LAFAYETTE, Indiana — A mother and her 5-year-old daughter are dead after what Lafayette police believe could be a possible murder-suicide.
Right now, the coroner has not said how they died.
"You could hear the laughter," said neighbor Angela Snyder, describing the sounds she would usually hear from the house across the street on Kinkaid Drive, the one with a "God Family Country" sign hanging above the front porch.
"Very patriotic. In the backyard, lights, fireworks," Snyder said of her neighbors, whose last names she knew only because of another sign in their front yard.
Thursday, the only lights Snyder saw across the street were the ones coming from police cars after investigators said they found the bodies of 43-year-old Tracy Bondurant and her 5-year-old daughter, Rayleigh Bloyd. The bodies were found by officers around 2 p.m. Thursday after police received a report that two people were dead inside the house.
"You couldn't even get in the neighborhood, so I knew it was something really really bad," Snyder said.
That something turned out to be a possible murder-suicide that police are continuing to investigate.
For Snyder, it's hard to imagine the little girl she'd seen playing outside is gone.
"She would be out on the sidewalk when I would walk my dogs. She would do little chalk drawings, say 'Hi' and want to pet the dogs," Snyder remembered.
Now, police are investigating whether Bondurant killed her daughter and then took her own life.
"You just ask what could have led up to that point," Snyder said.
The answers could be in recent court documents filed in Tippecanoe County Superior Court 2. They show Bondurant was facing felony charges of theft and fraud for allegedly stealing more than $50,000 from her sister and brother-in-law's bank account and using it to pay her and her fiancé's bills online.
According to an affidavit, Bondurant admitted to police that she took the money but told them her fiancé knew nothing about it.
Last week, Bondurant appeared in court for her initial hearing. A day later, she posted a meme on social media about being grateful for life.
The Tippecanoe County coroner found the cause death as suicide for Bondurant and homicide for Bloyd.