I had another post nearly written for tonight. But I have to switch gears. My head is spinning and I have to share this with you.


While we were in Colorado last week, I heard on Colorado news, way up in Estes Park, something about a Kansas girl that was abducted from a Target store in broad daylight last Saturday night. She had graduated from high school two weeks ago. The Target store is in a very nice part of town in this very nice community. The store is a few miles from where Stephanie works in the summertime.


The young woman’s body was found Wednesday. Her life ended at age 18. She won’t be going on to Kansas State University to study veterinary medicine and march with her sister in marching band. She won’t get married, have kids, or join her family for holidays any more. She was beautiful, as you can see in these photos.


Video tape from the Target store identified a “person of interest.” He was arrested yesterday. He is 26 and he and his wife and 4 year old son live in the community next to mine.


I just watched the news coverage tonight about the case. And guess what I learned? This man was adopted at age 7 by a couple in Emporia, Kansas. When he was 15 years old, after numerous oppositional and dangerous behaviors prior to that time, he held a knife to his (adoptive) sister’s throat. His (adoptive) parents decided he was too dangerous to continue to let him live at home and so they returned him to the state. (I can only imagine how difficult that was legally and logistically, having some idea how social services in this state worked back then.) He spent several years after that in juvenile facilities.


His adoptive parents relinquished him to the state in the hopes that he would “get the help he needs.” This occurred in 1996.


In 1996 I had just started ATN in Kansas. I was fighting an impossible uphill battle to get social services in this state to listen to the realities of parenting unattached children. Of course, Kansas wasn’t alone… there were no states that really recognized this as far as I know. At the same time that I was trying to get things moving, this family was trying to get help for this young man and for the Hall family as a whole. I don’t have to tell you what this family endured … you all know exactly what they experienced … up to and including all the grief they no doubt incurred when they relinquished their parental rights. And have they been living in fear of him ever since? Did they wonder if he would be following that same sister he assaulted 11 years ago? Were they just waiting for that phone call that told them he had harmed someone else? Or are people now blaming them again because they “didn’t do something right” or “didn’t love him enough”???? I know they are being hounded by the media right now, but “not answering the door.” Well, why would they? Where was all that attention when they most needed it?

By the way, the photo is of the Menninger Clinic in Topeka Kansas. This building was abandoned when the clinic moved to Texas in 2003. Wonder if this killer spent time in this facility? They sure didn't know squat about attachment when I dealt with them in the late 90's.

After writing and publishing my post, I noted that Cindy Bodie had blogged about this as well. Her comments are right on target, as usual.

I have a lot of processing to do about this. There will undoubtedly be more coming about this story ...

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