http://www.omaha.com/index.php?u_pag...u_sid=10252292
Published Thursday | February 7, 2008
Neighbor heard shots from home where 2 men died
BY KEVIN COLE AND JOHN FERAK
WORLD-HERALD STAFF WRITERS

An Omaha man who lives next door to the scene of a double homicide said Wednesday that he may have heard the gunshots that took the lives of two men.

Kenneth Coup, who lives next door, said he thought he heard two gunshots come from the duplex about 7:30 a.m.

"It sure sounded like gunshots, but I couldn't swear to it," Coup said. "I was getting my son ready for school, and that's when I heard two loud pops from over there."

Omaha police were called at 5:05 p.m. Tuesday to the duplex at 3125 S. 16th St. Inside they found the bodies of two men.

Officer Bill Dropinski, a police spokesman, said the identities of the victims had not been released because investigators were still trying to locate relatives.

As of Wednesday night, no arrests had been made in connection with the slayings.

Coup said the people who lived in the duplex had moved in about six months ago. Once in a while, he said, they would sit in the backyard, but they generally kept to themselves.

"The folks over there looked to be in their mid-30s," Coup said. "I saw a lot of different people coming and going all the time."

Alan Langpaul, who owns the house, said he was shocked when detectives called him Tuesday evening to report the grisly discovery.

Langpaul said detectives did not tell him the victims' names. He said that he rented the house to a couple of Hispanic men and that they had lived there since last summer.

"We don't know for sure who was in there," Langpaul said. "I don't know if the people they found are the people I rented to.

"I have been in the rental business 30 years, and I've never had anything happen like that. This is just a shock. I just can't believe it happened."

Both of the men he rented to had steady jobs, Langpaul said, but he declined to identify their employer.

He said he wasn't aware of any prior police calls to the house.

"The people who were down there were very nice and quiet," Langpaul said. "These guys took care of the place. They did not cause any trouble, and they always paid their rent on time."

John Kudirka, 66, who lives directly south of the duplex, said he did not know the residents of either unit in the duplex.

"They are really quiet. I really didn't pay much attention to them," he said. "I don't know what happened. I'm just as dumbfounded as everybody else."

Dropinski urged people to call Crime Stoppers at 444-STOP if they saw anything suspicious near the house Tuesday.

Omaha Police Officer David Spizzirri said Tuesday night that he did not know where in the house the victims were found.

The duplex is in the Deer Park neighborhood, just north of Interstate 80 and across the street from Fire Station No. 3.


Contact the Omaha World-Herald newsroom