The Nation - News from Aug. 13, 1989

Hundreds of friends and relatives attended a memorial service for four children who drowned when the family station wagon plunged into a river, but the youngsters’ mother was in seclusion and their father in jail charged with their murders. About 500 people crowded into a suburban Detroit church to say farewell to Brian DeLisle, 8, and his sisters: Melissa, 4; Kadie, 2, and Emily, 10 months. Wyandotte police say Lawrence DeLisle, 28, of Lincoln Park, confessed to pressing down the car’s accelerator and driving into the Detroit River on Aug. 3 “to be rid of his present burdens.” He was described as pressed by money problems. Police say he intended to kill his children and wife, Suzanne, 32. Both parents escaped from the sinking car in which DeLisle’s father committed suicide 18 months earlier.