Family History

We subscribe to the Sunday newspaper. I like reading the newspaper, and coupons come on Sunday, so it's really a win-win.

I was going through the paper throwing out the copious amounts of advertisements, and a news story on the front page caught my eye.  It was a big spread about a notorious crime family in our city and the number of crimes that has been committed over the past 40+ years by members of this family.

The reason this is news worthy is because a guy in the family is accused of killing four people, and that is just the latest in a long long long string of crimes committed by him and obviously other relatives of his.

So inside the paper they have a family tree. Parts of the tree are missing, they only included people with several crimes to their name as well as a few upstanding citizens in the family. There are probably 50 or maybe even more people on the tree.

I'm pretty sure one of the guys listed was C, Y, and M's bio dad.  It only gave his name, age, and a picture from the 80's so I can't be 100% sure.

I contacted the author of the story about if there was a way to find out if it really is their dad. We've exchanged a few messages but I have nothing definitive yet.  IF (and I do mean IF) it was their dad, this news story is extremely valuable if only for the reason that it traces the family's roots back over 100 years.  Considering I know basically nothing about their dad other than some of the crimes he has committed, this information is incredibly valuable for if/when they begin having questions. The patriarch of the family was a very upstanding member of the community which I think is also valuable, as well as knowing that there are members of the family who have lifted themselves up out of the bad and turned their lives into something good.

So, IF this is their family, their cousin is the guy that killed these people. Which is pretty horrifying.  I am so thankful that they made it out of the family essentially unscathed and that they are safe, with new last names, and that we have no contact with the bio dad at all.

It is a strange, strange thing to find something like this, especially in this way. We will see if this is their history or not. If it's not, I don't know what hope we would ever have of tracing their family roots on their dad's side. Maybe they wouldn't want to know, I don't know.  I'd like to have it for them if they do want to know, though.

Comments

  1. AnonymousDecember 17, 2013 at 7:29 PM

    my son's birth half-uncle was brutally shot in the head multiple times this past summer. it was a gang turf war (drugs).
    so i totally get what you're saying. totally.
    ~natalie

    ReplyDelete

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