By MARK BOWES | TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER
Published: July 17, 2010
Chester, Va. --
Sisters Cherry, Hanna, Vanessa and Molly Parker face a daunting task: How do they restore their shattered family and continue with their young lives after losing both their parents in an apparent act of spousal violence?
Police say their mother, Cindy Parker, was gunned down outside a Chester restaurant by their father, Richard Parker, during a domestic confrontation. Now, three weeks later, the Parker sisters still are trying to comprehend what happened and pick up the pieces.
Richard Parker, 56, has been charged with second-degree murder in his wife's death and with malicious wounding of Michael Dudley, 18, a Thomas Dale High School football standout who stumbled upon the altercation and tried to intervene, according to police.
In an instant, the sisters lost both their mother and their father, who is being held without bond and could spend the rest of his life behind bars if convicted. They are struggling from the weight of crushing sorrow and insurmountable debt.
At ages 24, 20, 19 and 14, the sisters -- three of whom still live at home -- have had immense responsibilities thrust suddenly upon them as they grieve for their parents.
"We lost our mom, but we lost our dad, too, and everything just falls on us," said Cherry Parker, 24, who has taken a leave of absence from her job of two years in San Diego to try to sort out the family's next step. "We have to try to make the right decisions."
The family has no savings, no retirement portfolio and no life insurance policy from which the four sisters can draw. The only resource they have is the family's $325,000 home in the River's Bend subdivision in Chester, which has a substantial mortgage and only about $50,000 in equity, and needs significant cosmetic repairs.
"It's all we have, and I guess we're kind of scared that it would be taken away from us," Cherry Parker said as she and her sisters gathered this week in the dining room of their family's home, stacked with moving boxes, to talk about their plight. "And we definitely don't want that to happen, because we'd be left with nothing."
Their father, who has highly technical computer and engineering skills, lost his job with the Qimonda computer chip plant in Henrico County about 18 months ago. To help tide over the family, his wife had been operating a house-cleaning service called Cherry Clean.
"I think they just made it month to month," Parker said.
The sisters are resourceful and have demonstrated self-sufficiency skills -- three have fullor part-time jobs, have paid their own junior college tuition and maintain their own cars -- but their family's situation is well beyond their ability to handle alone, said Jon Schoepflin, a family friend who is leading an effort to help the sisters.
"The Parker parents have instilled in these girls a very, very high sense of self-preservation," said Schoepflin, who got to know the Parkers through Molly, one of his former students at Elizabeth Davis Middle School, where he's the band director.
"They wanted them to be able to earn their own way and make their own decisions," he added. "They really want to be self-sufficient, they want to make it on their own. But the situation that they're in" would be challenging for even established adults with successful careers. "It's a very, very scary time for them."
. . .
Some in the Chester community already have rallied to help. The sisters have received gift cards to buy groceries and other essentials, and several churches plan food drives. Others have volunteered to help fix up the family's home so the sisters can place it on the market.
Several family supporters plan to prepare the interior of the house today for members of the Fat Boys Football Club to paint next weekend. Lowe's is donating new carpeting, and The Home Depot is donating paint, Schoepflin said.
A yard sale is planned for Aug. 21 to sell many of the family's possessions. The proceeds will be used of help with the sisters' living expenses.
"They've got to downsize from a 3,000-square-foot place to probably a 1,200-square-foot apartment somewhere," Schoepflin said. "So they're going to have to get rid of a lot of things."
With Schoepflin's help, the sisters hope to put their home on the market in coming weeks. A Realtor has agreed to help them sell the house for little or no commission. The sisters are unable to continue paying the mortgage without help.
"We have to try to survive here until we can try to sell the house and move on with our lives," Cherry Parker said. The Parkers have extended family mostly out of state, but "there's nobody coming in from out of town to rescue them," Schoepflin said.
Beyond selling the house, the sisters are weighing their futures.
"I guess we would all like to stick together," said Cherry Parker, who shed a few tears at the uncertainty of it all. "It's kind of hard because I'm out in San Diego, and I don't want to lose my job, and now I have to try to support everybody and get custody of my [14-year-old] sister. I just want to make the right decisions for everybody."
The second-oldest, Hanna, is a licensed practical nurse working on her registered nurse degree at John Tyler Community College. Vanessa attends John Tyler and works part time for a Hallmark greeting cards store. Molly, a talented musician and artist, is a rising freshman at Thomas Dale High School in Chesterfield.
"We grew up trying to be independent and never really asked my parents for money or anything like that," said Cherry Parker, who works for Cox Communications in San Diego.
Parker said her father is supportive of their efforts to sell the family's home and possessions so they can move on with their lives. The sisters say they are angry with their dad but still love him.
"It's kind of weird -- you hear about stuff like this happening and you would think you would hate that person," Parker said. "But when we talk to him [in jail], it's like just talking to our dad -- how we've always seen him."
Parker said she and her sisters were caught off guard by the violent confrontation and were unaware of any difficulties between their parents. Police have not disclosed a possible motive for the killing, and Richard Parker apparently has not discussed with his daughters what happened and why.
"I would have never thought in a million years that something like this would happen to our family," Cherry Parker said. "We always had a really good upbringing. And looking back, we wouldn't have ever [predicted] this could happen.
"Our mom was our best friend and was a really loving person," added Parker, who noted that her mother would have turned 46 today. "And we can't believe that she's actually not here, and that we're never going to be able to talk to her again."
To donate
Contributions to help the Parker sisters can be made to the Cindy M. Parker Memorial Fund at any Wachovia or Wells Fargo bank.
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