Two Kill Selves; N.J. Death Pact Influence Cited

Two depressed young women killed themselves by filling a garage with auto exhaust, and police in this Chicago suburb said today that they were probably influenced by publicity about the joint suicides of four New Jersey teen-agers.

Karen Logan, 17, was holding a stuffed animal and Nancy Grannan, 19, was holding a rose when their bodies were found Thursday, said Alsip Police Chief Warner Huston.

“Nine sealed envelopes to friends and relatives were found on the dashboard of the car and two notes were stuck under the windshield,” he said.

Parked in Garage

The bodies were found inside Grannan’s car, which was parked in a garage attached to the Logan home, said police dispatcher Tim Furmanek.

Exhaust fumes filtered into the home and killed two cats and a dog, he said.

Logan had apparently dropped out of high school and the notes indicated “she felt that she had made a mess of her life, felt that she had disappointed her parents,” Huston said.

Grannan apparently had been depressed over the disintegration of her marriage, Huston said, although he did not know whether she and her husband, Gary, were divorced.

Wedding Photos

A wedding photograph and numerous photo albums were found in the back seat of the car, he said.

None of the notes said anything about the New Jersey case, but Huston said he thought the two young women “had heard about it, and that the publicity surrounding that incident probably gave them the impetus” to kill themselves.

The two women were discovered by Logan’s sister, Melanie, who summoned a neighbor.

“I was shaking them to see if they were dead, and I knew they were dead right away,” said the neighbor, Blair Fawley, 18. “I had to get out of there, because I couldn’t breathe. . . .

“I don’t know what was bothering them. They were very outgoing. They had become best of friends.”