ESSEX, Vt. -
The quiet Essex neighborhood that was once home to Bill and Lorraine Currier is slowly getting back to normal. As the case nears closure friends and neighbors seek some of their own, but the scars left behind by this bizarre crime are difficult for many to ignore.
"If someone would abduct someone from Colbert Street in Essex Junction you're not safe anywhere," said Randi Tomczak, who lives across the street from the Curriers former home. She remembers them as a kind and quiet couple would ordinarily have a yard filled with holiday decorations by this time each year. "They'd put out Halloween decorations for the kids and around Christmas they'd put out big Christmas display with kind of modern piping, like Christmas carols." she said.
Lorraine Currier's co-workers at Fletcher Allen said she's still with them every day. They keep her picture on a board near the front door. "We bring her up in conversation pretty much every day, especially the women who were close to her," said Jane Vizvarie.
Lorraine worked as a payment processor for Fletcher Allen Healthcare for 25 years. Everyone we spoke to who knew the couple remarked on their consistency. Vizvarie said Lorraine's co-workers miss her quirkiness. "She also was very opinionated, which made it fun to get into conversations with her," she said.
"They were obviously very reliant on each other and very much in love, which was kind of cool," said Ruth Blauwiekel, a co-worker of Bill Currier at the University of Vermont, where he worked as an animal care technician.
Co-workers there said he was usually quiet and extremely hardworking. Blauwiekel said while Bill mostly kept to himself she appreciated his sense of humor. "But then he'd get a little twinkle in his eye and he'd come up with kind of a zinger," she said.
Friends and neighbors still grapple with the concept that something like this could happen here.
"There is bad in the world and there are bad people and every once and awhile they intrude upon our lives even in a beautiful place like this -- like Vermont," Blauwiekel said.
One small sign that things are starting to return to normal -- the Currier home was sold two months ago and the new owner has moved in.
Click here for the statement from the Currier family.
Click here for the statement from Chittenden County State's Attorney T.J. Donovan.
Click here for the statement from U.S. Attorney for Vermont Tristram Coffin.
Click here for the FBI request for public assistance on the travels of Israel Keyes.
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