Several people took me to task for yesterday's post about the double murder/suicide in Wilmette, just as they did awhile back when I made the assertion that crime victims often ignore warning signs of danger, particularly when they occur in relationships.
Richard Wiley was an ex-con who murdered his first wife by stabbing her almost two dozen times. He was convicted, served fifteen years of a thirty year sentence, and was released in 2000. The man who prosecuted him is quoted as saying Wiley,"gave me chills."
Eight months after his release, Kathryn Motes married him.
Over the weekend, the couple reportedly argued. Then, police say, Wiley shot her and her teenage son, spent the night writing a suicide note, then killed himself.
Motes knew Wiley killed his first wife. So did her pastor and the people in her church. The pastor who married them tells the Tribune she even had misgivings about marrying the two but that Motes assured her she had considered all the scenarios and could, "deal with it."
And some of you think there weren't warning signs in this relationship? C'mon! The man got angry and stabbed wife number one twenty-three times! Some relationships have subtle hints of problems to come. This one flashed, "DANGER AHEAD" in big red letters from the first day they met. Undoubtedly there were other, more subtle, warnings that went unheeded over the past eight years, too.
Yet, as one friend noted to me yesterday, "People see what they want to see." And no one wants to see evil when they look into the eyes of someone they love.
My final thoughts on the subject? God Bless Kathryn Motes for loving Richard Wiley despite his history. God Bless the members of their church for accepting him and supporting her. I wish it had all turned out differently for them and her son. May God rest their souls.
"Thus," as I am fond of quoting Sean Connery in The Untouchables, "endeth the lesson."
Oh, but not really. A little postscript.
Recently a young mother in the Chicago area moved in with an ex-cop with a history of checkered relationships. You know the one I mean. One ex-wife dead in their bathtub? The other one missing? His grinning face all over the news on a regular basis? That guy.
Another pretty obvious case of warning bells clanging loudly, right? Personally, I think she'll go missing someday, too. Just because he wants the thrill of doing it right under the noses of people who are watching and waiting for it to happen.
I'm more worried about the silent domestic alarms, however. The ones going off, maybe in a relationship in your community. Maybe even between people you know and care about.
Perhaps nasty words have given way to shouting. Making threats. Or grabbing an arm and twisting it. Or giving a shove. Maybe a punch. Maybe one of the kids has an unexplainable bruise. Or someone has a black eye from "running into a door." Or someone fell down a flight of stairs.
Accidents, pure and simple? Or warning signs of domestic abuse?
What does your intuition tell you?
What are you going to do about it?
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