Prom night Murders

Back in 1989, four members of the Pelley family were found brutally murdered in their home. After all these years, their murders have finally been solved. Guess who was behind the killings.

When Bob Pelley and his son Jeff Pelley talked about prom night, it wasn't the conversation Jeff was hoping for. I watched this special the other night on 20/20. The fact that someone felt the need to murder four people over a dance was so disturbing to me. so the story goes like this..... Jeff Pelley, a minister's son was taking his first love, Darla Adams, to the prom. While they were at the prom, enjoying themselves, hanging out with all their friends, dancing the night away, Jeff told Darla he felt like something horrible has happened at home. Darla blew it off. Something horrible indeed happened, and four members of his family had been shot to death. His father Bob Pelley, his step mother Dawn, and her two daughters, 8-year-old Janel and 6-year-old Jolene. All shot at close range. Detectives Mark Senter and John Botich were among the first on the scene. Senter was horrified.

"No human being should've ever seen what we saw that morning," he said.

When detectives arrived at he house though, it was all locked up. This would play a key role into the investigation. There were two other sisters, who were spending the night with friends. This family was made up of two different families. Bob's biological children were Jeff, and Jacque. And Dawn came into the picture bringing in Jessie, Janel, and Jolene. As detectives looked into the family history, they seemed like the Brady bunch, but that is far from what was the truth. Jeff and Jacque did not get along with their step mom Dawn, and Jessie said that she didn't get along with Bob. Tension in the house was always high. The day after the prom, Jeff and his girlfriend were at the Great America Theme Park, north of Chicago. The police had found him and told him what had happened. They brought him back home. From that first day of questioning, police had their suspicions that Jeff may have been involved, but they had no evidence to make an arrest. It took police 13 years to charge the man they thought was guilty of killing the Pelley family. Jeff was late picking up his girlfriend the night of the murders. Jeff's girlfriend Darla had told police she was surprised that he was allowed to go to the prom. Jeff's dad had told him he was not allowed to go due to the fact he was in trouble. Darla said Jeff was given permission to go last minute by his father, after the pastor had a change of heart. Will Tisdale, a church member, and good friend of Bob Pelley, remembered talking to the preacher about Jeff and the prom the week of the killings, and said Jeff's dad had no intention of letting him drive his car to the prom. In fact, Bob had told Will that he disabled Jeff's car so he couldn't take it. The conflict gave police something to work with in a case nearly empty of physical evidence. It made Jeff their one and only suspect, and gave them Jeff's possible motive: to go to the prom and save face in front of his high school sweetheart.

But the case against Jeff was so weak that two district attorneys over two decades refused to prosecute. Jeff is now an adult, and is married with a child of his own. "20/20" gathered the jurors together to talk about the trial and the limited circumstantial case. Ironically, it wasn't the police timeline that brought the jurors to their conclusion.

According to one juror, "What stood out for me was a picture of Rev. Bob Pelley. A photograph of his body laying in the house, the manner in which it was laying … led me to believe that the shooter came out of Jeff's bedroom."

And there was another photograph the jurors found significant, of a gun rack in the parent's bedroom. No gun -- just a gun rack -- but combined with Jeff's stepsister Jessica's testimony, it became critical because she remembered both a bow and a gun in the rack Friday night.

In the jury room, there were three votes over 2½ days, and with each ballot, the tally for innocent shrank until everyone agreed that Jeff had committed the crime.

A murder spree that took four lives was finally solved without the high-tech CSI or DNA evidence. A prosecution depended upon the old saw of motive and opportunity, and a community determined not to forget the minister, his wife and their two little girls. I guess he is appealing the verdict. I hope for Bob, his wife and those two precious little babies, he doesn't walk free, and I hope justice is served.