BETHEL – Several hundred people of all ages attended a candlelight vigil Saturday night under threat of thunderstorms on the town common.

They came to remember the lives of four area residents found brutally slain over the Labor Day weekend.

Many of them grieving, they joined the surviving children of Selby Bullard, 30, her best friend, Cindy Beatson, 43, and Beatson’s husband, Doug, honoring the two women and Bullard’s mom, Julie, 65, and her friend, James Whitehurst, 50.

In the first 60 minutes, family members and friends took turns standing behind a podium in a white gazebo, sharing memories of the Bullards and Cindy Beatson, real estate agents who worked for Bonita Sessions, owner of Apple Tree Realty in Bethel. Sessions hosted the vigil.

Robin Mills, of Bethel, led the ceremony, telling people she was the best friend of Cindy Beatson and Selby Bullard. Her stepson dated Selby, and her 14-year-old son, Mason Mills, visited and played with her children. Cindy sold her house and and found Robin Mills another house in Bethel in which to live.

“I know that none of our lives will ever be the same,” she said, reading from a prepared statement, her voice thick with emotion.

“We have lost three of the most incredible and vivacious people in our community,” Robin Mills said.

Doug Beatson and another woman went to the podium next.

“Cindy really loved this place,” he said, his voice cracking.

“She was on the top of her game. I will remember her for that,” he said.

Then, after the woman shared a poem, Doug Beatson’s 12-year-old daughter Carlee joined him. While “Time Loves a Hero,” a Van Halen song, played, Carlee rested her head on dad’s shoulder, then began sobbing.

The song was Carlee’s favorite, one sung to her by her mom, to put her to sleep, her dad later told the crowd.

Carlee Beatson then read a poem and letter to her mom she’d written after her death.

“Dad is still very emotional, but I can handle him. I love you,” she read.

Robin Mills’ stepson then shared his memories of Selby, before slow-dancing with his mom, both of them sobbing. During the impromptu dance, a light bulb overhead suddenly burned out, darkening the gazebo and common.

The Bullards, Cynthia Beatson and Whitehurst were shot to death – Whitehurst on Friday off Campbell Brook Road in the Upton woods; Julie Bullard on Sunday at the Black Bear Bed and Breakfast she owned at 879 Sunday River Road in Newry. Her daughter and Beatson were killed Monday when they went to the inn to check on Selby’s mom, police say.

Whitehurst’s body was burned and the remains hidden. Corpses of the three women were dismembered.

Julie Bullard’s two cats were spared, but her three golden retrievers were also shot to death at the bed and breakfast.

On Tuesday morning, police arrested and charged Christian C. Nielsen, 31, with four counts of murder, saying he confessed to the killings on Monday night.

Neilsen, a one-time Farmington resident, had been staying at the remote bed and breakfast since June, while working as a cook at the upscale Sudbury Inn in Bethel.

He is the son of Charles Nielsen of Woodstock, an English teacher for 28 years at SAD 21’s Dirigo High School in Dixfield.

It was the elder Nielsen and his wife, Lee Graham, who discovered the bodies when they went to visit Christian Nielsen, police say. Graham then called Maine State Police, alerting them.

State Police Chief Col. Craig Poulin, at a news conference Tuesday, called the killings the worst cases of multiple homicide in Maine in the past 14 years.

Police have yet to reveal a motive for the killings, the weapon or weapons used, and how the bodies were dismembered.

Nielsen was taken to Oxford County Jail in Paris, where he had been held without bail until late Friday afternoon.

He then was moved to Cumberland County Jail in Portland after whacking another inmate in the back of the head with a mom wringer earlier that day, Oxford County jail administrator Capt. Ernest Martin said Friday night.

On Tuesday, Sept. 12, in Oxford County Superior Court in Paris, a hearing will be held to determine if Christian Nielsen can be released on bail while awaiting trial.

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