Community shaken by Benicia teen's arrest for slaying family

One day after a Benicia teenager was arrested on suspicion of killing his family, people in the city are trying to come to terms with the tragedy.

Outside the Buchanan home on Cambridge Drive in Benicia are two vehicles from the business owned by the now deceased father, Adam Buchanan. He and his fiancee, Molly McAfee and their 8 year old son, Gavin were shot to death in their cabin before it was set on fire.

"I'm just glad that it's over with right now. Because in the in-between period, if the kid really got away with that, and is still living there, right next to us, that would have been kind of sketchy," said neighbor Kai Bryant.

He added the family could be hard to deal with.

"They seemed to me like they didn't really want other people in their business that much," remembered Bryant. "They would yell at people who parked in front of their house."

The family business, Buchanan Construction, is on East 2nd Street. A couple doors down is the Pro Faction Martial Arts studio. 16-year-old murder suspect, Nolen Buchanan trained there for a couple months.

"Yeah, here, he'd push. He'd push. I mean, almost to the point where you'd think there was too much aggression there," said Pro Faction owner and instructor Geoff Quares.

Quares said after the family was reported missing, Nolen Buchanan gave him a list of things he wanted to talk about. Quares showed KTVU the list which consisted of family members and company assets.

"I guess what sturuck me as odd was right away, he started to talking about the businesses and the property," he said, adding that police took a photo of the list.

Kurt Knobel, another nearby business owner, said Adam Buchanan and his fiancee often fought with each other.

"It was a lot of cussing and yelling. And like I was saying, they didn't hide it at all. It was out in the open, out in front of everybody's business," said Knobel.

Nolen Buchanan is a student at Benicia High School and had been attending class while his family was missing, up until he was arrested at school on Thursday.

"I just wouldn't feel safe with my child being in a room or a class or a school. I mean, how many problems are we seeing in schools?" asked business neighbor Nicole Knobel.

Another Benicia resident told KTVU that her son was in class the past couple weeks with Nolen Buchanan, and that Buchanan acted totally unfazed, even after investigators said his family was dead.

While Benicia Police have heard some concerns of the public about Nolen Buchanan being in school while he was potentially a suspect in a triple homicide, officers told KTVU that the El Dorado County Sheriff's office, which arrested Buchanan, told Benicia they didn't see a reason for concern.