(This article was _very_ hard to find, and I don't find any follow-up articles on it, either - weird.)

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Four found shot to death in Wichita house

The Wichita Eagle

Date: 12/07/00 22:58

WICHITA -- Four persons were found shot to death Thursday morning in Wichita's worst multiple killing in almost 27 years.

A 15-year-old cousin of one of the victims discovered the bodies of two females and two males inside a rental home on the city's near-northeast side, an area long plagued by exchanges of gunfire between feuding gang members.

The deaths sparked a massive police investigation involving 30 detectives and dozens of officers.

The enormity of the tragedy played out on crowded streets near the yellow one-story house and in a Wichita Police Department waiting room, where relatives of the victims held each other, rocked back and forth and sobbed.

"That's my brother, Momma! That's my brother!" Jeremy Levy screamed to his mother outside the house. He was referring to Jermaine Levy, one of the victims.

Relatives identified the dead as Raeshawnda Wheaton, 18; Quincy Williams, 17; Odessa Ford, 18; and Jermaine Levy, 19. Williams and Ford were cousins. Ford was renting the house.

Police had no suspects.

"Who might have been angry or evil enough to do this?" Lt. Ken Landwehr said Thursday. "What we're trying to do is piece together the last few minutes of these people's lives."

By late afternoon, Landwehr said, homicide detectives had ruled out a murder-suicide. He also said police were not yet classifying the shootings as gang-related.

"We have not ruled out robbery as a motive," he said.

At one point Thursday, about 15 officers searched a nearby cemetery, looking for evidence.

A neighbor called 911 at 9:02 a.m. Thursday, and officers responded to the scene minutes later. Witnesses last reported seeing the victims alive about 7 p.m. Wednesday, Landwehr said.

Jesse Hardyway said he was at the house with Quincy Williams between 6 and 7 p.m. Wednesday, and everything seemed fine. He drove to the house Thursday, when Williams did not respond to a page. The porch light was still on.

"The door was wide open," he said. "It was like they had a war up in there or something."

Hardyway said he knew of no one who had a reason to harm the four.

They had no enemies, he said. "That's what I don't understand" about the killings.

Wichita police blocked the streets near the slaying site as relatives arrived.

"Why?" emerged as a frequent question, shouted in frustration and repeated in emotion-charged prayers.

Inside a police sedan near the home, Levy's mother wiped away tears. Another woman -- thought to be the relative of another victim -- later joined her inside the car. They grabbed and held each other's hands through an opening in a glass window dividing the police car's front and back seats.

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