Shoot Up A Church, Blame Lyme Disease
Mar 9, 2009 6 Comments ›› Pat Dollard
FOX:
Illinois Church Gunman Charged With First-Degree Murder
The man suspected of killing a pastor and injuring two others at a suburban St. Louis church on Sunday has been charged with first-degree murder.
Terry Sedlacek, 27, was also charged with aggravated battery in the shooting, according to Stephanee Smith of the Madison County state’s attorney’s office, who said prosecutors aren’t commenting on a motive.
Sedlacek is accused of killing the Rev. Fred Winters, who was shot through the heart during his sermon at the sprawling First Baptist Church in Maryville on Sunday. Smith says Sedlacek also is accused of wounding two worshippers who fought to subdue him after he allegedly pulled a knife.
Chief Judge Ann Callis on Monday also ordered Sedlacek held without bond. He remains hospitalized in St. Louis with self-inflicted knife wounds.
One of the parishioners also remains hospitalized in serious condition.
The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported late Sunday that Sedlacek had developed mental illness while suffering from Lyme disease, according to his family. FOX News could not immediately confirm the report.
According to the newspaper, the man’s mother, Ruth Abernathy, said he contracted the disease after he was bitten by a tick on a family farm in the late 1990s. She described him as an avid outdoorsman and hunter.
The man was taking several medications to combat the disease and seizures, which nearly killed him in 2003, the paper reported.
Neighbors, who believed Sedlacek was mentally ill, told a reporter he would sometimes wander into the middle of the road and shout obscenities for no reason.
Illinois State Police Director Larry Trent said Monday morning on CBS’s “The Early Show” that authorities are “hopeful” the suspect, whom authorities did not name and described only as a 27-year-old from Troy, can be charged sometime Monday.
The gunman strode toward Winters shortly after 8 a.m. Sunday in the church, exchanged words with him, then fired a .45-caliber semiautomatic pistol until it jammed. Churchgoers then wrestled him to the ground as he brandished a knife, Trent said.
Worshippers at the sprawling First Baptist Church in Maryville, Ill., initially weren’t alarmed when the young man walked up the church’s center aisle during the early morning sermon — until he opened fire.
None of the about 150 worshippers attending the early morning service seemed to recognize the gunman, and investigators did not know details of Winters’ conversation with him, Trent said, but they planned to review an audio recording of the service.
Winters later died of his injuries.
The mystery leaves church members wondering why anyone would want to hurt the man who was their pastor for 22 years — and why.
Authorities didn’t know whether Winters, a married father of two, knew the gunman.
Winters deflected the first of the gunman’s four rounds with a Bible, sending a confetti-like spray of paper into the air in a horrifying scene worshippers initially thought was a skit, police said.
“We just sat there waiting for what comes next not realizing that he had wounded the pastor,” said Linda Cunningham, whose husband is a minister of adult education at the 1,200-member church.
Winters had stood on an elevated platform to deliver his sermon about finding happiness in the workplace — titled “Come On, Get Happy” — and managed to run halfway down the sanctuary’s side aisle before collapsing after the attack, Cunningham said.
Two worshippers tackled the gunman as he pulled the knife, and all three were stabbed — the gunman suffered “a pretty serious wound to the neck” while one worshipper had lower back wounds, Trent said.
Churchgoers knocked the gunman between sets of pews, then held him down until police arrived, said member Don Bohley, who was just outside the sanctuary when the shooting began.
“People came running out and told us to call 911,” said Bohley, 72.
Trent said investigators found no immediate evidence of a criminal background for the suspect. He said police were investigating whether a red Jeep parked outside the church belonged to the man.
The Jeep, which remained at the church Sunday night under State Police watch, was registered to the address of a 27-year-old man in an upscale neighborhood in Troy. No one answered the door at the residence Sunday.
The Rev. Mark Jones, another First Baptist pastor, said he briefly saw the gunman before the gun was pulled. Jones then walked to an adjacent room and did not see the shooting, though he heard a sound like miniature fire crackers.
“We have no idea what this guy’s motives were,” Jones said outside the church.
Jones later urged a Sunday evening prayer service attended by hundreds at nearby Metro Community Church in Edwardsville to be resilient after “this attack from the forces of hell.”
The standing-room-only crowd cried, cradled Bibles and stretched their hands skyward as they packed into the church, many watching the service on large television monitors in overflow areas.
“We need to reassure our hearts and reinforce our minds that Pastor Fred is in that place that we call heaven,” Jones said. “Church, evil does exist. Today, we saw the visible results of evil and its influence.”
The gunman and 39-year-old worshipper Terry Bullard underwent surgery at St. Louis University Hospital and were in serious condition Sunday evening, according to hospital spokeswoman Laura Keller. The other victim, Keith Melton, was treated and released from Gateway Regional Medical Center.
“I would call it heroic,” Trent said. “While many understandably were stuck to their seats, they took to action.”
But Melton said he was struggling with whether he acted quickly enough.
“It’s very hard to see when I had to see my pastor murdered,” Melton told St. Louis station KDSK-TV. “A half second more, might that have made a difference?”
First Baptist had an average attendance of 32 people when Winters became senior pastor in 1987; it now has about 1,200 members and three Sunday services, according to the church’s Web site.
Winters was former president of the Illinois Baptist State Association and an adjunct professor for Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, according to the site.
He hosted Pizza with the Pastor dinners in his home, and the church organized bowling parties for fathers and daughters, karate classes and a golf league.
The church sits along a busy two-lane highway on the east side of Maryville, a fast-growing village of more than 7,000 about 20 miles northeast of St. Louis. A farm sits directly across from the church, but subdivisions of newer homes can been easily seen from every side.
“Things like this just don’t happen in Maryville,” Mayor Larry Gulledge said. “We’ve lost one the pillars of our community, one of our leaders.”
Church shooting suspect has mental illness from Lyme disease
By Joel Currier, Jeremy Kohlerand Nicholas J.C. Pistor
MARYVILLE — A man suspected of killing the Rev. Fred Winters during a church service in Maryville on Sunday morning had developed mental illness from a tick bite, his family has said.
Police did not release the name of the suspect, who was seriously injured in a struggle with members of the congregation after the shooting of Winters at the First Baptist Church.
But a source close to the case confirmed late Sunday that it is Terry Joe Sedlacek, 27, who was the subject of a Post-Dispatch story in August about how Lyme disease had attacked his brain.
His home in the first block of Zachary Court in Troy, Ill., about three miles from the church, was searched late Sunday afternoon by police, who seized some gun cases and a computer. They would not comment.
Vehicle records show that Sedlacek is part-owner of a Jeep Wrangler parked outside the crime scene.
Illinois State Police Director Larry Trent said that the vehicle, which was kept under guard, was believed to have been used by the attacker. Trent described the gunman as a 27-year-old who lives in Troy with no criminal record and no state firearms-owner identification.
Trent declined to confirm the suspect’s name, pending filing of charges.
Winters, 45, was shot about 8:30 a.m. by a man who walked down the aisle during the service, exchanged words with Winters and fired his .45-caliber semiautomatic handgun four times before it jammed, police said.
The first shot shredded Winters’ Bible, sending paper shreds into the air like “confetti,” Trent said. One of three more shots hit Winters in the chest. Nobody else was hit.
Two church members wrestled the attacker down as he slashed them, and himself, with a knife.
The attacker and one of the wounded congregation members, Terry Bullard, 39, of Troy, were treated at nearby Anderson Hospital and airlifted to a St. Louis hospital for surgery, officials said. Both were reported to be in serious condition. Winters died at Anderson.
The other injured congregation member, Keith Melton, 51, of Troy, was treated at a hospital and released. Melton could not be reached, but his home answering machine has a message thanking callers for their concern.
Trent called Bullard and Melton “heroic” for stopping something that could have been worse.
Police and some congregation members said the shooter had no known connection to the 1,200-member church at 7710 Illinois Route 162, a short distance west of Interstate 55-70.
Trent said the motive for the shooting was unknown.
“We haven’t spoken with him yet,” Trent said at midafternoon. “He’s still in surgery.” He said the gunman suffered a stab wound to his neck.
It appeared that nobody was home late Sunday afternoon at the house on Zachary, where a state trooper stood guard until other officers arrived, ostensibly with a search warrant.
The home is listed as the address of Sedlacek and his mother, who co-owns the Jeep.
Neighbors told a reporter that Sedlacek appears to be mentally ill and would sometimes stand in the street and shout obscenities for no apparent reason.
He was the subject of an Aug. 6, 2008, Post-Dispatch article about his battle with mental illness attributed to Lyme disease. The man’s mother, Ruth Abernathy, said her son, an avid hunter and outdoorsman, may have contracted the disease after being bitten by an infected tick on a family farm in the late 1990s.
He became ill during his junior year at Edwardsville High School and had taken several medications, including anti-seizure drugs, to combat the disease. It nearly killed him in 2003, but he survived after a series of treatments and was reported to have lesions on his brain.
Abernathy could not be reached for comment Sunday.
The attack stunned about 150 church members attending the early service. “Some thought it was some type of skit or program at the time,” Trent said.
Police will review video and audio tapes made of the service, Trent said.
Church member Linda Cunningham said she was sitting in the back of the church when the shooter walked up the center aisle.
Winters’ wife, Cindy Lee, and their daughters, Alysia Grace, 14, and Cassidy Hope, 12, were in the church but not in the sanctuary when the shooting occurred, church members said. The couple were married in 1987.
Some churchgoers initially believed the shooting was part of a dramatic sketch — something that is common during Winters’ services.
After the first shot was fired, Cunningham said, “All you could see was confetti.”
Andy and Kris Nothnagel, of nearby Glen Carbon, were sitting about five rows from the pastor when the gunman opened fire.
They, too, said they thought it was part of a play.
“We didn’t know if it was real,” Andy Nothnagel said.
The couple, who have belonged to the church for about 12 years, said they had never seen the gunman before.
“He didn’t look scary,” Kris Nothnagel said. “He could have blended in with anybody.”
Security experts say church shootings are particularly shocking because worship sanctuaries are so often thought of as a respite from the world’s evils, where people come together for the sole purpose of praise and love.
Yet that very notion, say safety experts, leaves them more susceptible to danger.
“The biggest thing churches need to do is get over the ‘it can’t happen here’ mentality,” says Jeffery Hawkins, who has worked in law enforcement and security for 30 years and last year started the Christian Security Network. “It’s the No. 1 stumbling block of churches.”
Officials said the church had been working with some of its members to develop an emergency readiness strategy.
The Rev. Mark Jones, its worship minister since 2002, told reporters assembled outside the church: “People cannot stop living their lives. They cannot be paralyzed with fear.”
The sprawling grounds of the church are on the east edge of Maryville, tucked between farmland and an unfinished subdivision.
The website says Fred Winters is the former president of the Illinois Baptist State Association and an adjunct professor at Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary.
T.J. Beckman, a church member whose twin 12-year-old sons, Jordan and Canaan, were baptized by Winters last fall, described him as a “man of courage and integrity” who dedicated his life to the church.
“He is a modern-day martyr,” said Beckman, 47, of Collinsville. “We’re shattered, shocked by this heinous crime, but we know there is hope beyond this.”
Beckman said Winters’ death should bring the church’s members closer.
“This is not the end of this church,” she said. “I think this church is going to grow even stronger. We have that hope.”
Can Lyme Disease Lead to Insanity, Violent Tendencies?
