So this is likely some sort of robbery gone wrong? Perhaps Mr. Girdner fought back to protect the kids and this is the result.
Someone posted (Pensfan?) that most robbers are not cold-blooded enough to kill kids. That's true, but some are quite ruthless if you try to cross them. Don't give them what they want and they could do anything.
If this was an attempted carjacking, Mr. Girdner was in a horrible position. he couldn't just throw the keys or run from the car. He had two kids to care for. What a horrible, horrible thing.
As for Mr. Girdner, by all accounts (article comments by those who profess to know him), he was a nice man with no impure motives when it came to the kids. That's certainly possible. Just being a man does not mean a person is a pervert if they are kind to someone else's kids. But, I would not allow an unrelated man to babysit my kids, especially overnight, especially after he has shown unsolicited "interest" in them and wanted to take them on outings. With everything we know nowadays, that's risky, no matter how well you know a person, because most men are not interested in dealing with someone else's kids.
But there are some kind men out there who maybe have the capacity and ability to give something back to society by being a mentor, caring for kids, etc. and it appears this man was one of those. Just a granddad type who felt like helping out another part of his church family.
It says something awful that we, as a society, have been conditioned to immediately suspect the motives of such a man in a situation like this (I sure did) and also that a such a kind man and the two precious kids in his care can be murdered over a material possession, which appears likely.
I'm just shaking my head over this whole thing. I'm appalled.
