Victim’s Family Suffered Grief, Distrust, Bitterness

Trish Graisy was 15 years old when her world turned gruesome.

It was November 1973 and Trish’s big sister, Rita, and her sister’s husband, Ron Marcussen, had disappeared.

In the years that followed, Trish Graisy watched as her sister’s clothing turned up, then pieces of her hair and bones, then her skull.

While most of her friends were filling out college applications, a jury was setting her sister’s accused killer free.

“I became very distrustful of life,” says Trish Graisy, 37, now a veterinary student at Washington State University. “It took me a long time to learn how to live.”

To each Graisy family member, the closing of the Marcussen murder case after two decades means something different.

For Trish Graisy, it brought frustration at the judicial system’s impotence. For Liz Graisy, a sister in Montana, it offered the first real chance to grieve. Barbara Graisy, a sister in Vancouver, Wash., found closure and an emotional whirlwind.

“Twenty-two years of accumulated feelings just came up and smacked me a good one,” Barbara Graisy says.

There is one emotion that unites this family. They are convinced George Stroisch is a murderer.

Rita Marcussen grew up in Rathdrum, the second of eight kids.

She was the leader, headstrong and beautiful, an excellent student. When she played the piano, the family gathered around and sang.

“To this day I can’t hear certain songs on the piano without bursting into tears,” Trish Graisy says.

To her, Rita was a second mother.

Ron Marcussen was Rita’s beau and protector. He gave 12-year-old Liz rides on his motorcycle and gave Barbara, 17, advice about boys. He was like a big brother.

The couple married a year before they disappeared. Liz was a flower girl at their wedding.

Although Rita Marcussen’s remains were not found until months later, Barbara Graisy knew almost immediately that her sister never was coming back.

Word spread the couple had been carried off by devil worshipers. The rumors were so gruesome Liz Graisy was sent away to boarding school.

“It really took my childhood away from me,” she says.

Barbara Graisy understands what it was like for her parents. Her daughter is 20, the same age Rita was.

“I’ve had nightmares of her being brutally murdered,” she says.

Trish watched their mother turn bitter over the years. “She didn’t have that love of life that had always pulled us together,” she says.

Mary Graisy died before her daughter’s murder case was closed and George Stroisch was named the likely murderer last month.

“Justice was never served,” Trish Graisy says. She, too, is bitter. “He’s not here to pay the piper.”

Barbara Graisy is grieving again while Liz Graisy truly mourns for the first time.

“For a lot of years I couldn’t cry,” Liz Graisy says.

The tragedy has made the siblings strong and resilient and has forged a tenacious bond among them.

“We talk about the deep things in life,” Liz Graisy says. “We value each other.”

, DataTimes MEMO: See related story under the headline: Man’s past still haunts his family