Family Remains Haunted By Double Murder
SPOKANE – Thursday was the 2nd annual National Day of Remembrance for murder victims and for one North Spokane family a double-murder earlier this year still haunts them.
Laurie Pehl owns a home in North Spokane where she lived with her son Tanner. The house holds 10 years of good memories, but there’s one awful memory from this last February that no amount of clean up and restoration can remove.
On February 28th Tanner and his friend Sarah Clark were murdered inside the home. Former Las Vegas resident Justin Crenshaw was arrested within a matter of hours for their murders.
Now Laurie Pehl now hates this house.
“Can’t help but look at certain places and know what happened and try not to look,” she said Thursday.
The contradiction is that she loves her son and her home is one of the only places she feels close to him.
“Lots of years with him in this house, all our family,” she said.
For the last seven months crews have transformed the home at 512 Elm Street from the scene of two murders into someone else’s new house. The walls and floors have been covered but for Laurie it still feels the same.
On Thursday Laurie walked through the house with her daughter Katie surveying how the work has been progressing. However when the works stops and the noise goes away the thoughts are inevitable.
“I know what’s behind these walls,” Katie Pehl said. “I know what’s beneath. I’ll never forget, despite all this beautiful work done, I’ll never forget what I saw.”
On Saturday the Pehls will work on finishing the front yard and are inviting the public to the volunteer effort which will include the planting of Tanner’s Tree which will stand in the yard in his memory.
