Man convicted of killing LaPorte mayor, wife dies in prison

LAPORTE, Ind. (AP) – A man convicted in the slayings of a northern Indiana mayor and his wife 33 years ago has died in prison.

New Castle Correctional Facility spokesman Mike Smith says 63-year-old Harold Lang, the man convicted of murder, attempted murder and burglary in the deaths of La Porte Mayor A.J. Rumely and Rumely’s wife, Frances, died Friday in the prison’s infirmary.

Smith tells The LaPorte County Herald-Argus the preliminary cause of death was pulmonary edema, an accumulation of fluid in the lungs.

Lang, a disgruntled former city sewage department employee, broke into the mayor’s home on May 31, 1982, and shot the couple. Frances Rumely died at the scene but the mayor survived more than five months before dying.