21 MINUTES OF TERROR Stabbing spree left 4 dead and 7 wounded
RIGHT: Members of the Rockford East High School softball team sign Jenna Newcomb's memorial cross March 28 during a prayer vigil on Charles Street in Rockford. Several hundred people gathered to honor victims of a mass stabbing the day before.
A spree of mayhem and violence on Wednesday afternoon March 27 shattered the peace of a quiet Rockford neighborhood leaving four dead, seven residents wounded and the Rockford community in mourning.
Christian I. Soto, 22, of Rockford was charged with four counts of firstdegree murder, seven counts of attempted first-degree murder and two counts of home invasion.
Here’s what police are saying about how the event unfolded, what happened and when.
First calls to 911
Rockford police officers were called to the 2300 block of Holmes Street at 1:14 p.m. as neighbors reported seeing Jacob Schupbach, 23, flee his house.
Witnesses told police they saw Soto chase Schupbach across the street, stabbing him repeatedly after he fell to the ground. They say they saw Soto get into a black Chevrolet Silverado and run Schupbach over at the end of the driveway.
“Jacob was seen getting up and running back into his residence,” Rockford police said in a written court summary.
Witnesses told police they saw Soto follow him back into the house. Police would find Schupbach and his mother, Romona Schupbach, 63, dead inside.
Police later learned that Soto had been visiting Schupbach, a neighbor and childhood friend. They had apparently smoked marijuana that Soto claims was laced with another “unknown narcotic” which made him paranoid.
“(Soto) said he retrieved a knife from the kitchen at Jacob’s house and he proceeded to stab Jacob and Romona to death,” police wrote. “He could not recall a description of the knife.”
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Mailman killed
Witnesses said that after the attack on Schupbach, they saw Soto leave the Holmes Street house and get back into the black Silverado heading south.
During an interview with police investigators, Soto recalled “‘taking out’
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the mailman,” police wrote.
Jay Larson, 49, a 25-year veteran of the U.S. Postal Service was found critically injured in the front yard of a house in the 2200 block of Winnetka Avenue. He was taken to the hospital where he later died.
A witness said he saw Soto on top of Larson, punching him. The witness opened his front door and he heard Larson yell for him to call police. The witness called 911 and Soto started to come toward him. He quickly closed and locked his front door, watching from the front window.
Soto retrieved a knife from the truck with an orange handle and began to stab Larson over and over again, the witness told police.
He saw Soto get back into the truck, run Larson over and hit a parked vehicle. Soto, he said, put the vehicle in reverse and “ran Larson over a second time with the vehicle” before getting out and fleeing on foot.
Fighting off ‘the devil’
Darlene Weber was letting Brandy, her 4-year-old pit bull, out into the backyard when she says Soto attacked her, slashing her face near her left eye and leaving a cut that took four stitches to close. Weber said he forced his way into her house.
Weber screamed and curled into a ball on the floor.
“The look in his eyes was like he was the devil reincarnated,” Weber said.
Brandy bit Soto’s leg as he attacked Weber’s daughter, Cathy Gilfillan, 23, and Weber’s son, Jacob Vollmann, 21, who tried to fight him off. Gilfillan suffered a cut to the lower left side of her chin that took six stitches to close.
Vollmann suffered a cut to his forehead and his ear, but he managed to hit Soto with a syrup bottle and drive him out of the house.
Killed protecting friend, sister
Three teenage girls on spring break. One 14-year-old girl was in the kitchen fixing something to eat. Her sister,
Jenna Newcomb, 15, an East High School student and softball player, was in the basement with a 15-year-old friend watching a movie on a laptop.
They couldn’t know that Soto had allegedly spotted a motorcycle in their garage and was looking for a way inside the house in the 4700 block of Cleveland Avenue.
The 14-year-old told police she saw
Soto enter the house covered in blood through an unlocked door. She saw him pick up Newcomb’s softball bat. She told police that somehow he did not see her and she ran down to the basement to warn the other girls.
Soto cornered them, demanding a gun and began to beat them with the bat, the girls told police.
The girls suffered severe injuries. One girl’s wrist was broken, her head was cut open and her left side was bruised. Another girl was battered along her left side, shoulder and arm.
Newcomb was beaten to death trying to fight Soto off and protect her sister and her friend, officials said.
A hero appears
Neighborhood resident Keith Fahrney was driving his gray Jeep at around 1:30 p.m. in the 2100 block of Eggleston Road when he saw a man attacking his neighbor, Lindsey Craig, with a knife.
Authorities say Soto had broken into Craig’s house in the 4600 block of Florence Street through a window and attacked her. Despite her injuries, Craig escaped the house and fled outside and onto Eggleston. Soto tackled her and began to stab her, police said.
Fahrney stopped Soto from continuing his assault on Craig, but then Soto turned his attention to Fahrney, stabbing him in the head and neck, police said.
Soto tried to get into Fahrney’s Jeep and steal it, but Fahrney pulled him out of the vehicle, authorities said.
Fahrney occupied Soto long enough for help to arrive.
Winnebago County Sheriff’s Deputies and Rockford Police Officers got there, pursued Soto and took him into custody at 1:35 p.m.
Winnebago County Sheriff Gary Caruana’s office on Facebook message said Fahrney is the “definition of a true hero.”
Fahrney suffered serious injuries but has since been treated and released from the hospital. Craig was critically wounded and is expected to survive, officials said.
Jeff Kolkey writes about government, economic development and other issues for the Rockford Register Star. He can be reached at (815) 987-1374, via email at jkolkey@rrstar.com and on Twitter @jeffkolkey.