NATION : Minister, Family Shot to Death
A minister, his wife and two of their daughters were discovered shot to death in the church parsonage as the congregation sang hymns next door.
“The whole county’s shook,” said Dan Richard, 27, a member of the Olive Branch Church of the United Brethren in Christ, where Robert Pelley was pastor.
The body of Pelley, 38, was found in the hallway Sunday morning, and the bodies of Dawn Pelley, 32, and their daughters Janel, 8, and Jolene, 6, were discovered in a family room, St. Joseph County Sheriff’s Cpl. Charles Feirrell said. Investigators believe that the four were slain Saturday. The one-story frame house was found locked and without signs of forced entry.
The Pelleys’ three other children, ages 10, 14 and 17, were not home when the attack occurred, police said.
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