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SPARTANSBURG, Pa. — A Pennsylvania man was arrested Saturday and charged with the slaying of a pregnant Amish woman whose physique was discovered final week.
Shawn C. Cranston, 52, of Corry, has been charged with felony murder, felony murder of an unborn baby, housebreaking and felony trespass, Pennsylvania State Police stated.
He was denied bail at a preliminary arraignment early Saturday morning and is being held on the Crawford County jail. On-line court docket information present a preliminary listening to has been scheduled for March 15; they don’t checklist a protection lawyer.
Calls and emails to state police, the district lawyer and public defender’s places of work weren’t instantly returned Saturday morning.
Cranston’s arrest comes lower than per week after authorities discovered the physique of Rebekah A. Byler, 23, in the lounge of her house just a few miles from Spartansburg.
Police stated she appeared to have reducing wounds to her neck and head.
The killing shocked the agricultural group in northwestern Pennsylvania, the place individuals say the Amish get alongside properly with their neighbors within the space.
Police started their investigation Feb. 26 after Byler’s husband, Andy Byler, discovered her physique inside the house shortly after midday.
Trooper Cynthia Schick advised The Related Press on Thursday the investigation and post-mortem have given police an concept of what homicide weapon could have been used.
Two younger Byler kids on the house weren’t harmed, Schick has stated.
The Bylers’ house is positioned alongside a mud highway in a really distant farming space. Scores of Amish turned out for calling hours Thursday night at a house in the neighborhood. Many arrived by buggies lit by headlights alongside the slender nation roads.
Residents stated the Amish had a longstanding presence within the space and blend properly with the encircling group. Amish and non-Amish go to one another’s houses, and the Amish work jobs for the non-Amish and attend occasions just like the fish fries, they stated. Neighbors have been elevating cash to assist the Byler household.
The Amish typically observe primary Christian beliefs and practices however aren’t homogeneous, in line with the Younger Heart for Anabaptist and Pietist Research at Elizabethtown Faculty in Pennsylvania. They’re recognized for easy clothes and for counting on horses and buggies for transportation. Native congregations keep a wide range of guidelines and restrictions relating to gown, the usage of expertise and participation in American society.
The general Amish inhabitants is sort of 400,000 individuals in a whole bunch of settlements throughout 32 states, Canada and Bolivia. Pennsylvania has one of many best concentrations of Amish.
