A well-being check would shatter officer Ron Harper's perception of Hoffman Estates as a sleepy, suburban farm community.
The night of Jan. 11, 1979, the young cop and his partner were dispatched to an unusually still Teets farmhouse. No lights were on. No answer at the door. And perhaps most chilling: no sign of the four guard dogs.
Together with Earl Teets Jr., the concerned 36-year-old son who called police, they broke down the door. The grim finding: Teets father, mother and brother, all shot to death.
"It still haunts me," said Harper, 57, who retired a lieutenant in 2001 and now teaches criminal justice at Rockford's Rasmussen College. "And it sent shock waves through the area."
The murders of Earl Teets Sr., his wife Elizabeth, and their son Gary happened 30 years ago this week and rank among the Northwest suburbs' grisliest unsolved crimes. But with last year's formation of the Cook County Sheriff's Office Cold Case Squad, the case has been resurrected - or at least put back on detectives' radar.
Simple farm folk
The weathered, century-old farmhouse on 200 acres near Higgins and Shoe Factory roads in then-unincorporated Cook County was secluded but bustled with activity.
The elder Teets worked as a heavy equipment operator. He also farmed, raised cattle and stored towed vehicles there.
"There was a lot of traffic in and out. "You could get several people a day coming for their car or to buy a duck or turkey," said Earl Jr., who lived in Elgin at the time of the killings and now lives in Hampshire. He has rarely spoken publicly about the slayings.
Because the lot was visible from the road and a popular target for vandals, Teets Sr. set up a bell that rang inside the house whenever someone pulled in. He also kept guard dogs so scary that even friends and family would wait in their cars until Elizabeth or Earl Sr. secured them.
It was the dogs' absence that made Earl Jr.'s stomach sink.
His 35-year-old brother Gary's fiance, Marlene Manke, had called to say no one answered the door despite dinner plans. Blackie, a German shepherd, was found shot to death in the living room near Elizabeth, 60, and Gary. Earl Sr., also 60, was facedown a few feet away in the kitchen. The other dogs were locked in a shed and bedroom.
"Whoever it was knew they had to put away the dogs," said Sharon, Earl Jr.'s wife. "Mom Teets had a calming effect on them but no one else knew what they'd do."
Police at the time speculated robbery could be a motive, in part because Earl Sr. had recently sold 100 black angus cattle. The house wasn't ransacked, but Earl Sr.'s wallet was stolen and a few drawers dumped on the bed. Yet the $6,000 in cash stuffed into a sock was undisturbed, as were dozens of expensive figurines.
In 1980, now-retired Lt. Frank Braun told the Daily Herald he felt he knew who the killer was, but there was no "physical evidence, such as fingerprints, that links the suspect to the scene." When the Herald revisited the case in 1993, Braun said an unnamed man who had refused to take a lie-detector test and borrowed money from the Teets remained a suspect.
Earl Jr. said the dogs made it impossible for anyone to sneak into the house. There was no forced entry. His father owned guns, and there doesn't seem to have been a struggle.
He's sure the killer, or killers, knew the family.
"I can't see him letting in just anyone," he said.
Beyond that certainty, what happened remains a mystery.
http://www.dailyherald.com/story/?id=264189
His 35-year-old brother Gary's fiance, Marlene Manke, had called to say no one answered the door despite dinner plans. Blackie, a German shepherd, was found shot to death in the living room near Elizabeth, 60, and Gary. Earl Sr., also 60, was facedown a few feet away in the kitchen. The other dogs were locked in a shed and bedroom.
"Whoever it was knew they had to put away the dogs," said Sharon, Earl Jr.'s wife. "Mom Teets had a calming effect on them but no one else knew what they'd do."
Police at the time speculated robbery could be a motive, in part because Earl Sr. had recently sold 100 black angus cattle. The house wasn't ransacked, but Earl Sr.'s wallet was stolen and a few drawers dumped on the bed. Yet the $6,000 in cash stuffed into a sock was undisturbed, as were dozens of expensive figurines.
In 1980, now-retired Lt. Frank Braun told the Daily Herald he felt he knew who the killer was, but there was no "physical evidence, such as fingerprints, that links the suspect to the scene." When the Herald revisited the case in 1993, Braun said an unnamed man who had refused to take a lie-detector test and borrowed money from the Teets remained a suspect.
Earl Jr. said the dogs made it impossible for anyone to sneak into the house. There was no forced entry. His father owned guns, and there doesn't seem to have been a struggle.
He's sure the killer, or killers, knew the family.
"I can't see him letting in just anyone," he said.
Beyond that certainty, what happened remains a mystery.
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