Beacon Blog

i can see the neighbors getting upset but i think this mother and her children deserve to have there memories last longer then a few day's. the neighbors who removed these should be ashame. what if this was there daughter and grandkids? leave them alone for awhile and let this mother and children rest it peace.

Thirty days is probably about right for this type of memorial. I'm fairly certain that many of the Vaughn's friends feel a void of sadness because the remote location of the wake and funeral services for this wonderful family made it very difficult to pay their last respects.
Thirty days is such a small amount of time compared with eternity. I pray that a peace that surpasses all understanding calms the fears of this community. And it is my wish that all the children affected by this will come to realize that 99.9999999% of parents would shield their children from any harm...in a heartbeat!

Marge, you can see the neighbors getting upset but yet leave the memorials alone? Why do the neighbors not have a say in this? With all due respect, who are you to say the neighbors should be ashamed for removing the memorials? The place for memorials is a cemetery. The neighbors have a right to object to their community being a media circus and for their own lives to return to normal. In the four sentences you wrote, I couldn't help but notice 10 (ten) spelling and punctuation errors. They lower your credibility.

This was a shocking and brutal incident. However, now that the victims have been buried in their hometown, and have an appropriate long-term memorial there, isn't it time for their local neighbors to reclaim their community? As a new subdivision there probably is something in the homeowners covenant that restricts or limits this type of display. I understand mourning, but this family only lived in the area for a short time so I imagine the neighborhood remains more in shock than in mourning. I would suggest that anyone who wasn't close enough to the family to be visiting their permanent memorial/burial site shouldn't be subject to this in their neighborhood endlessly.

I think that this is such a tragic case. My heart goes out to everyone involved. I do not know any of the family members; however, I cried when I read about this case. This crime is so unimaginable, I think time will be the only thing that helps to heal the wounds.
I can see why the neighbors would want to move on, but I think they should try and remember it may take others a little longer. No one has the answers to how long they should be allowed to have a temporary memorial up. Everyone will just have to be a little more understanding to ALL the people involved. It really must have been hard for those neighbors to wake up one day to a never ending media circus and a constant reminder of such a horrible event.

I would like to comment that this situation is a tragedy. I had a neighbor, 17 years old, killed across the street from where I lived, in front of his front porch. They had a cross in their yard for over a year. They have since replaced it with an abundance of flowers in that same area. I feel that yes, crosses in the front yard following a death can cause people to see the area as a problem area or high crime. Also, when people are looking to buy houses and across the street there's crosses, they may look elsewhere. But none the less, I feel that in America we have the freedom to by a house, live in it, and if we want to, put whatever we want in the yard. And if it is crosses, I feel that you should be able to not only display them in the yard, but keep them there as long as you may need to. If that's 5 years, then so be it. As long as that home is owned by anyone in that family, their crosses should be left alone. So what if someone else doesnt like them or think their "pretty". TURN YOUR HEAD