For first responders, healing from Grand Haven Township mass fatality will be a long process
Processing eight deaths, particularly involving children, in a single home is a long, heavy road — and local authorities know it.
GRAND HAVEN TWP. — First responders checked the quiet residential block on Riverside Trail once on Friday morning and found nothing out of the ordinary.
Three hours later, they were called back to white smoke pouring from the home.
Inside, firefighters found eight bodies: two adults and six children. Police believe they were all members of the same family. Some had been shot.
Read More: 8 found dead, including 6 children, after suspicious house fire in Grand Haven Township
Authorities have not yet formally named the victims. However, friends and family of the victims named them as Kristopher and Amanda "Mandy" Karolkiewicz, and their six children: Keegan, Bennett, Teddy, Smith, Caroline and Ella. The children ranged in age from 5 to 15.
For the deputies and firefighters who walked through that front door on July 24, the job didn't end when the fire was out or when the scene was taped off.
Processing eight deaths, particularly involving children, in a single home is a long, heavy road — and local authorities know it.
"We have a couple different layers of support," said Ottawa County Sheriff Eric DeBoer. "We have a support team built up of men and women in the sheriff’s office that are trained for that. They also have resources outside of that they can use."
Mass casualties are extraordinarily rare in Ottawa County, a community of 300,000 that typically sees between one and four homicides a year. Most are isolated disputes.
The last time the county saw a non-traffic incident with this number of fatalities was September 2008, when Troy Brake murdered four people in Wright Township.
An investigation of this magnitude draws in dozens of people — investigators, crime scene technicians, firefighters and child protective services personnel. Each one carries a piece of what they saw.
To counter that, Ottawa County partners with Pine Rest Mental Health Services for a specialized program aimed at giving officers "emotional body armor."
The physician who leads the program is scheduled to run a formal debriefing for everyone who responded to the Riverside Trail address.
By Saturday morning, the department had sent a message to all staff urging them to take advantage of the help.
"I’m happy that this generation is open to talking to people," DeBoer said, pointing to a real cultural shift in how law enforcement views trauma. "It’s just something we have to deal with, and thankfully people are getting better at understanding what we go through."
Residents in the victims’ neighborhood were also doing what they felt was necessary to address the tragedy.
As of Saturday evening, neighbors of the victims had taken steps to dissuade passersby from driving by the home. A message written in chalk on the asphalt read: “Stop gawking.”
Some were standing in front of the victims’ residence, waving away those who drove by as they worked on displaying a makeshift memorial.
Dozens of Grand Haven-area students gathered Sunday night to honor the lives of the Karolkiewicz family members, largely organized by students within the Grand Haven Public Schools district, where the six Karolkiewicz children attended school.
The district issued a released a statement on Sunday, saying grief counseling is available for students.
"As our community continues to grieve Friday's tragic loss, our hearts remain with everyone affected. We know many members of our school community may be experiencing a wide range of emotions as they process this tragedy, whether they were directly impacted or simply struggling with the loss," said Superintendent Kristin Perkowski.
Read More: ‘This was dark, this was evil': Dozens attend vigil for loss of Grand Haven Twp. family
Grand Haven Public Schools released a second statement on Sunday evening, saying counseling for students will be available by Mosaic Counseling from 1-4 p.m. Monday, July 27, despite school not being in session.
Counseling will be available at:
- Hope Church: 14932 Mercury Drive, Grand Haven
- Summit Church: 15020 Stanton St., West Olive
— Heather VanDyke covers northern Ottawa County for the Ottawa News Network. Contact her at hvandyke@ottawanewsnetwork.org. Sarah Leach is the executive editor of the Ottawa News Network. Contact her at sleach@ottawanewsnetwork.org. Follow her on Twitter @ONNLeach.
