Triple Homicides - Twice! And a Flood

(Gov. Noem's pet slogan, more appropriate
than she's ever been able to grasp)

Well, it's back to crime in South Dakota, and we've seen a lot of it lately. Besides the usual child molesters and child pornographers (at least one a week, most of them not living in Sioux Falls, just so you know it's not all centered in the city), the drug crimes, and miscellaneous crap, we've had two triple murders within two weeks. And no, no one's calling them a "mass shooting" because you have to hit 4 victims to be a mass shooting. But I'm sure that, given enough time, someone will up the ante and put us into the big leagues.

First Shooting

So, this is what happened: On May 23^rd, Jay Ostrem (former mayor of Centerville, SD, pop. 946, where everyone lived) 's wife and a guy named Paul Frankus were all drinking together when Mr. Ostrem was passed out. While he was asleep, Paul forcibly kissed her and exposed his genitals to Mrs. Ostrem (and/or rubbed his penis on her).

Five days later (Monday, May 28th), after some more drinking (the police smelled alcohol on his breath when they arrived), Mrs. Ostrem told Ostrem about the incident, and he went "raging out of the house". She said she had no idea that he had weapons in his car, but he did. (I find Mrs. Ostrem's last statement disingenuous, but that's just because I find it hard to believe that she never saw or noticed an "AR-style rifle" in the back seat or the trunk.)

Anyway, he stormed across the street, where Paul Frankus, 26, Zach Frankus, 21, and Timothy Richmond, 35 were, barged in and started shooting. Zach Frankus called police at 9:44 p.m. Monday to report that his brother had been shot by "a guy from across the street" and that the shooter had gone back home. Apparently Ostrem came back, because while Zach was on the phone with the dispatcher he said that he had been shot, too, and then stopped talking. (I have no idea when Mr. Richmond was shot.) (Yahoo)

When Ostrem was arrested a short time later, there was an AR-style rifle on the ground near him, he had a handgun in his pocket, and he smelled strongly of alcohol.

This being South Dakota, an anonymous contact told me that Ostrem was known for drinking and mental instability. Records also show that he was not squeaky clean sexually:

He'd been sued for sexual harassment in federal court in 2010, while serving as mayor of Centerville, by former Police Chief Rachel Kopman, who claimed she’d been subjected to unwelcome sexual comments for more than a year before her dismissal as chief. The suit was settled in 2012. (Source)

He was also a law enforcement officer in Wyoming for two decades, where there were a couple of gun-related incidents while on duty and at least one lawsuit. (Wyoming)

Ostrem is being held on a $1 million cash bond, which tells me that no one in tiny Centerville trusts him. Good.

Second Shooting:

About a dozen people were having a regular bonfire party (food and beer) on June 6th in a quiet residential neighborhood in Sioux Falls that went on into the early hours. Somewhere along the line, Justin Cody Rackley, originally from Texas, who moved to South Dakota in 2020, came to join them.

Anyway, Mr. Rackley came to the bonfire armed with a handgun, because ________ (fill in your own reason here)

When the police arrived at 2:45 a.m., there were three adults shot to death (Daniel Carl Kemnitz, 43, Kellie E. Reaves, 43, and Michael A. Thompson, 34, all of Sioux Falls), and two other victims who had non-life threatening injuries and were taken to the hospital.

NOTE: The only prior on Rackley's South Dakota record is a simple assault charge in 2020, BUT prosecutors said he also has a criminal record in Texas. He's being held on $3 million cash bond, so obviously no one trusts him to not do a runner. (LINK)

Apparently, this was a fairly regular bonfire gathering, with people coming and going throughout the night. From the Go Fund Me page for Kellie Reaves: "a strange man showed up to their bonfire and attacked her home with gunfire which left her and two others without a chance of survival." (Thank God all the children were asleep indoors.)

Neighbors Angela and Joe Windstead, who live next door, told the Argus Leader on Saturday afternoon their internal cameras caught the sound of 16 shots, three of which were muffled. They turned the footage and audio over to police, they said.

Joe Winstead also said he saw his neighbors sitting out around a fire at about 9 p.m. at the house that's now a crime scene. "They were out there most of the night," he said. "I know I got up once or twice in the middle of the night to use the restroom, and they were still out there. But like this morning, we went out front, and there are two vehicles that were there that we've never, ever seen there before."

The Winsteads said they've known their next door neighbors for about seven years. "She's a wonderful gal, with a wonderful man," Angela Winstead said Saturday afternoon of Reaves. "We've had absolutely zero issues. She's the one neighbor we clicked with, and she's the only other neighbor on our block that was really our age when we moved in."

Investigating Officer Nyberg said the incident does not appear to be a crime of passion or a robbery. "That's why we're trying to track down anybody that was there at the time that it happened to see if we can't flesh out some more information," he said.

Rumor mill:

"The shooter was an acquaintance of one of the victims. He was a stranger to everyone else. The shooter and a victim (high school friend of the homeowner) ran into the homeowner and her friend at the gas station and were invited over.
"He said something racist early on but dropped it when called out. He repeated it later and things escalated.
"I was told by a victim's family member that a survivor had the shooter pinned for an hour before the cops arrived and was repeatedly punching the shooter/fighting to keep him down."

MY NOTE: This might be Kellie Reaves' "heroic significant other, Dusty Miller" (see Obituary) and if so, the punching is, to be frank, fine with me. And it would explain the mug shot below.

"Even the victims' families still don't have a ton of great, reliable information. This is a senseless, horrible situation."

Amen.

Writer's Analysis:

As a story, the first one is kind of obvious: grouchy old man with guns and a drinking problem whose wife told him one of the neighbors assaulted her… so off he goes and kills everyone who was in the house. Excessive, but at least there's a motive. And it could be worked a number of ways: wife and neighbor had been having an affair for a while. Everyone's an out of control alcoholic, and things escalated that night. The old man had other reasons for wanting the neighbor dead and got his excuse. The real victim was one of the others in the house, but people would buy the motive of a sexual assault. I mean, you can see a number of ways to twist it up, build the tension, etc.

It's the second shooting that's frustrating, because there's no motive other than (perhaps) being called a racist. And it's all so random. I think writers and the reading public hate random crimes unless they're incorporated in with something that does have meaning. Is a hot tempered guy from Texas who packed a gun and lost it when being called a racist enough? I think a major change in motive or an in depth background would be required to write this one. As it is, it's a real reminder to not invite people you meet at the gas station over to a party.

BTW, The last time Sioux Falls had a homicide that involved three or more victims was 1973, when a family was found deceased in their home. There were four victims, and the suspect took their own life. (Argus)

Oh, and we had an almost shooting:

June 17, Jason Matthew Palmer, 49, of Sioux Falls was arrested for shooting a rifle at a 12 year old and 17 year old who were talking and playing outside. He got upset, walked out, fired the rifle once, and went back inside and barricaded himself indoors. I guess that's one way to get arrested. (DakotaNewsNow)

Rain, Rain, Go Away…

Last week, we had 16 inches of rain in Sioux Falls and most of Southeast South Dakota (some places had more), with a cloudy one day break in the middle that did nothing to improve our depression or our apprehension. Flooding started almost immediately. I grabbed some groceries on the non-rainy day, and scurried down to Yankton Park to see what it looked like: the port-a-potties were already tipped over on their side, bobbing in the water, and all I could think of was, "I hope they were emptied before this hit."

There are small towns that are still flooded and will be until the Big Sioux and the Small Sioux rivers quit cresting.

A railroad bridge collapsed down in Sioux City, Iowa from the strength of the rushing floodwaters. The Big Sioux River crested at 45 feet, seven feet higher than the prior record. (LINK)

Roads are buckled from the raging water.

Fields are flooded, meaning the crops are lost.

They closed Falls Park in Sioux Falls because it was way over its banks, and idiots were going down there to film it, trying to get out on the rocks, etc… One idiot wanted to go swimming in it. I saw the video, and all I could think of was let him experience Darwin's Law for himself.

Meanwhile, our Governor finally got back from her trip to Washington, D.C., and headed straight for the camera at one of the wealthiest spots per capita in South Dakota, Dakota Dunes, and North Sioux City, SD. Her press releases have been regular, urging everyone to report their damage to the South Dakota Office of Emergency Management, because "We have to have a loss — in order to qualify for FEMA — of $1.6 million worth of property damage." (LINK) She also said her top priority would be the area around McCook Lake, where the residents are complaining that “McCook Lake was sacrificed for the benefit of North Sioux City and Dakota Dunes. We don’t really think that’s fair.” (LINK)

June 24^th, 2024, view of flood damage that occurred the previous night
at McCook Lake in southeastern South Dakota. (Courtesy Dirk Lohry)

Yesterday, Governor Noem says she will NOT call out the South Dakota National Guard to help with clean up or disaster relief:

Noem said counties must request assistance from the National Guard. The governor then decides if it should be warranted.  “That’s usually a very crisis situation. And the National Guard is extremely expensive. So, if you do activate the National Guard, then the local county has to pay for that response.  We have to be wise with how we use our soldiers. And this was a situation where our community was pretty well prepared, and that wasn’t necessary to activate them at this time."  (LINK)

I think more of us might buy this line except that Noem has sent our National Guard down to Texas three times in the last three years, spending $1.3 million of our taxpayer dollars each time.  So, Texas gets to use our "extremely expensive" soldiers, but we don't?  Former South Dakota Governors have sent the National Guard out for other floods...  

Meanwhile, all that water headed south, and will end up in Nebraska.  

And the storms themselves went east, into Minnesota, where one result is that the Rapidan dam in southern Minnesota had a partial failure, and may fail completely.  The National Guard has already been activated in Minnesota to respond to flooding.

Sigh...

It's hot, it's humid, the heat index Tuesday went up to 105, and the mosquitoes are biting.

But my hollyhocks are blooming!

And how's your week been?

On the Subject of Murder

You've seen the large print headlines of your local newspaper. You've heard the news from your television commentators. Someone, or even several people, were murdered. Maybe the victim was shot down in the street. Or maybe multiple bodies were found in a house. Police are investigating. If you're lucky, these murders didn't happen to anyone you know. But, if you live in a large city, these type of local headlines seem to occur with a growing frequency. And, regardless of where you live, it appears that people are going crazy.
How the hell did we get to this point?

According to Dr. David Buss (author of The Murderer Next Door), an evolutionary psychologist, who examined over 400,000 FBI files of murderers, "the vast majority of murders are committed by people, who until the day they kill, seem pretty normal." Now that's a scary thought. The world was so much more tidy on my end when I could consider psychological misfits and stone cold street criminals as the prime candidates for being the guys that kill. So now, I have to watch out for Uncle Benny who takes umbrage at me kidding him for still wearing a bow tie after all these years? And what about Neighbor Jim who thinks my grandkids took a shortcut across the corner of his lawn? Am I destined to be doomed by Joe Everyman? What is pushing that normal everyday person over the edge and converting him into a killer?

I'm glad you asked. Conveniently for us, Dr. Buss, besides examining those 429,729 homicide files in the FBI system, also conducted a fantasy homicide study with 5,000 subjects, 175 of which were actual murderers. (Guess for these latter few, it wasn't just a fantasy.) Out of this total group, 91% of the men and 84% of the women had had at least one homicidal fantasy. These were vivid fantasies, often going into great detail. That's a lot of people thinking about murder and how to do it. No wonder bodies keep piling up in novels, and the mystery genre is doing so well.

Fortunately, most of the study participants got their homicide fantasies worked out in other ways to resolve whatever the original problem was. What seemed to separate the non-killers from the killers? Fear of being caught and sent to prison was a common response. However, when asked if they could commit the murder without being caught, most men thought the chances of them going forward would increase about fourfold. So, it appears that if you have caused someone to suffer mentally and/or socially and are still alive to read today's post, you may owe your life to the cost/benefit ratio of committing murder these days. Perhaps, television shows like CSI, where the investigators identify the criminals within an hour by forensic science, have had a positive influence to help keep down the murder statistics to some degree.

In the doctor's fantasy study, public humiliation was the leading factor for especially violent and detailed fantasies when disposing of the tormentor. Now, think of the teen bullied at school, or the guy who lost his job and blames his boss or coworkers. You've already seen those headlines. Seems like a certain amount of social cost and psychological pain to a person's pride and reputation can make for that person taking a bent towards revenge, where the next step may be a giant one called murder.

Under the right circumstances, it appears that most people are willing to kill. And, it's not all for pride and reputation. You've probably heard lots of people say that they would kill to protect their children or themselves from being killed. How about you? How far would you go to protect family and/or yourself? Depending upon the laws in your state, the act of killing another person under certain circumstances may not make you a murderer, but the act itself does make you a killer.

So now, let's go one step further. Have you had your own homicidal fantasies towards someone who has seriously tormented you? If so, then I hope those thoughts worked as some kind of therapy for you, and you could then put those fantasies out of your mind and get on with your life before doing something stupid.

Dr. Buss thinks we can maybe design environments that prevent the stimulation of those feelings which lead to murder. I don't know exactly what the doctor has in mind, but us showing a little kindness to those we cross paths with just might help some with the daily grind of living that we all get caught up in. A few kind words, a compliment here and there, a helping hand. See if we can make this a better world without so many dark headlines. Maybe we can save a few lives and not even know it.

Of course, authors can still murder people, as long as they only do it in books.

YTD

  Just the facts… believe it or not  

• Americans own more firearms than all nations’ armies combined.
• The US is ranked 1^st in crime rates among nations.
• The US is 14^th among the most dangerous nations in the world.
• America locks up more of its own citizens than any other nation.
• America experiences nearly one multiple/mass shooting per day.
• Americans kill a thousand of their own countrymen every month.
• Gun owners commit suicide at the rate of two thousand a month.
• NRA claims $1-million per day from its 5 million members.
• The NRA-owned Congress says it’s not time to discuss it… ever.

Year-to-Date 2018’s 49 Days the price of conscience 49 ⇧ YTD days since 01 January 2018 18 ⇧ YTD school shootings 8 ⇧ YTD school shootings ending in death 26 ⇧ YTD school shooting fatalities ~1643 ⇧ YTD shooting deaths nationwide ~2862 ⇧ YTD suicide by firearm ~4966 ⇧ YTD shooting deaths + injuries ~$1,677,000 YTD gun lobbying expenditures ~$700,000 YTD NRA lobbying expenditures ~$7,056,537 YTD NRA industry contributions ~$49,000,000 YTD NRA membership dues, fees 327,217,871 US population: people 252,284,978 US population: adults 359,939,658 US population: firearms 200,000,000 military-owned arms worldwide ~27,000,000 police-owned arms worldwide 2 firearms owned by author 135 legislative efforts to weaken gun laws ¹ including legalize silencers and ² allowing mentally ill gun ownership 0 bills to restrict firearms 15,137 registered Washington lobbyists ~75,000 unregistered Washington lobbyists 50 state governors 435 congressmen 100 senators 1 vice president 1 president ? strikes 0 balls

Made to be Broken

Well, it’s January 12th. If you haven’t already broken your New Year’s resolutions you’re running late. So get to it. Start by eating that Snickers bar or cutting back your daily jog from twelve miles to a quick walk to the corner store...to buy that Snickers bar.
A couple of years ago Writer’s Digest put out 5 resolutions for writers (http://www.writersdigest.com/editor-blogs/there-are-no-rules/5-new-years-resolutions-for-writers ). I’d like to comment on them.

1. Resolve to make time for writing: This would seem pretty obvious. We all have busy lives, but are they really any more busy than when we had to till the ground working from dawn till dusk, before there were dishwashers and washing machines to do our dishes and clothes? Generally speaking we are as busy as we want to be. True, there are things that have to get done like work and dealing with kids or critters, but if one wants to write they will find the time. I hear a lot of people who claim they want to be writers. They have great ideas for the next best-seller or Academy Award-winning screenplay. They want to share them with you, have you write them while they take half the credit...and money. But they never write a word. So, apropos of Resolution five below, are they writers?

2. Resolve to embrace your personal writing style: The WD piece talks about embracing your style of being a pantster or an outliner. But I would look at this differently. When I first saw their resolution I thought they were talking about “writing style,” as in your voice, not how you go about your writing. And I would say, find your own voice. We all borrow from things we’ve read but you have to make it your own. The “worst” part about finding your voice is when some editor or someone else wants to water it down. That’s why I never use grammar checkers. They’re way too didactic, and some editors are too. They often want you to change your style to fit some mold or template that they like, which may be fine. But it’s not you. So you have to resolve to stick to your tone, your voice. Your style.

3. Resolve to self-edit as you write: They’re talking about “revising as you write in order to produce a cleaner manuscript that requires less revision on the back end.” I couldn’t disagree more. I’m not saying one shouldn’t do a little minor editing as you go along, but that often turns into major editing and going over the same ground ad infinitum. The best piece of writing advice I ever got was not to rewrite as you go along. If you do rewrite as you go you’ll just get mired in that quicksand and often never move ahead, or move ahead so slowly that it hardly seems like progress.

4. Resolve to step outside your comfort zone: Here the folks at Writer’s Digest suggest we branch out from whatever genre we mostly work in to other things outside of our comfort zones. For example, if you write fiction, try freelance articles, if you write cozy try hardboiled. Like that. I don’t have a real problem with this one...except to say who has the time to branch out? I have several “branch out” works in progress, but I rarely have time to work on them, much as I want to. And why not just try to break out of your comfort zone within your own genre/sub-genre? Sometimes the best novels are the ones that change the genre and stretch the boundaries of that genre. They also mention reading books you normally wouldn’t read. Fine. I like reading a variety of things anyway. As they say, variety is the spice of life, one just needs the time to enjoy those spices while trying to meet deadlines, earn a living, etc.


5. Resolve to call yourself a writer: Writers write. If you write you’re a writer. You may not be a professional writer, but you are a writer. Go for it. I’ve seen various arguments here and there as to who is and isn’t a “writer”. But why rain on someone’s parade? If they write, if you write, you’re a writer. Just do it. Learn as you go. Trial and error. We’re all at various stages of learning to write and we’re all still learning as we go. I come from a screenwriting background. Making the switch to prose writing had various learning curves, particularly in description and transitions. In screenplays/movies description is sparse at best. A beach is a beach. No glorious crimson sunsets dancing on the edge of a knife (well, you know what I mean...). And transitions are usually cuts from one scene to the next. The audience can figure out what’s happening. In prose writing one needs smoother transitions and more “transcendent” descriptions. In some quarters there’s a certain snobbery as to who’s a writer and who isn’t. But mostly I’d say you’re a writer when you put the words on the page, keep writing despite setbacks of one kind or another, including “endless” rejections. When you persevere and believe in yourself, then you are a writer.

6. And now a resolution of my own: Resolve to watch more shows on the Murder Channel, Discovery ID: like Homicide Hunter (Lt. Joe Kenda), Momsters: When Moms Go Bad (w/ Roseanne Barr), Wives with Knives, Web of Lies, Evil Kin, Vanity Fair Confidential, True Crime with Aphrodite Jones, On the Case with Paula Zahn. In fact, I plan to do nothing but watch murder shows on Discovery ID 24/7 to escape the horrid realities of everyday life.


7. And one more resolution of my own: Resolve not to do much BSP in the coming year: But wait, it’s time to break all those resolutions, so please check out Vortex, my noir-thriller novella (which means it’s short—you can finish it quickly!). And if you’re eligible to vote for the Lefty Awards from Left Coast Crime, I hope you’ll consider it for—here it comes and it’s a mouthful: “Best mystery novel set in the Left Coast Crime Geographic Region (Mountain Time Zone and all time zones westward to Hawaii)”. Vortex definitely fits the bill. Set in L.A., Venice, CA, Hollywood, the Salton Sea and on/at the Shakespeare Bridge in Los Feliz/L.A. Ballots are due by January 15th. And right now the book is still on sale at Amazon/Kindle for a mere 99 cents, which means it’s cheap—it won’t break the bank. Hell, you probably have 99 cents in change in your pants or purse or on the dresser right now that you just don’t know what to do with. I know what you can do with it—Vortex calls.

And Happy New Year to all ye merry SleuthSayers and our Cherished readers.

Hour glass credit: photo credit: Grains via photopin (license) 

Trifling Through "Trifles"

The play, "Trifles", is a one act play written by Susan Glaspell based on a true story of the murder of John Hossack. Glaspell was working as a reporter for the Des Moines Daily News and covered the case. The wife was accused as the killer and convicted, with the verdict later overturned on appeal. A year following the play, Glaspell used the play's storyline to compose her short story, "A Jury of Her Peers."

Reading this mystery play inspired me to be more observant and look to the little things to make a better assessment of what is really going on in my life and those around me. It is the little things we normally dismiss as irrelevant that accurately tell the true story often hidden beneath the obvious like an extravagant gift beneath wispy and inexpensive tissue papers. It is the little things that happen in our lives that gathered together comprise who we become. How and more importantly why a person chooses to do the things they do are subliminally addressed in this play where it is indeed the little things, the trifles, that count.

The historical setting of "Trifles" engages the reader in a look back at a not-so-distant time when women were supposed to be like children: seen and not heard. A woman's worth was less than a man's in more than wage earnings in these early twentieth century days. She was important as a bearer of children, keeper of the home and to pleasure a man. Other than that, she probably gained some recognition among other women by her homemade jams, quilting expertise and attendance at church, but rarely for her intelligence of reasoning skills. Though smart women surely were in abundance, they were stifled by men who were more physically strong and in charge. By the setting of this story, women had not had opportunity to exercise the right to vote much less be a voice heard in a community unless it dealt with child rearing or recipe collections.

Thinking like Sherlock Holmes in an investigation, it was the women who emerged as the true detectives due to the fact they unearthed the truth of the crime and its motive by seeing what the men could not: the little clues left behind to follow like Hansel and Gretel's breadcrumbs.

The women also acted as the self-appointed jury by deciding to allow her to get away with the murder, especially since the crime seemed justified to another woman, the men weren't wise enough to pick up on the not-so-hidden clues and a jury of the women's peers would surely not be her own, but a panel of twelve angry men who would more likely view a woman killing her husband as guilty without consideration of the circumstances leading to the crime.

Taking a cue from the men, the women left them to make their own evaluations as the men studied the crime scene in their Barney Fife manner undertaking the homicide analysis enough to formulate what had happened in the household leading to the husband's death. In their arrogance, the men didn't consult with the women on what a woman may have thought or done in such circumstances. Instead, believing themselves smarter than the fairer sex, the men brought the women along only to gather some clothing items for the widow in her jail cell awaiting their investigation report.

Irony runs rampant through the play as the men repeatedly give little relevance to the women and their mentions of the little things they notice in the household. The men overlook the importance of no outside communication via the party line telephone not hooked up to this home because the husband was too cheap to invest in the service even though his wife had once been a very social type whose isolation had robbed her of more than a cheerful song to sing. The dead bird who would sing no more was reminiscent of the new widow who had also been trapped, caged and no longer allowed to sing by a stingy and jealous husband. The men could not see beyond the empty birdcage with a broken door. The half-cleaned table should have been something to note in an otherwise clean household, but the men overlooked its importance.

History shows the strides women have made in being taken seriously for their choices whether they decide to become homemakers, astronauts, detectives or merely portraying ones on television. The true worth of any of us is by how we choose to define ourselves and not what others say we are or should be.

We've come a long way baby, and a lot of that was accomplished by not overlooking the little things in life. Sometimes the little things really are a matter of life or death.