Murder in Iowa

It’s not supposed to happen around these parts.  But it has happened,  and it has shocked folks in this great Heart of the American Heartland, Ames, Iowa.

The talk of this town today  — and in many nearby towns — is the killing of 22-year-old Iowa State University student and star golfer Celia Barquin-Arozamena, whose body was found in a pond near the 9th hole at the Coldwater Golf Links here in Ames.  She had been fatally stabbed while she was playing golf. Collin Daniel Richards, also 22, has been charged with first-degree murder.  Authorities said he is homeless, that he has a long criminal record, and that he committed  “a random act of violence.”

You could not go anywhere in this gorgeous college town today without hearing people talk and wonder about this almost-unspeakable, and almost-unbelievable, crime.  You must understand that Ames is an incredibly safe town.  You must understand that Barquin-Arozamena was playing golf in broad daylight on a popular course in this incredibly safe town.  And yet, she is dead, and everyone is trying to figure out how such a thing could happen.

Much of that  same speculation took place a couple of months ago when another university student —  Mollie Tibbetts, 20,  from the University of Iowa — disappeared one night while she was jogging in the small, incredibly safe  town of Brooklyn, Iowa.  Her remains were discovered a few weeks later, and a laborer named Christhian Rivera, 24, has been arrested and charged with Murder One.  Like Richards, he faces the prospect of life in prison without parole (Iowa has no death penalty).

Two university students, killed in this safe state within the past couple of months.  Both cases have left us wondering  and worrying — what in the world has happened here in Iowa?  How in the world should all of us react?

The answer, I’m afraid, is that, indeed, “the world” has made its way here.  “The world” has people who, yes, are good and honorable and decent.  But it also contains people who are bad and dangerous and who, if we let them, will prey on us, or our children, or our children’s children.  Iowa is still, statistically, a “safe place.”  That has not changed.

What has changed — forever, I’m afraid — is our perception that just because we’re in Iowa, or just because we live in Ames, we don’t have to be watchful for the scumbags who live among us.