A detention hearing put new focus on the sequence prosecutors say led to three deaths in one night.
JOLIET, Ill. — A detention hearing in the case against Jenna Strouble turned a triple homicide investigation into a step-by-step account, with prosecutors alleging the Indiana woman planned to kill Jacob Lambert and then went to his family’s Crete Township home and killed his mother and stepfather.
The hearing, first set for March 30 and then delayed into the next day, marked the first detailed public description of the killings since deputies found three bodies during a welfare check on March 23. Strouble, 30, has been charged with nine counts of first-degree murder. The victims were identified as Lambert, 32, Stacy Forde, 54, and Patrick Forde, 55. Prosecutors asked that Strouble remain in custody as the case moves forward, while family members from both sides attended court and watched the proceedings unfold.
Instead of starting at the house, prosecutors began their account hours earlier. They said Strouble and Lambert, who shared two children and had an on-and-off relationship, made plans to meet on the night of March 22. She picked him up around 11 p.m. or 11:30 p.m., prosecutors said, and drove first toward Plum Creek Nature Preserve. When they found it closed, she moved to Burnham Road in Sauk Village. There, according to court filings, she told Lambert she had brought a massage gun because his back hurt and because, in her words as described in court, she did not do enough for him. The prosecution’s version presented the stop not as a detour, but as the moment the plan took shape.
Prosecutors said Lambert reclined his seat and lay on his stomach in the car while Strouble massaged him for about 20 minutes. Then, they said, she pulled a Glock from under the seat and held it to the back of his head for several minutes. Local coverage of the hearing reported that Strouble allegedly told investigators she nearly stopped, but did not. She fired, prosecutors said, then remained at the scene long enough to smoke a cigarette before driving away. Deputies later found Lambert in a black Ford Fusion in a nearby cul-de-sac, face down in the passenger seat with the chair reclined. That placement became one of the prosecution’s clearest physical details, tying the alleged account to the vehicle where officers found his body.
Only after laying out that scene did prosecutors turn to the Norway Trail house. They said Strouble drove there next, used Lambert’s keys to try doors, and told Patrick Forde she was there with Lambert when he responded from inside. Once he opened the door, prosecutors said, she fired repeatedly from the porch and continued into the house. Patrick Forde was shot many times, according to court filings cited by local outlets. Stacy Forde came down the stairs after hearing the gunfire and was shot near the stairwell, prosecutors said. When deputies arrived after 2 a.m., the front door was open, shell casings were on the floor, and both victims were near the entry area, giving the house itself a central role in the prosecution’s account.
The detention hearing also gave the first fuller public look at what prosecutors say Strouble told police afterward. They said she returned home to St. John, Indiana, called her sister, and said she had shot three people. That call prompted the welfare check at the Crete Township home, prosecutors said. When Indiana officers went to arrest her, they said, she came outside carrying a bag with a loaded Glock 19 equipped with a suppressor. Prosecutors further alleged that lab testing matched 13 shell casings to the recovered gun. They said Strouble later told investigators she bought the pistol in December 2025 in Crown Point and purchased the suppressor online for about $589.
Prosecutors also used the hearing to argue that the killings were planned and that the motive, while not broad, was deeply personal. Local reports said prosecutors described complaints by Strouble about Lambert’s parenting, his interactions with the children, and what she saw as controlling or snarky behavior from his family. They also said she wrote a note the night before the killings asking others to care for her children and named possible caretakers. One of the more striking allegations was that she had considered killing her own parents as well, though that did not happen. Defense counsel’s position was not fully aired at the delayed hearing, and no plea was entered in the public reporting available at that stage.
What comes next is more routine, though no less serious. The detention issue must be resolved, prosecutors must turn over evidence, and the case will move toward preliminary hearings and later trial dates unless it is otherwise resolved. The sheriff’s office said early in the case that there was no threat to the public and that the shooting appeared domestic in nature. But in court, prosecutors argued the allegations showed a capacity for deliberate violence that justified continued detention. As of the latest reports, Strouble remained jailed while the murder case proceeded in Will County.
Author note: Last updated April 16, 2026.