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Tensions rose before slaying
Keeling had problems, girlfriend scuffled with neighbor, police called
By Tom Beyerlein and Daniel Wells
Dayton Daily News
DEERFIELD TWP., WARREN COUNTY | Linda Wilson wasn't afraid of her back-door neighbor, Melvin Morris Keeling, until about a week before the bloodshed.
Then, as she'd work by the kitchen window that looked out on Keeling's home, she said, "I thought of doing dishes and (feared) he would shoot through the window and blow my head off."
Authorities say Wilson had reason to fear Keeling, 43. They believe he entered her Deerfield Twp. home early Sept. 19 and fatally shot her granddaughter, Katelind Caudill, 13, a witness against Keeling in a child sexual abuse case. Officials believe Keeling fled to northwest Indiana and killed two women in a convenience store. He remained a fugitive Tuesday night.
Tension had been rising in the neighborhood over allegations, which surfaced on Sept. 11, that he molested a girl in his family. The girl told Wilson, her daughter Franki Phelps and Katelind, who confronted Keeling and called him a pedophile. Police interviewed Katelind two days before she was killed about what she knew.
Neighbor Rick Campbell said Keeling seemed like a friendly, normal guy. But in recent weeks, Campbell said, Keeling had alluded to problems at home but wouldn't elaborate on them. "You could just see the air go right out of him" when he spoke of the problems, Campbell said.
The last time Campbell saw Keeling was about 10 days before the killings. "He said, 'Brother, things still aren't going good,' " Campbell said. "He asked me to pray for him. That was the last thing he said to me: He asked me to pray for him."
Keeling's problems weren't just that long-swirling stories that he was abusing children were taking on substance.
He was facing eviction, his utilities were shut off, and he had a rocky relationship with his girlfriend.
"He had a very violent temper and he could go off at any time," said the Rev. Michael Carpenter, pastor of Loveland Park Baptist Church, where Keeling's girlfriend's children attended services. Keeling was pleasant, Carpenter said, but "you could almost sense that it was put on, that there was something else going on in the background."
Carpenter said he was worried about Keeling's treatment of his family, but didn't call police because "I couldn't prove anything. I felt the way the kids acted, there was something terribly wrong in the house."
Keeling's life hadn't always been so chaotic, his former wife said.
Melvin and Jeanna Keeling were married Dec. 22, 1984, in Cincinnati. They had three children. Keeling worked for two paper-products companies, International Paper Co. and Jefferson Smurfit, before
landing a job with Ford Motor Co. in Sharonville about 10 years ago. "He was always a faithful worker," Jeanna Keeling said. Keeling remained at Ford until he became a fugitive.
DeAngelo Gaston, now 21, said Keeling was his neighbor and former baby sitter in Cincinnati. "He was a good man," Gaston said. "He use to take care of me like he was part of my family,"
Jeanna Keeling said her marriage had been happy until Keeling left her for the girlfriend in July 1998. The following month, Keeling was charged with carrying a concealed weapon. The charge was later dismissed. Keeling has no prior criminal convictions, according to Warren County authorities.
Keeling did have a history of failing to pay his debts, including taxes. Records show seven tax liens and judgments against him since 1992, two of them because he didn't pay his divorce lawyer.
"The little bit I remember about him was, he was an OK guy," said the lawyer, Sylvan Reisenfeld. "I
do remember he at least proposed to be a pastor of one of the churches."
In 2000, the year of his divorce, Keeling made $50,000 in regular pay, plus $28,000 in overtime, records show. He was ordered to pay almost $21,000 a year in child support and alimony, but half of that obligation ended last year.
Keeling was renting the house at 8993 Oak Drive in southern Warren County since at least 2003, public records show. To the rear is 2183 Cosmos Road, where Katelind Caudill lived with her grandmother, Linda Wilson, and other relatives.
The two households collided Sept. 11, with the allegations of sexual abuse. A week later, Wilson went to bed with her door unlocked. In the morning of Sept. 19, she heard two loud "bangs" and found Katelind dead in her bedroom.
Contact Tom Beyerlein at 225-2264. Staff writers Larry Budd and Kelli Wynn contributed to this report.
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