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GRISLY DISCOVERY IN PORTAGE CO.
Friday, May 1st, 2009 -- 12:27 pm
Posted by Riley Hebert-News Director
Deputies checking on a woman's welfare found her and her two young children dead and a man and infant alive but suffering from fumes in a gasoline-soaked house at Nelsonville in central Wisconsin.
Portage County Sheriff John Charewicz says the 36-year-old man is jailed as a "person of interest" in the deaths of the woman, her 2-year-old son and 3-year-old daughter. The man lived at the home but wasn't married to the woman.
The sheriff says it appears to be "a violent death" in all three cases, but the cause hasn't been determined.
Deputies went to the home Wednesday evening at the request of the woman's mother to check on her welfare. The officers couldn't get anyone to answer the door but could see a baby in an infant swing and assumed nothing was wrong, so they left. They returned to the rented home with the landlord this morning about 11 a.m. to check again.
This time, they found the windows had been covered by blankets, cardboard or drapes, so they forced their way inside and found the man holding his 6-month-old girl.
Gasoline had been dumped from three 5-gallon containers, and a gun was located near the man, but he wasn't holding it.
The sheriff says the timing of the recheck by deputies may have prevented a fire, because the house was probably going to go up in flames with that much gasoline dumped inside.
The man, the infant and two deputies were treated at a hospital because of the fumes and released.
Names of those involved haven't been released.
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