The Skelton boys

Praying for them too tm2. Hopefully they'll turn up at a friends or families house or something and not harmed. :(

I'm with you, tm2.

Sad, sad story. My BS detector went off when I heard the fake name of the woman the father claimed he dropped them off with: "Joann Taylor." It just resonated in my cynical head like a made-up name, though perhaps the way the story unfolded there were enough holes even for armchair pundits like me to see through the lies.

When there are nasty divorces and custody battles, sadly, the children suffer and become weapons. I hope they are just hidden somewhere.

When people go over the edge mentally, it is hard to rationize it. Sadly, I hope for the best outcome but expect the worst.
The innocent children become the tools of the wicked.

Keeping faith for a happy ending, but it is not looking good. It has been too long and exposure in the elements is not good.

I don't care what his illness/problems are, he needs to be questioned and/or tortured until he gives the real answers. This is ridiculous. He sits in a mental institution while costing everyone money, not to mention the heartaches he is causing everyone.

Discussion at MonroeTalks.com

Excerpts from a Nov 30, 2010 Detroit Free Press story :

From today's Blade At a Tuesday morning news briefing, he said he is basing that on information from everyone involved in the case, including the boys' father, John Skelton, who he said has not told them what has happened to the boys.

"He's been forthcoming with some information, the credibility of which we can not verify at this time," the chief said.

This guys needs to be hung by his nuts, maybe then he will be more "forthcoming".

"This guys needs to be hung by his nuts, maybe then he will be more "forthcoming"." Agreed. Give me a few minutes and a propane torch.

Damn Jeepmaker: watched Pulp Fiction a lot? LOL
This is such a sad story. I do happen to agree with you, btw

God knows exactly where these babies are and my prayer is that He reveal it to the family soon..

I was told by someone who knows a firefighter that they were found in a pond behind a Ramada Inn,

Hope that's incorrect news, but otherwise there may be a media release soon.

Heard the same, father admitted to killing them.

Damn, hoops, I was hoping that I had been passed incorrect information, but if you heard it too...

mom2- do you know what Ramada Inn? I am hoping this is incorrect

Didn't specifically hear that, but if you look on Google maps there is a Ramada Inn outside Holiday City and there appear to be several nearby bodies of water.

I'm hoping that the info relayed to me was mistaken and maybe they were just searching for bodies in that location.

Know it doesn't look good overall, but I'll still hope they are ok until there's another press release with more info.

Damn, this whole thing just sucks.

I just read a facebook post from someone at St. V's that buzz from police is that the bodies were found in a field, where dad finally told them to look. Nothing on local news media yet

Saw it reported that the dad had been at Fulton County Health Center. Didn't realize they had a psych unit there.

Guess he's being taken to Lucas County Jail until he can be extradited to Michigan? Too bad the officer who likes to use the sleeper hold isn't there any more...

no shit, mom2!

(The reference to Fulton County Health Center was in one media outlet's report - all the other media outlets were still saying "undisclosed Ohio hospital.")

WTVG is reporting he was in a facility in Toledo...?

Shows how accurate the media is - Detroit Free Press says he was at Fulton Co Health Center, now the Blade says Flower Hospital.

Flower makes more sense, I think they have an actual inpatient psych unit.

The Blade is reporting he was in the psych unit at Flower.

As a freelance reporter, I am so glad I am not reporting on this case. My heart could not take it

Must be wrong because they are still searching and plan to search tomorrow, just saw on 11 and 13 news.

That's good to hear.

P.S. The Blade story has been updated again to say Skelton had been at St V's. Cripes, before you know it the media will have had the guy in every hospital around.

The Blade story also reported:

The early Tuesday evening Detroit News story reported:

The mid-day Tuesday WNWO story titled Source: Police say father admitted to killing sons

Incredibly sad.

Wondering if dbw8906 and Danneskjold will pop into this thread blaming "welfare programs", "political correctness" and "underprivileged members of our society".

Because no heart-breaking news story is untouchable...

:(

Again, very sad for the mother and families.

:(

bullet to the head for that guy, now. he's a waste of air.

Nana:
As opposed to the noose he already tried to use?

Bail set at $3 million

http://toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20101201/NEWS16/101209983

How can you hate your (ex) spouse enough to harm your children or put them in harm's way? The kids are innocent for God's sakes...

Unreal.

LC, yah, a bullet is quick and sure. his failed attempt is just more proof that he's a loser. he doesn't want to live so I'm sayin help him out. if his kids are dead, no way he gets to live and they dont.

OHT, they weren't even exes yet, she only filed in Sept. sounds like they're both fucked up.

OHT, they weren't even exes yet, she only filed in Sept.

I read that too. I guess I just don't understand how you can hate someone so much to destroy life.

I've been hurt. I've been broken-hearted. I've had exes do all kinds of stupid shit that didn't make any sense to me. But, as intense as something got, it never once had me give up some basic level of humanity on the value of human life...especially innocents.

I think we should do as the Israelis do. In these circumstances, if he has already confessed but won't reveal the location of their bodies, then I don't have a problem with some measure of torture. I don't think it would last more than a few minutes at most before he gives police the information they want to hear.

"bullet to the head for that guy, now. he's a waste of air."

nana, I think I would like to see him get life without parole and let the prison's general population, which has its own brand of justice for child molesters and child killers, do their thing.

Unfortunately, this stuff is relatively common. I remember watching a documentary on children who are killed by a parent just to get back at an ex spouse. One of the worst incidents highlighted in the documentary is when a father picked up his kids because it was his weekend to have them (though the ex-wife begged courts not to let him share custody because he posed a risk to the kids), took them to his home, then called the ex. While she was on the phone, she could hear him shoot to death both of the kids.

These people are the lowliest of life and deserve special punishment, in my opinion.

'These people are the lowliest of life and deserve special punishment, in my opinion.'

tru dat

Things I'm currently hating about all this.
1) Haven't heard one word from "wife" or "x-wife". Where is this winner? Apparently she's a sex offender because she had sex with a 14 yr old 19 years ago. (It's time to look at that "designation" and make it more specific.)
2) The father has "rights", so I guess society can't "force" him to give up information. Can we please send Sheriff Telb over to get the info out of this monster.
3) Killing 3 small children, putting them into trash bags and dumping them into dumpsters would be too easy. But, if the trash truck driver didn't notice, now they are at a landfill. Has anyone thought to start looking there? It's been over a week and I can only imagine the amount of trash that's been dumped in some local dumps by now. That's where I'd look. These so-called searches through fields everyone in southern Michigan and northern Ohio aren't producing anything.

From the Dec 2, 2010 Toledo Blade story :

A week ago, he tried to kill and himself, and now he's alive enough to fight and to contest.

More from the Blade story:

The father probably heard about the guy who put body parts in hollow trees. I would be looking at hollow beech trees.

I was looking at the pic of him today in the Blade, sitting in his wheelchair, and I was thinking about the other pic of him and the wife that was in the paper the other day and it hit me, is this the same guy? Even tho the pic of them both is not dated, he looks WAY different in the new pic. He looks like a methhead. And, jr, you know it's his lawyer saying he should fight it, he looks beaten and he's not talking or even looking at anyone in court. I know lawyers have to use the law to protect their clients but it would suck to be him.

This guy should be waterboarded.

Send this guy on a hunting trip with Dick Cheney.

Are we always unconcerned with the presumption of innocence?

dhr, really? This isn't the court message board. I for one will be greatly surprised if these kids turn up alive or harmed by someone other than this loser.

On Nancy Grace last night, they had posted some of the father's confessions. One was that he killed the boys and wrapped them up in a sheet with a teddy bear and dumped them in a restaurant dumpster. Another was that he killed them and their bodies are inside an abandon school house. Who knows?

Are we always unconcerned with the presumption of innocence?-dhr

Well, we KNOW he's A) a liar and B) knows where those boys are. That's obviously not enough for us to collectively toss him on death row but it's certainly enough for most of us to have an opinion on the story and what kind of man he is.

Let Sarah Palin beat him with a hammer.

Make him watch Bristol Palin on Dancing with the Stars, now that's torture !

I wake up every morning expecting to read the news that these boys' bodies have been found.

What a terribly sad and tragic story. Those poor kids. God rest their souls.

I didn't realize it had been 19 years since the mother was caught having sex with a minor. That would make her a young woman herself at the time, and while obviously still illegal and distasteful/not quite normal/unacceptable and all that, it does put a different spin on it. But as someone else mentioned, why haven't we heard from her? Where are the tearful pleas for help from anyone who knows anything? Is she out searching with community members for her own children?

I guess I shouldn't judge her harshly for keeping a low profile -- at this point. (?) If my three children were missing and presumed dead, I'd probably be having a serious, hysterical nervous breakdown and need to be sedated. Perhaps I wouldn't be out in public, either.

Where are the tearful pleas for help from anyone who knows anything? Is she out searching with community members for her own children?

You know, I thought of that. But then I thought of the Susan Smith case in South Carolina 20 years ago where she locked the kids into their car seats and rolled the car into a lake--then went on every channel tearfully blaming a random "black" guy for stealing her babies.

I'm not saying the mom in this case is even remotely like that or that she is guilty of anything remotely like Susan Smith. I don't believe that at all. I simply bring up the comparison to demonstrate that displaying yourself in front of TV cameras to prove you care/you are devastated/etc. is not a great indicator of anything.

Considering how obnoxious the media are, if something this brutal happened to my family, I would tell the media to fuck off too...

Remember the movie "Payback"? Bare feet, concrete floor, large hammer? He'll talk.

This little piggy went wee wee wee all the way home. Weeeeeeeeeeee, weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee, weeeeeeeee, ok ok I will tell you.

If she had gone public she would have opened herself up to the kinds of attacks about her past that are already being made, and even then some people would have found fault with whatever she said or how she said it.
Seems to me whenever a child is missing or murdered, some segment of the population attacks them, no matter how clearly blameless they might be. John Walsh's wife was blamed for leaving Adam at video games (in 1981, back before we had kids on milk cartons and learned better) and later an affair she had was tossed out too. Comments were made about Polly Klaas' mother taking migraine meds and going to bed that night, leaving 2 12 year old girls awake in Polly's bedroom. And let's not forget Jon Bonet Ramsey's mom, who was only cleared after she was dead. We all make mistakes from one day to the next and not too many of us would hold up perfectly under intense public scrutiny. I have no idea what I'd do and hope to God I never find out but given the response of a whole lot of people, who apparently believe their lives are so perfect nothing bad could ever be said about them, I might stay hidden too.

well said.

dhr, really? This isn't the court message board.

Yes, really, if you have any self respect. Unfortunately, this is a board of gossiping old coots who watch Nancy Grace and run right over here to vent.

Speaking to the facts would certainly benefit everyone more than grossly wishing death upon anyone, but many regular poster here is just too low to understand that.

dhr, I am only an occasional lurker/poster so excuse me if this has already been addressed but why would you choose to hang out with a bunch of "gossiping old coots" in the first place? The internet is a really big place. Can't you find someplace with people more to your liking?

Just curious.

Hey, I did not run over here after Nancy Grace. I stopped at the fridge, got a drink of Ensure, then once my walker wheel was freed up, I continued to the living room where I fired up my TRS-80 radio shack computer and when my dial up connection connected, I posted.
But seriously, this is a message board. Most message boards are filled with opinions and expressed freely from behind a ficticious name. If we all waited for facts, we'd still be silent because only the police know the "true" facts. The rest has been reported from reporters and who knows where they got their info from.
I still stand behind my posted opinion of torturing this loser to gather information, and once these kids are found, hang him from his manhood. Slowly.
Do you really think he's innocent?

Hi toledolen. For the record, I hear a lot of venting about this issue and "tough words." Which amounts to little! I'm through that phase. Society continues to break down. What travesty will occur next week?

My position is clear. Analyze the true problem and deal with it aggressively. Until people are really ready to take the violence that is occurring seriously and quit rationalizing it or using it to serve their purpose we will continue to see these tragic episodes repeated. Until then the sad headlines shall repeat themselves. For the record I have had a friend raped and murdered who was very young. My sentiments reflect the necessity to take steps to greatly reduce these tragedies before they occur - not to vent about what should be done after the fact or express my sympathies and prayers each week.

"John Walsh's wife was blamed for leaving Adam at video games..."

CanineAsylum, I remember reading about that, too. How guilty that poor lady must be feeling since then. Just pure torture. The truth is, though, that many parents did the same thing. When I was a kid, I always nagged my parents to drop me off in the toy aisle until they finished shopping, and they did. Today, that never happens for obvious reasons.

"I still stand behind my posted opinion of torturing this loser to gather information, and once these kids are found, hang him from his manhood. Slowly."

hockeyfan, I agree. I don't feel sorry for him at all.

Well said, hockeyfan, but even the police might not know the facts. Only the murderer may know that (unless s/he is delusional). Until the boys are found (either dead or alive) we can't ask them (or examine their bodies) to get a true (scientific) account of what happened. Trying to torture a confession out of the father might not work. He might tell you whatever you wanted to hear to stop the torture.

I do realize that. It is very frustrating and I do not know any of them or their family.

Tonight on the news I was confused about a "fund" that was started for the Skelton family. It didn't say what the fund was going to be used for. I do not feel a fund is what they need now. Like I said, what's the fund for?

Also, a local female preacher from Morenci said that she isn't just optomistic, she knows that they (the boys) know that the x-mas lights are up at the Morenci park and they are excited for x-mas. She also said that gawd is in control and will see the boys safe. Apparenlty it must have been really, really cold and her brain started to freeze.

http://www.toledoblade.com/article/20101209/NEWS16/12090319/-1/RSS10

so what's up with this? she saw them on Sunday the 28th but didn't say anything to the cops until Saturday the 4th? am I reading that right?? um, what?

Well, it says she was interviewed by the police on Saturday. Maybe she reported it earlier, but they didn't interview her until later because they weren't focusing the investigation on the Sandusky area. Or perhaps they didn't feel her story was credible, so held off until a few days later.

My gut feeling is that these boys are safe and have been stashed someplace. Is Skelton insinuating that his soon to be x was sexually abusing the boys???

well, valbee, I can't say I didn't think about the 'not credible' part while I was reading it, mostly because it did appear to me that they didn't talk to her until 6 days after she called. If she called while they were in the building, you would think that the cops would have come over to check it out, weirder things have happened. if it turns out that the kids were there and the cops ignored her due to past history, they look like jerks not doing their jobs. cant afford that.

I was thinking the same thing, nana. That, and calling the search off, make me wonder if they have additional information that they're not sharing right now.

RockChick, the only thing that makes me question that is the suicide attempt. Why would he stash the kids somewhere safe and then try to off himself? If he were concerned with the safety of his children, as his parents are claiming, why would he stash them and then then make sure no one who cared about them could ever find them?

The other thing about the doughnut shop worker is that she makes it sound like she recognized them right when they walked in the door and heard the woman refer to the one by name. So why did she let them leave? If it was some big scary guy who looked like he was going to pull out a gun, I can understand. But a tired looking woman?

ace, that's what I'm talking about! if she called right when she realized who they were, this would be over now! even if she could only give a description of the car! plus, this was Sunday, the kids were reported missing Friday and their pics were in the paper Saturday, so why would the woman who has them show them in public? The Blade reaches Sandusky, why would she take the chance? it does sound sketchy, but people who are not criminals don't really know how things work.

From what i read on one of the news stations, she wasn't following the case and didn't know at the time they were missing, only after she learned of the missing kids, she realized who they were, but not at the time. I think it might have been abc 13 or 24, i don't remember which. It was 2 days before it was in the blade.

that is insane!

tm2, so what's this then?
"I couldn't believe it when they walked in the door," she said. "They looked just like the missing boys. "

our news outlets have no idea what they are even reporting on. which one is right?

Ace it would have been admiral and honorable if the doughnut shop worker would have stepped upto the plate for the safety of these children, but "crazy" comes in all shapes, sizes, genders, and breeds. Just because she was a woman doesn't mean she wouldn't end your life in crazy fashion.

Still not giving this lady a pass.

nana, i honestly don't know which one to believe, i just remember reading it. I did look for it today but can't find it now.

http://abclocal.go.com/wtvg/story?section=news/local&id=7828135

"Unlike most people, Sandy Jones says she hadn't been following the case of three missing Morenci brothers, until last week."

This is the one i read.

ok, she contradicted herself, now she sounds like an attention-seeker to me. I could not read the paper nor listen to any news this weekend, any new developments?

What the hell is this about some "organization?"

http://toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20101217/NEWS02/12170316

First, the dad posted some crap on Facebook about asking forgiveness from his wife and God. Then the sheriff says, based on what the dad has said to police, that they are conducting a "recovery" search, not a rescue search. And now the dad says the kids are with some kind of "organization."

This story gets stranger by the minute. And why is the dad in a wheelchair??

I was out state for the holidays. Has there been any updates? Did the find the kids or anymore leads?

:( still praying for the family.