Quadruple murder ............

A quadruple murder occurred in a nearby town a little over a week ago. The victims were Debra Kelley, a professor at Longwood University; her daughter, Emma Niederbrock; her daughter's friend, Melanie Wells who was visiting from West Virginia; and Kelley's estranged husband, Mark Niederbrock, a pastor. The bodies were discovered on Friday at Debra Kelley's home when police officers went there at the request of Melanie Wells' family who had been unable to get in contact with her. The police arrested Richard Samuel Alden McCroskey III, a 20 year old from Alameda County, California on Saturday at the Richmond airport.

The police are still trying to determine exactly what happened. McCroskey was an aspiring horrorcore rapper who went by the name of Syko Sam. I checked his MySpace page before it was taken down. His lyrics talk about killing - "I've killed many people and I kill them real slow. It's the best feeling, watching their last breath." His page was full of satanic images and upside down crosses. He knew Emma and Melanie through the internet and had attended a horrorcore concert in Detroit with them several weeks ago.

I won't go into all the details - if you're interested you can google Farmville murders or McCroskey. When I saw the video of the police escorting McCroskey to jail, I was struck by how young he looked. I was in Farmville the day they believe the murders occurred. If I had seen this kid, nothing about him would have alarmed me. I'm sure Emma's mother and father had no idea he was so dangerous. Today when kids meet people on the internet, they have no idea who they are talking to. It's hard for parents to monitor all of their children's online interactions. Events like this make me glad that I am childless (by choice). If I had children, I would probably worry myself sick or else lock them up out of harm's way.

This was such a tragedy for all the families involved. My heart goes out to each one of them.