Church member tied to poisonings

Christian Century, May 31, 2003

Five days after 16 members of a Lutheran church in Maine were sickened by arsenic in the coffee at church, one of whom died, longtime parishioner Daniel Bondeson was found dead of a gunshot wound. Police on the case that has attracted wide media attention said May 13 they have linked Bondeson to the poisonings, though he may not have acted alone.

Bondeson, 53, died of a gunshot wound to the chest, but authorities have yet to conclude whether his death May 2 was an accident, a homicide or, as initially reported by a relative, self-inflicted, according to the Associated Press. Bondeson was at a church bake sale April 26, the day before the poisonings, but was not at the Sunday service.

The Gustav Adolph Lutheran Church in New Sweden, in northeastern Maine, did not have a full-time pastor. James P. Morgan, an Episcopal priest and pastor of Trinity Lutheran Church in Stockholm, had been serving Gustaf Adolph on a part-time basis while the congregation sought its own pastor with the help of the New England Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.

The following Sunday, May 4, the church had a standing-room-only service. With ELCA Bishop Margaret Payne presiding, Governor John Balducci told the congregaton, "We're here to just stand with you, pray with you."

Morgan and an ELCA minister conducted the funeral service April 30 for W. Reid Morrill, 78, a church member who died within two days of the poisonings. At least three other churchgoers remained in critical condition two weeks after the incident. Seven had been treated without being hospitalized.