Emmanuel Castro’s painful vigil continues. The wounds of Jan. 8, 1993, are still fresh for the father of 16-year-old Palatine massacre victim Michael Castro, and he took little solace in the news Friday that police have two suspects in custody.
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“There’s no relief. Michael is not coming back,” Castro said. “Maybe there’s some closure, but no relief. The more we talk about it now, the more difficult it is.”
Few friends and family members of the victims felt like celebrating Friday, despite what appeared to be a major break in the long-dormant case. Though they hoped a resolution was at hand, they’d been dejected before by false alarms.
Even as rumors of an alleged confession and DNA evidence dribbled out, those closest to the victims were hesitant to believe that the crime had finally been solved, wanting to know more, yet dreading emotional churn.
`Listening and waiting’
“I’m just waiting to see what’s going on,” said Mary Jauch, who for more than a decade has lived next door to the Castros in Palatine. “We’re just listening and waiting because we’ve heard before they might have someone, and they didn’t.”
She recalled Michael as a pleasant young man, dedicated to his family and caring toward others in their close-knit suburban outpost of split-level and two-story houses.
“He was very kind to the other children in the neighborhood,” she said. “When someone was hurt, he carried the child home and stayed with them.”
News of the suspects’ detention stirred painful recollections for Cathy Mennes of Houston. She was the sister-in-law of victim Thomas Mennes, a quiet guy who fancied bowling and darts and who had worked at the restaurant for just two months before the slayings.
“It brings up a lot of memories I’d rather not relive,” she said. “I’m sure the whole family will feel that way. You don’t want to go through that again.”
The fact that the suspects were teens at the time of the murder was an extra heart breaker for the family, she said, because Thomas Mennes’ father was stabbed to death in 1999 by a 16-year-old neighbor. The youth, Melvin Paige, was convicted of the murder in March.
Now divorced from Thomas Mennes’ brother Larry, Cathy Mennes said she had tried to reach her ex-husband and two of his brothers with the news, but the trio was on a sailing trip off the coast of Texas.
“I’m just glad–I hope this is it,” she said. “I went through this with Larry when it happened nine years ago. It was awful. I’m just so relieved. I think all the family had given up that this would ever be solved.”
Earlier miscues eroded many people’s confidence in the investigation. But one of the daughters of Richard and Lynn Ehlenfeldt, who owned the restaurant and were slain alongside their employees, thanked the police for their dedication and expressed cautious optimism that the end was near.
Jennifer Shilling, the Ehlenfeldts’ daughter, issued a statement from her office in the Wisconsin legislature, where she is a Democratic representative from LaCrosse, saying:
“Although we are greatly relieved that the persons are no longer at large, this has taken an emotional toll on my family and will continue to do so, as we will have to relive this very sad and difficult time. … My family and I appreciate the hard work of the Palatine Police Department as well as the other law enforcement agencies that have always remained committed to solving this case. We hope this is the break we have been waiting for during the past 9 years.”
Cold-blooded slayings
John Bruce, a friend and neighbor of the Ehlenfeldts in Arlington Heights, is still haunted by the cold-blooded executions of the couple with whom he attended Chicago Cubs and Milwaukee Brewers games. He was less kind to police, saying they had “bungled [the investigation] big time.”
Yet he added that somehow, he had always been certain of the outcome.
“I’ve always said all along they’d eventually solve the case,” said Bruce, 57, a baggage handler for United Airlines.