Coincidences

A small article in the 7/13/10 edition of the San Antonio Express-News announced a guilty plea in the murder of Donald H. Althaus that occurred on 1/22/09 in San Antonio. (I discussed this case here previously in a post from 8/23/09 that is followed by a comment by my ex-husband.) Coincidentally, the middle name of the man who admitted committing the crime is a very prominent name in my ex-husband's family. Also, the mother of the accused apparently is involved in the case.

There are also some interesting coincidences concerning another old murder case. In August of 2007, a man named Kenneth Polan was said to have been murdered near I-10 and 1604 (i.e., northwest of San Antonio) at a trailer sales business owned by a couple having the same last name as close friends of my former in-laws. Polan's body was found later in a river south of San Antonio, and a man was charged with the crime. One night while watching television newscast coverage of this case, my children and I saw news footage of a very distinctive Suburban with unusual coloring and markings being towed to the crime lab for forensic examination. We instantly recognized this vehicle as looking identical to one owned by my former brother-in-law and his wife. News reports said the case was an extremely complicated one and involved multiple jurisdictions, but no additional information was ever given out and I have never seen any updates or status reports on this case. Coincidentally, a few months after this, my kids said their aunt and uncle told them they had sold this vehicle. We continued to see them and various family members and associates of theirs driving this Suburban, however, so we weren't sure they'd really sold it. A few days ago, we spotted it parked next to my former brother-in-law's wife's workplace with a "For Sale" sign in the window.

After my husband suddenly left in 1999, people around town began telling me he was a close associate of a man here who's a member of an extremely wealthy West Coast family with extensive media holdings, a fact my husband had apparently concealed from me. Coincidentally, this man also filed for divorce from his wife around the same time my husband left and filed. This man's children, who happen to be around the same age as mine, almost immediately became some of our worst and most long-time harassers, and they continue to stalk and harass us to this day.

Finally, although a recent pair of local shooting deaths made me suspect coincidences, not enough information has come out yet for me to know for sure. I first learned of these deaths when I turned on the 6 PM news just after it had started and was shocked to see the San Antonio reporter standing in front of our small-town law enforcement building with the word "Suicide" written in large letters below her. The story ended before I heard any of it, so I tried other stations, but no one else seemed to be carrying the story, which I thought was odd for what had been a lead story on the first network's newscast. Immediately afterward, I turned the t.v. to our local station to catch the story on the local news-radio channel--and was shocked to discover music playing instead and the announcer making no mention of the missing newscast and acting as if nothing was wrong!

That night at 10 PM, I watched the entire newscast on the channel where I'd caught the end of the story originally, but this time they never mentioned it. There was nothing in the newspaper the next morning, so I was mystified as to what had happened to what I knew had been a lead story the night before. I saw no mention of the story on the noon news from either San Antonio or Austin.

That night on the 10 PM news on the station originally carrying the story, I finally found out what had happened: a married couple and their pet dog had been found shot to death in their home out in the country here. I did not recognize the couple's last name and did not believe at the time that I knew them. I was very surprised to hear the reporter say the deaths had been ruled a murder-suicide by the police, both because of the "Suicide" label used by itself the previous night and also the fact that normally such a story would be front-page news.

The San Antonio newspaper finally ran one of their little "mini-articles" on the deaths the next day. Our local paper carried only a very brief article about the deaths containing little additional information.

According to the newspaper accounts, the wife was the same age as my ex-husband. I've been watching for obituaries for the couple to find out who they were related to, her maiden name, and where she went to high school. If she's the person I now believe she might be, she's very closely connected to my ex-husband and there are some very interesting coincidences indeed. I'll post an update here when I get more information.

7/25/10: Here's the promised update. I finally saw an obituary for the wife, and she's not the person I was afraid she might be. Coincidentally, however, she has ties to the equestrian world, as did Dana Edwards, a local woman who was murdered in San Antonio, who had harassed us, and whose family may have owned property near ours. (I've discussed this death previously in an earlier post here. In "My Story" at the beginning of this blog, I've also discussed the fact that my first cousin is very well-known in the equestrian world and that I have good reasons for believing my ex-husband married me in order to make certain "business connections" to my cousin and his wealthy jet-setting friends.)