wfn.org | Maine Suicide Tied to Arsenic Poisonings at Lutheran Church

[News News <NEWS@ELCA.ORG>]

ELCA NEWS SERVICE

May 8, 2003

MAINE SUICIDE TIED TO ARSENIC POISONINGS AT LUTHERAN CHURCH
03-096-FI

     CHICAGO (ELCA) -- Public health and law enforcement officials in
Maine ruled the death of Daniel Bondeson, 53, to be a suicide and
indicated that a note found in Bondeson's Woodland, Maine, home linked
him and possibly others to an arsenic poisoning that killed one and
sickened more than a dozen other members of Gustaf Adolph Lutheran
Church, New Sweden, Maine, a congregation of the Evangelical Lutheran
Church in America (ELCA).
     Members of the congregation in northeast Maine became nauseated
Sunday afternoon, April 27, shortly after drinking coffee and eating
sandwiches and sweets at the church.  Walter Reid Morrill, 78, died the
next day from what Maine health officials identified as arsenic
poisoning.
     Medical teams at Cary Medical Center, Caribou, Maine, and Eastern
Maine Medical Center in Bangor, Maine, treated Morrill and 15 other
adult members of the congregation for arsenic poisoning.
     It is common to find traces of arsenic in Maine groundwater,
according to state health officials.  The poison is available in rural
areas of Maine, where it was once used as a pesticide.
     On May 1, Maine State Police Lt. Dennis Appleton told reporters
that arsenic was found only in a church coffee pot -- not in the
church's sugar supply or groundwater, that the arsenic was deliberately
placed in the coffee pot and that Morrill's death was a homicide.
     The next day, Bondeson died of a single gunshot wound to the
chest, according to the state medical examiner's office.
     In a May 5 news briefing, Appleton said police found a note
Bondeson left in his home but did not disclose its contents.  He said,
based on the note's contents, the poisoning investigation would
continue, especially studying the "dynamics" of the congregation.
Disputes within the congregation were among several possible motives
state police officials are investigating, said Appleton.
     A member of Gustaf Adolph, Bondeson worked on his family's potato
farm and at a nursing home.  Other congregation members told police he
attended a bake sale at the church the day before the poisonings but did
not return to church on Sunday.
     The Rev. Margaret G. Payne, bishop of the ELCA New England Synod,
Worcester, Mass., preached May 4, during the first Sunday worship
service at Gustaf Adolph after the poisoning.  Maine Gov. John Baldacci
attended.
     "God's choice to become human in Jesus Christ was a choice to come
and be with us in all our brokenness and suffering," said Payne.  "God
has come.  God is here," she said.
     Payne referred to the Gospel story in which Jesus' disciples were
mourning his death.  "Jesus himself stood among them and said to them:
'Peace be with you.'"
     "Jesus comes to bring the end to the grief and fear and confusion,
and to bring peace.  Jesus is here now, bringing peace," Payne said.
     "You have shared the gift of God's love with many people over the
years, and it is that same love that now grieves so deeply with the
Morrill family, that suffers with all the people in the congregation who
are ill, and that surrounds the Bondeson family as they grieve for Danny
and suffer all the agony of the present investigations," she said.
     "Seeing the way that you have loved, I know that God is here,"
said Payne.
     The Rev. James P. Morgan, an Episcopal priest and pastor of
Trinity Lutheran Church, Stockholm, Maine, has been serving Gustaf
Adolph on a part-time basis while the congregation works with the ELCA
New England Synod to find its own pastor.  The Rev. Elaine C. Hewes,
Redeemer Lutheran Church, Bangor, is assisting Morgan in counseling
family members and friends of the congregation.
     The Portland (Maine) Press Herald reported that on May 6 seven
Gustaf Adolph members were at Eastern Maine Medical Center.   Dale
Anderson, Ralph Ostlund and Lester Beaupre were in critical condition --
having "vital signs that were unstable and not within normal limits" --
and Carroll Ruggles, Frances Ruggles, Herman Fisher and Robert Bengson
remained in serious condition -- having "vital signs that might be
unstable and outside normal limits."  The paper also said three members
were treated and released, while five others remained in fair condition
at Cary Medical Center.
     Congregations of the ELCA are organized into 65 synods, each
headed by a bishop.  The New England Synod includes congregations in
Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island and
Vermont.
-- -- --
     Redeemer Lutheran Church has established a fund to assist family
members with room and board expenses while visiting those hospitalized
at the Eastern Maine Medical Center, which is more than 175 miles from
New Sweden.  Checks with "for Families of Gustaf Adolph" on the memo
line may be sent to Redeemer Lutheran Church, 540 Essex Street, Bangor,
Maine 04401.
     A "Joint Statement from New Sweden Families" is available at
http://emmc.org/News/Joint+Statement+from+New+Sweden+Families.htm on the
medical center's Web site.  The May 7 statement said "everyone who was
listed in critical condition has been upgraded to serious, and everyone
who was listed in serious condition has been upgraded to fair."
-- -- --
     The June 2003 issue of The Lutheran, the magazine of the ELCA,
includes an article by Julie Sevig, "Faith over Fear: After Arsenic
Poisoning, Maine Congregation Receives 'An Extra Dose of Consolation.'"
The story is available at http://www.thelutheran.org/0306/page35.html on
the Web.

For information contact:
John Brooks, Director (773) 380-2958 or NEWS@ELCA.ORG
http://listserv.elca.org/archives/elcanews.html