Millikin University, a small Presbyterian liberal arts college in Illinois, recently found out that one of their long-time and well-respected psychology professors murdered his family almost four decades ago, but plan to keep him on their staff.
James St. James, 61, had shot and killed his parents and sister one August night in 1967 at their home in Georgetown, Texas, a suburb of Austin. He was 16 at the time of the killings. According to Fox, St. James was found not guilty by reason of insanity, and was treated for paranoid schizophrenia at a mental institute for six years.
Two years after his release, he decided to start a new life and change his name. Formerly known as James Wolcott, he changed his name to James David St. James and received a master’s degree and doctoral degree in psychology.
St. James has been working at the college of 2,380 students since 1986. While most of his co-workers respect him as a professor and want to keep him on the staff, others think it is unacceptable that he never notified school officials about his past.
"I look at this from a law enforcement perspective, and I just have a problem with somebody who didn't disclose this information," said Decatur city council member Jerry J. Dawson, Reuters reports. "If I were a parent and my kids were going to Millikin, that's something I would want to know."
St. James was tracked down by The Georgetown Advocate, the local newspaper of the town he had murdered his family in, when reporters from the paper became curious about his whereabouts and traced him to the college.