BLOOMINGTON, Ill. — Two central Illinois brothers found dead in rural Putnam County in March were killed by their father, but it is impossible to say exactly when the boys died, authorities said Wednesday.
BLOOMINGTON, Ill. — Two central Illinois brothers found dead in rural Putnam County in March were killed by their father, but it is impossible to say exactly when the boys died, authorities said Wednesday. Michael Connolly told a fellow patron at an East Peoria casino hours before he picked up 9-year-old Duncan Leichtenberg and his 7-year-old brother Jack that "if he doesn’t hit it big he is going to kill himself," police said in a timeline that tries to piece together the boys’ last hours. "There is one person responsible for this horrific crime and that person is Michael Connolly," McLean County Sheriff Mike Emery said. "It’s sad, it hurts to this day. I say that because there were two young boys who were the victims of circumstances." Connolly left the riverboat casino at 4 a.m. on March 7, about six hours before he picked up Duncan and Jack at the LeRoy Police Department for a custody visit, police said. Later that day he took the children to a library in Bloomington and a pizza delivery driver saw the boys in Connolly’s Bloomington apartment that night, the timeline shows. The boys, from LeRoy, were the subject of a national search after Connolly failed to return them to their mother the next day. Authorities found Duncan and Jack dead on March 29 in the back seat of their father’s car. The body of Connolly, 40, was found about 60 yards away. Connolly hanged himself. The boys died after ingesting prescription drugs, and Jack also was stabbed. When Connolly did not drop the boys off on March 8, their mother, Amy Leichtenberg, notified the LeRoy Police Department, and officers started an incident report that noted Connolly had a history of suicidal threats and threatened Leichtenberg for leaving him and taking the boys. About two hours after being notified, police asked Sprint to check a GPS locator on Connolly’s cell phone, which indicated the phone was "in the area of" his Bloomington apartment, police said. When police arrived at the apartment around 11:15 p.m., the cell phone was there, but officers could not locate Connolly’s vehicle or the children’s possessions. LeRoy police faxed an Amber Alert request to the state that night, but officials determined the alert "would not be issued due to not meeting criteria," according to the police timeline. The alert was ordered and broadcast at 8 p.m. the following day, March 9, by the McLean County Sheriff’s Office. A lead came in on March 10 that Connolly’s vehicle had been spotted in Champaign. And on March 14, a man in Putnam County, about 70 miles from Bloomington, spotted the car in a remote, wooded area but did not call police. A 911 call led authorities back to the spot on March 29 where the boys’ bodies were found in the backseat. Connolly and Leichtenberg divorced in 2006, and Connolly had only recently been allowed to keep his sons overnight. She had a court order barring her ex-husband from contacting her. Leichtenberg has asked the Illinois Judicial Inquiry Board to investigate the conduct of the McLean County Circuit Judge James Souk, who allowed Connolly unsupervised visits with the children. ______ Copyright 2009 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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