breathing.

Breath in and out, we get to make it through another day!!!

FTS <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/tongue.gif" alt="" />

Update(s):

DS is on his way to Mexico!

The bodies found in the SUV have been identified as Kimberly Vaughn, 34 and her children, Abigail Vaughn 12, Cassandra Vaughn 11, and Blake Vaughn age 8 all of Oswego, IL.

The wounded man, said to be her husband was talking to IL State Police following treatment and release from Provena St Joseph Medical Center in Joliet. He was not being called a suspect at the time of latest news broadcasts. His wound seems to be in the leg and it was he who flagged down a passerby this morning and asked them to call 911.

The SUV is being processed by Will County CSIs attached to the coroner's office.

Police spokesmen say it was a case of "domestic violence." A gun was found inside the vehicle and appears to be the murder weapon.

Nobody is saying who shot who yet.

I have two theories, but I'll keep them to myself.

Mark

NBC5 Chicago just had another report on the murders.

The husband says he pulled off the highway because the luggage carrier had come loose on top of the Excursion. He said that's when "All ****** cut loose."

IL State Police say that Mr Vaughn is NOT a suspect and has been released by them and can go home.

When asked if that meant that they thought the wife had perpetrated the crime, the official answer was "No comment at this time."

Neighbors said the family was beginning a vacation trip this morning...

Gives one new perspective on this stuff.

Mark

Mark,

I haven't been on this board in ages, I almost couldn't sign in and reply because I couldn't remember my password. I'm glad it came to me, makes me feel better that my mind isn't completely shot. LOL

What a tragedy. I find it interesting that your thought behind it went straight to infidelity. I thought the same thing, but prior to having infidelity in our marriage the thought never would have crossed my mind.

OT, but you and I are from similar stomping grounds. Although we don't live in the area any longer, my hubby and I grew up on the opposite side of Joliet, down the road a bit and lived there for the first 10 years of our marriage. I even worked PRN at St Joes back in the day.

This has nothing to do with your thread, but based on things I have read from you and knew we were from the same area. I was just trying to figure out if I would end up knowing you in real life. I think we're safe, although I know the area I don't believe I know anyone who lives on your side of Joliet. LOL

I'm glad your son made it on his vacation. Too bad he got the run around.

I heard about this tragedy this morning on the way to work, but I haven't watched the news

OMG..I live in Oswego!

My kids know some kids last name Vaughn, but they are older.

Sooo sad, this community has had too much tragedy this year already

LC,

I once lived on the other side of Joliet myself, in Ingalls Park to be exact.

I've been involved in retail in the area for 17 years and once worked for Radio Shack in downtown Joliet, when there was a downtown.

Since I have been here all of my nearly 55 years, the idea of perhaps our having crossed paths at some point is not out of the question. Since I have been actively involved in other activities in the area for so long, we might have actually met at some point. It is a small world.

I once ran into an old high school friend while hitch-hiking in Utah. I was coming from Oregon, he from California and we arrived at the same truck stop in Monticello within 10 minutes of each other. We made our way back to Joliet together and haven't seen each other since.

FWIW, it is not only my own recent travails that led me to my first assumption that infidelity might be involved, but a whole host of things I have seen and heard in the past few years. I think that without my own sitch being so fresh, I might not have paid much attention to that possibility, but in recent months the story of Lisa Stebic, the story on 48 hours last week, and a bunch of other cases of people involved in affairs and either them or their spouse committing murder have appeared in pretty rapid succession.

BTW, there is no official word as to the presence of an affair in this case.

The latest, from what is being said, is that forensics supports Mr Vaughn's description of events that led to the deaths of his wife and three children. The luggage carrier was loose, he got out to fix it and while he re-entered the vehicle, Mrs Vaughn began shooting at him, striking him in the thigh as he fled.

He literally ran for his life, hearing multiple shots behind him as he ran, thinking she was continuing to shoot at him. When the shooting stopped, he approached the car and found his wife and three innocent children all dead. The kids were each shot multiple times at close range and appear to have been shot from the angle of the front passenger seat.

BL,

The whole Chicago area has been in a mess for a long time. What surprises me most is that people are still shocked by the utter depravity of mankind.

Update: on DS21 and his dream vacation.

He arrived 6 hours late in Cancun with no sleep since he got up Tuesday morning at 9 am and went out drinking with his friends and promptly lost his wallet.

Hope he has enough fun to get it out of his system but suffers enough to learn his lesson. This is not the first time he has lost his wallet, and not even the first time this year.

Can't drive to Cancun for a rescue on this one...

<SIGH>

Mark

Mark,

I hadn't heard the Lisa Stebic story or about the one on 48 hours, but did check them out. Did they determine an A was present in the Stebic case? I didn't see info on that part of it, it they did.

My H and I were discussing the family from Channahon and he right away went with the A angle, too. I was watching the Chicago news videos from the last few days. It is such a sad situation. I won't be surprised if an OW shows up somewhere along the line, but that is just my opinion on the matter.

Yes, it is very possible our paths have crossed at some point in our lives or at least the paths of family members since both my H's and my family still live in the area.

I just don't understand how people think killing their spouse is the answer, but I read these words here and truly believe them: "I think it is a brick wall of ugly reality...that previously sane, intelligent, disciplined, accomplished people act like PSYCHOS in affairs." I can't give credit to the author because I can't recall who originally said them or what thread it was on.

Your son didn't lose his passport, too, did he?

edited to clarify.

LC,

Son still has his passport. I was up till 4 am trying to get info to him concerning the $ I wired via WU. I couldn't reach him because he was out doing what college kids go to Cancun for...drinking. This he gets to do for free with his VIP pass, so lack of money didn't hinder this. He needs the money because while he can get free food, he is expected to tip the wait staff, keeping in mind that this is a 30 story luxury hotel on the beach of Cancun.

The news media has not pursued the infidelity angle in the Stebic case. But I can say that early comments by the husband stated that it was not unusual for Lisa to go out and not return for one or more days. The two were divorcing but lived in the same house and there were rumors of As on the part of both.

In the Vaughn case, I suspected that one of them may have been involved in an A, since we have seen recently the crazy things that go on in such cases. Can you say astronutcase?

The 48 Hours story was interesting to watch at our house to say the least. During the whole time, I wondered if my W realized how fortunate she is that I am not typically a violent person.

For me, all of it shows how far any one of us can slide when we choose to ignore God and He leaves us totally in our own hands. It is the people who KNOW the truth and yet follow the lie that have the most to fear IMO.

Mark

Nobody but nobody should doubt the varied and potentially deadly effects of the chemical soup our brains endure from affairs. Both the WS and BS get full measure of all sorts of emotionally induced endorphins, hormones, etc.

Crazy as an outhouse rat, as Plank likes to say.

Larry

I don't know.

But what upset me about the whole thing is HOW CAN YOU KILL YOUR KIDS???????

I do not understand how you could kill your kids. EVER. I do not understand how people could do that.

I don't know. The whole Vaughn case seems so sketchy, we will see.

But the kids? It breaks my heart.

Don't police often declare that a key individual is "not a suspect in the case" in the hopes that it results in that individual relaxing a little too much and ending up incriminating themselves in some way? Or is that just something I got from watching too many crime dramas? <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

BTW, one of the newer articles reports that his in-laws are saying that his story of where they were going doesn't match up with his wife's.

Also, it struck me as kind of cowardly to run away long enough to allow your wife to kill all your kids in cold blood - I mean, assuming he is in fact the stand-up guy he's trying to portray himself as being.

Last I read Mr Vaughn has been missing since Thurs. Allegedly even his own parents do not know where he is.

First of all, the police are saying that forensic evidence supports Mr Vaughn's story, not only that he isn't a person of interest or a suspect.

Secondly, having been shot at, I can tell you that you do not think, you move. According to police (not the media but the police) he scrambled to get away as she began shooting, the first shot striking him in the leg. As he moved away, she continued shooting and his assumption was that she was shooting at HIM, not the kids. FWIW, he probably ran less than 20 yards from the car, just to the end of the tree line south of the tower.

Third, after any kind of case like this, all kinds of things are said. One woman in our neighborhood said she heard two groups of shots...at 10:30 the night before while the Vaughn's were all at home in bed. The murders happened at 5:15ish the next morning.

The fact that his wife told her family something other than what he is saying comes as no surprise. If, as it appears, she is in fact the killer, I find it very easy to believe that she may also have lied to her family.

As far as anyone knowing where he is..I don't think I'd run right home to where I lived with my wife and children now that they were all dead, at her hands. This would be especially true if I knew that a thousand reporters were waiting for me.

I will admit that there is a piece of this story missing, but I do not think Mr Vaughn ever will be charged with any wrong doing in this case, because I think it went down just as he described it. He was shot first according to evidence at the scene. She was shot last, while he was out of the car. Sometimes the survivor is the victim, not the perp.


As much as anyone hates to admit that a mother would kill her own children, this is not the first case of this and not even the first since the first of the year.

Also, to say he should have taken another bullet to save his kids is to presuppose that he himself thought that his wife planned to kill them. If it is hard for us to imagine, how much harder for him? It also presupposes that by taking another shot himself, or basically sacrificing himself and letting her kill him first that the kids would be spared, which is even less logical than killing your own children.

He was not only being shot at by the last person on the planet he would suspect of doing such a thing, but was in fact hit by the very first shot. The only heroes who continue to remain in harm's way by design after that, are dead heroes.

And just so you know, she didn't just shoot the kids once each. She basically sprayed bullets into the back seat repeatedly. She likely even stopped and reloaded before continuing. All three of them were shot multiple times. This was not a case of a wife gone berserk over dirty socks left on the floor.

Just so you know, the cellphone tower is less than 250 yards from my front door. The police chief lives in the house over my back fence. For us, this isn't just a local story, but a neighborhood story.

Mark

Thanks for the additional information. I, most certainly, wasn't giving anyone the benefit of the doubt.

You said this:

"The fact that his wife told her family something other than what he is saying comes as no surprise. If, as it appears, she is in fact the killer, I find it very easy to believe that she may also have lied to her family."

I have to agree with you and especially if she was having psychological issues. I know when I was falling head first over the deep end, after I ended my A and before I confessed to my H, I didn't tell anyone how I was feeling and that there was "something" wrong with me. I could recognize that I was being irrational, but I lacked the ability to stop myself from acting like a total psycho-freak. I never had any violent thoughts, but if I did I'm not sure I would have been able to stop those either. It's a very scary place to be that's for sure.

I feel for the whole family, there will always be so many unanswered questions.

I'm bumping this back up. According to a Chicago news report the father has been arrested for the murders and has admitted to having an affair.

Here is a link to a video on NBC news:
http://video.nbc5.com/player/?id=122314