Late Monday morning on July 11, 2022, officers and the Kankakee County Emergency Response Team went to a house in the 700 block of Cherokee Drive in Bourbonnais for a welfare check and found two people dead in the master bedroom: Ruth Ann Menz, a 46-year-old White female, and her husband, Larry Menz Jr., 48.
Hours earlier, just before 11:30 p.m.
the night before, police had responded to a 911 call reporting a domestic disturbance at the address.
According to police, the husband met officers outside, said there was no issue, went into the garage and locked the home, after which officers documented the situation and continued monitoring the situation until the welfare check was requested.
Records also noted past domestic calls to the residence.
The following day, the coroner reported preliminary autopsy findings: 46-year-old Ruth Ann Menz died of a gunshot wound to the head, and the 48-year-old husband also died of a gunshot wound to the head, with his injury appearing self-inflicted.
Authorities publicly announced the deaths as a murder-suicide discovered during the welfare check, fixing the timeline to the late-night disturbance and the Monday morning entry into the home.
In obituary notices, the 46-year-old female was identified as Ruth Ann Menz, born in Kankakee and living in Bourbonnais, with her life taken at her home on July 11, 2022.
The remembrance placed the 46-year-old Ruth Ann Menz at the center of family and community ties, even as official accounts anchored her final moments to the tragedy that played out at her Cherokee Drive address.
With the suspected shooter, her 48-year-old husband, dead at the scene, the investigation proceeded without a living suspect to charge.
Local victim-advocacy statements in the aftermath referred to the case as a domestic-violence murder-suicide, underscoring the loss of 46-year-old Ruth Ann Menz, who in her short life, impacted the lives of many.
Leaving friends, family, and community members with lingering questions,that will never get answers.
