Texas man accused of killing wife and baby won’t fight extradition

A man suspected of killing his wife and infant son in Texas calmly told officers during a traffic stop in Colorado that he was having a “long week” because his wife and children had been murdered and he was being blamed, according to police reports filed in connection with the case.

Craig Vandewege, 35, was being held Friday in Glenwood Springs, a Colorado resort town, pending his extradition to Texas to face charges and did not plan to fight the effort to send him back, said his lawyer, Leslie Barrows.

Police have said he had called 911 Dec. 15 in Fort Worth, Texas, to report he came home from work and found his wife, Shanna Riddle Vandewege, and their 3-month-old son Diederik dead. Their throats had been slashed.

The Colorado police reports stated Vandewege raised suspicions after police say he borrowed a phone from a 7-Eleven clerk and was overheard talking about a murder. The clerk called 911 and when police later pulled him over for speeding, he calmly and unemotionally told them that his wife and son had been murdered, the reports said.

Vandewege had two holstered handguns with him plus a rifle in the backseat of his car, the reports said.

He also told officers that has family had moved from the Denver area earlier this year and that he had returned to Colorado to bury them, the reports said. But Vandewege also said he was on his way to Las Vegas because he had hear that three suspects had been arrested in the deaths of his fie and son, the reports added.

The Glenwood Springs officers decided to arrest Vandewege for not having insurance and speeding, believing he could pose a threat to public safety “in his state with numerous loaded firearms.”

He was later poised to be released from custody when the Glenwood Springs police department received a warrant from Fort Worth to arrest him for suspicion of murder.

Vandewege told a co-worker before the killers that he was taking a new medication that was making him hear voices telling him to kill people and that one voice said it wished he could kill his then-pregnant wife by pushing her down stairs, The Fort Worth Star-Telegram (http://bit.ly/2hazalf) reported, citing a police affidavit.

Barrows did not directly address the allegations against Vandewege but said she and other lawyers have started “our own independent investigation into the deaths of Shanna and Diederik.”

Authorities also found a fourth gun and ammunition in Vandewege’s car.