Vigil planned for slain Vermont social worker

BARRE, Vt. (AP) – A woman who lost custody of her 9-year-old daughter killed three relatives in a Vermont home and then headed to a nearby state office to gun down the social worker involved in the custody case, authorities alleged.

According to police, Sobel, a case worker with the state Department for Children and Families, died after she was struck by two shots several seconds apart behind Barre City Place shortly before 5 p.m. Friday. Herring was tackled outside the building and arrested on a first-degree homicide charge.

The woman is also the suspect in the deaths of three others at a home in Berlin. Police said it appeared two or the three women were shot.

Family members were the source of the information, and it was a family member who discovered the bodies and summoned authorities.

Shumlin tentatively identified Saturday’s victims as Rhonda Herring and Regina Herring, the suspect’s cousins and Julianne Falzarano, an aunt. The cousins were in their 40s, and the aunt in her 70s; the three were killed before Sobel’s life was taken, Shumlin said at a news conference Saturday night. A Sunday morning press conference has been scheduled by police.

Officers stated after Sobel’s capturing that Herring’s daughter remained in state custody.

Officials said Herring’s daughter remains in state custody. She will be arraigned Monday afternoon in Washington County Court. It is unclear if she had a lawyer who could comment on her behalf.

He said it was his understanding following conversations with relatives that Herring’s father had been one of 16 siblings in a very large family.

“The family and extended family would ask that all concerned continue to respect their privacy at this time”, read Bombardier from the prepared statement.

“This case is in the early states of investigation, to include exploring the connection with the homicide that occurred in Barre city yesterday afternoon”, state and local police said in a joint statement.

Gov. Peter Shumlin, who was returning from a Nova Scotia vacation a week early after receiving word of the deaths, said Saturday there was no reason to believe there was a continuing threat related to the incidents. “We additionally know and firmly consider that this was an remoted assault based mostly upon the individual we’ve got in custody, who’s the alleged perpetrator of those crimes”.

To honor Sobel, Gov. Peter Shumlin also ordered that all Vermont state flags at government buildings be lowered to half staff Sunday.

“I feel all Vermonters are as shocked, dismayed, horrified and grief-stricken as all of us are”, Shumlin stated. The governor added that he was unable to remember a similar murder in his entire lifetime, especially by the same perpetrator.

The two shootings amount to the deadliest attack in Vermont since a quadruple murder in Belvidere in 2001. A home telephone number listed for her had been disconnected.