Two Girls Found Stabbed to Death in Illinois

Two second-grade girls were found stabbed to death early Monday, hours after the best friends had disappeared on Mother’s Day while taking a bike ride.

Police said a jogger found Laura Hobbs, 8, and Krystal Tobias, 9, about 50 yards from a bicycle path that winds through Beulah Park.

The children had multiple stab wounds. They had their clothes on and did not appear to have been sexually assaulted, police said.

A girl’s bicycle was on the ground nearby.

The parents of one girl reported her missing about 8:50 p.m. Sunday, investigators said. She was last seen riding her bike near the park about 4 p.m.

Her family grew worried after the sun had set and she was two hours late getting home.

Soon after, police officials said they received a call from the other girl’s parents. After contacting the parents of other children in the girls’ class at Beulah Park Elementary School, police said they gathered volunteers and search dogs and began canvassing the area.

The 80-acre park, a mix of lawns and dense woods on the north end of town, is surrounded by homes.

Residents said they routinely walked their dogs and rode their bikes along the paved path. There is a Native American trail popular with hikers, and a small playground on the edge of the nature preserve.

The park is a few blocks from the elementary school the girls attended.

“This is gruesome, it’s heinous. This sort of thing just doesn’t happen here,” Zion Police Chief Doug Malcolm said. “This is the first murder we’ve had in a year.”

Shocked parents in this town of 23,000 about 40 miles north of Chicago arrived at Beulah Park Elementary on Monday to wait for their children, who were escorted out of the building by police.

As they left the one-story brick building, the children passed by a safety poster instructing them to cross at the corner, try to hold hands and always “have a going home plan.”

Quinterra Flowers, 10, cried as she walked home. The fifth-grader, who said she knew both of the girls, was afraid because she’d have to pass by the park.

“We play there all the time,” she said.

Some parents said they had learned about the deaths from notices that school officials sent home with each student

The girls appeared to have been killed between 1 and 2 a.m., but cool overnight weather made it difficult for investigators to pinpoint when they died, said Lake County coroner Richard Keller. Autopsies were underway.

Police said they had no suspects or leads.

Neighbors expressed frustration, saying that neither the police nor the girls’ parents had acted quickly enough.

“It’s dark. It’s Mother’s Day. They’re in second grade,” said Michelle Leong, 21, a neighbor and mother of a 2-year-old. “We’re not talking about teenagers out partying. We’re talking about children. What are they doing outside after dark?”

Zion, about halfway between Chicago and Milwaukee, was founded in 1901 as a religious utopia -- its motto was “Where God rules, man prospers.”

“We know our neighbors and we know when there’s a stranger around,” said Lauri Cernoch, who lives near Beulah Park. “That’s what makes this town feel so safe. That’s why we’re all devastated by this. What if it’s someone we know?”