Rumor versus fact

I JUST FINISHED READING the paper and wanted to thank you so much for your diligence, your hard work, integrity, and honesty in trying to dispel so many rumors and innuendos with as many facts as can be found about what happened to Tom. This remains, and will always remain, a horrific and beyond grievous thing for Tom’s family, and I wish this community would find a better way to help them through this than what has been going on.

Regardless of what people reason in their minds, this not only does not help them, but it is destroying other families as well as creating a meanness and division in our community that I thought I would never see.

For me personally, I hate the killer among us signs and don’t know enough about legalities to understand why something that hasn’t even been proven as fact can be put out there—other than maybe that is freedom of speech and not libelous since no one is named. Our town is struggling economically and drying up anyway, and this cannot help.

Out of respect for Tom’s family, as well as the infighting that occurs (have even experienced this within my own extended family), I have begun to feel like I can’t even speak out about rights and wrongs or rumors as opposed to facts, because in this town, you cannot defend what isn’t factualor, heaven forbid, defend Nathan Lewiswithout automatically being seen and labeled as against Penny and not wanting the truth to come out or wanting justice for Tom. That’s just not true.

My heart aches and breaks for Tom’s family, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to jump into this ring of meanness and accusations when there are no facts to support this. If you defend Nathan (which doesn’t even mean him personally, only as pertains to the unfounded accusations made against him), you are seen as not “a fan of Penny,” and that’s just not true.

Time and time again, as I have done with this latest round after the statement from the AG’s office suspending the investigation, I only think to myself and say to others that, “I know Laurie will do the work and will let us know the facts, so I am going to wait on that.”

Thank you for the clarification—which you did very respectfully and without divulging any information from the transcription that is delicate to the family. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Have a blessed day.

KAREN VOORHEES