Shawn Cranston appears in a booking photo from February 2024 (Crawford County Correctional Facility).
A young Amish woman was six months pregnant with her third child when she was brutally killed in her own home in late February. Over the weekend, a Pennsylvania man was arrested for the apparently senseless slaying.
Shawn C. Cranston, 52, stands accused of criminal homicide, criminal homicide of an unborn child, burglary, and criminal trespass over the incident that took the life of Rebekah A. Byler, 23, according to a criminal complaint filed by state police in Crawford County.
The victim is believed to have been killed by some combination of being shot in the head and/or having her throat cut, police say.
An application for a search warrant in the case obtained by Law&Crime paints a particularly grim picture of the house that Andy Byler, the deceased woman’s husband, came home to on Feb. 26.
Rebekah Byler’s “throat had been cut” and she was “laying on her back in a pool of blood in the living room of the residence,” police wrote. There was also an “evident laceration” on the front side of her neck and what appeared to be “a scalping type wound on her head.”
The two Byler children were home when their mother was killed but unharmed, Trooper Cynthia Schick told The Associated Press.
A GoFundMe for the Bylers is being run by a longtime family friend.
“We are collecting money for Rebekah’s husband Andy and their two children,” the online fundraiser reads. “We would like to show our support for the entire Amish community and help raise funds so that Andy and his children can find a safe new home.”
The surviving children are toddler-age, police have said.
The Spartansburg area of the Keystone State is home to numerous Amish families and residents there typically have a harmonious relationship with the tradition-focused, electricity-disfavoring group.
A murder, however, among the community of Amish and non-Amish alike, is all but unheard of in the region, community members say.
“The outside world doesn’t get in,” local pharmacist Charleen Hajec, who spent her entire life in Spartanburg, told ABC News. “To have something this tragic … it doesn’t happen here.”
“It’s not something that happens around here,” Spartansburg Volunteer Fire Department Women’s Auxiliary President Lindsey Smith told The Associated Press. “We’re worried about our Amish.”
But one woman who identified herself as the defendant’s foster daughter suggests he had problems with one particular Amish family.
“Like I could never picture my dad being that cold and heartless of a monster,” the woman who declined to be otherwise identified told Erie-based ABC/Fox affiliate WJET/WFXP. “Never in a million years.”
According to Cranston’s foster daughter, another Amish couple used to live in the Byler home on Fish Flats Road in Sparta Township. Years ago, that Amish couple adopted Cranston’s grandson, the woman told the TV station — and she thinks that the only father she has ever known believed he was going after a different Amish family.
“As far as I know, he just wanted his grandson back,” the woman said. “Supposedly she started yelling at him coming in, then that’s when, boom, all it took. And it’s just horrifying to think that.”
Pennsylvania State Police, however, remain perplexed about the alleged killer’s motive in the case.
“It’s still very perplexing,” Lt. Mark Weindorf told the Erie-Times News. “We want to uncover why this happened.”
While the details that led law enforcement to Cranston’s door are currently scarce, Weindorf told the paper the defendant is known to the area’s Amish community. Hailing from the small town of Corry, Cranston lives roughly 10 miles north of the Byler residence. It is currently unknown if he knew the Bylers.
The defendant is currently being detained in the Crawford County Correctional Facility without bond. He is slated to appear in court on March 15 and does not have an attorney of record as of Monday.
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