THE
Daily Egyptian SERVING THE SOUTHERN ILLINOIS UNIVERSITY COMMUNITY SINCE 1916.
DAILYEGYPTIAN.COM
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 30, 2022
VOL. 105, ISSUE 11
Justice for Molly
Ten years later, quest for justice carried on by loved ones Joel Kottman | @JoelKottman
A memorial service for Molly Young took place at Turley Park on March 27 at 2 p.m. Molly Young was a 21 year old native of Marion, Illinois when she was found dead on March 24, 2012 in the home of her ex-boyfriend, police dispatcher Richie Minton. Her death was initially ruled a suicide, but additional investigation came to later label the cause of death as undetermined. Since Young’s death, her family has worked to raise awareness of her case and influenced legislation to fight against opaque police procedures and reducing opportunities for government employees to abuse positions of power. “There were young girls coming up to me and asking me about it and it was so heartwarming to see their interest,” Linda Young, Molly’s stepmom, said of the memorial service. Molly’s father, Larry Young, began the event by getting up to speak but overwhelmed with tears, asked Linda Young to tell a story. “One of his fondest memories was one time when she was about six years old and she went to church to watch Larry get baptized,” Linda Young said. Linda Young said the air conditioning had gone out and the priest made a comment about hoping there would be air conditioning in heaven. “He asked her (Molly) what she thought about the experience and she replied ‘can you believe the preacher didn’t know there was air conditioning,’” Linda Young said. Illinois Senator Terri Bryant then stood up to speak on some of the legislative updates taking place, including new laws introduced. “When you get to the ten year point, it’s especially painful and we don’t really want to call it a milestone unless we’re celebrating the conviction of the person who we know ultimately took the life of Molly,” Bryant said.
A poster to memorialize the life of Molly Young sits on a table at Turley Park March 27, 2022 in Carbondale, Ill. Julian Castillo | @julcastillophotography
Molly Young Bryant said she was a brand new legislator when Larry Young came to her and told him finding justice in this case would be difficult because of the way the laws were written. Bryant said her job was to fix the issue so it never happened to someone else, and one of the problems they encountered was,
by the time the Young family got the case to civil court, the two year statute of limitations had expired. “The first thing we had to do was change the statute of limitations from two years to five years as most of the municipalities and government entities were dragging their feet until they ran the clock out, so now that’s a little harder to do,” Bryant said. The second law she introduced was to strengthen Freedom of Information Acts (FOIA) laws, because if someone files a request and the documents aren’t turned over, then the FOIA was ineffective. Bryant said now if there is an order from the attorney general’s office, agencies have 31 days to turn over the documents. Please see MOLLY | 7
Larry Young (right) and Linda Lamont-Young, father and stepmother of Molly Young, speak to the community on the case of their late daughter at Turley Park March 27, 2022 in Carbondale, Ill. Julian Castillo | @ julcastillophotography
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