FBI searches office of lawyer in murder-suicide

http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/04/29/hotel.deaths.investigation/index.html

"NEW YORK (CNN) -- FBI agents on Wednesday searched the law office of William Parente, the lawyer who killed his wife and two daughters before committing suicide April 19 in Maryland.

Agents removed business records that might help explain what led Parente to take the life of his family in a hotel room near Baltimore, said FBI spokesman James Margolin. At least four agents left Parente's office carrying dozens of boxes and computer hardware, he said.

The FBI, at the request of Baltimore County police, is investigating what happened to money that might be missing.

CNN has learned that officials are investigating whether Parente lost at least $27 million of client's funds. Some clients said Parente encouraged them to invest in short-term real estate loans that he claimed would yield high returns.

A source familiar with the investigation said authorities are looking at more than one bank Parente used, allegedly to deposit clients' funds.

One client, through a spokesman, has said Parente wrote him checks just before he killed his family and committed suicide, but the checks bounced.

Police have said Parente's wife, Betty, 58, and daughters Catherine, 11, and Stephanie, 19, were killed by asphyxiation and blunt force trauma. Parente, 59, bled to death after cutting himself. "

9yr old quadraplegic found dead

http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/04/23/michigan.child.dead/index.html

"CNN) -- Michigan authorities are investigating whether foul play led to the death of a 9-year-old quadriplegic girl whose body was found inside a public storage facility.

"This is a very sad and tragic case that hurts all of us involved in the ongoing investigation," Genesee County prosecutor David Leyton said at a news conference Wednesday.

Shylea Myza Thomas of Flint, Michigan, hadn't been seen in six weeks, and relatives reported her missing Tuesday, Leyton's office said. Her adoptive mother, who is also her aunt, is in custody as a suspect, special assistant prosecuting attorney John Potbury told CNN. No charges have been filed pending the results of the autopsy, he said.

Because of her physical disabilities, Shylea used a feeding tube. She suffered from quadriplegia because of a "suffocation issue" in her crib at 3 weeks of age, Leyton said.

On Wednesday, Flint police found her body stuffed inside a garbage bag in a public storage facility in Vienna Township, near Flint, Leyton said. The bag was covered in mothballs "in an apparent attempt to mask odors from the dead body," his office said in a news release.

"For her to have to live like that, and then to die and be stuffed into a bag and plastic bin in a storage facility, just breaks my heart," the prosecutor said.

He said that Shylea and other relatives had lived in "absolutely filthy" conditions.

CNN affiliate WJRT reported that the suspect could face charges including murder, first-degree child abuse and welfare fraud.

The station also reported that investigators are trying to determine why the girl's disappearance wasn't reported until six weeks after she went missing.

Relatives told WJRT that they remember Shylea as a happy child, who loved music and whose smile was infectious.

"The last memory I actually have of Shylea is seeing her when she was in my care," said her second cousin, Josette Thomas. "She was on the bed listening to the radio and smiling. Those are actually the memories I want to keep in my head. I don't want that memory to leave me."

Dad who killed family, self, was $460,000 in debt

http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/04/21/maryland.family.shot/index.html

"(CNN) -- A man who shot his wife and three children to death before committing suicide in Middletown, Maryland, last weekend had about $460,000 in mortgage and credit card debt, the local sheriff said Tuesday.

Deputies who examined a computer taken from Christopher Wood's home found information that showed "severe financial difficulties," including money owed on a home in Florida that the family had been unable to sell, Frederick County Sheriff Charles Jenkins said at a news conference.

Wood was a salesman for CSX Railroad, where he earned about $97,000 a year, the sheriff said.

He left six suicide notes, according to authorities.

Jenkins said the medical examiner had determined that Christopher Wood, 34, shot himself with a shotgun Friday after shooting his wife, Francie Billotti-Wood, and their three young children -- Chandler, 5; Gavin, 4; and Fiona, 2 -- with a small-caliber pistol.

"Traumatic lacerations" found on the bodies were made after their deaths, with either a kitchen knife or a pruning saw, the sheriff said, quoting the medical examiner. Both items were found in the house.

"The injuries were very horrific," the sheriff said.
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The wife and children apparently were killed while they slept Thursday night into Friday, Jenkins said.

Authorities found a shotgun next to Christopher Wood's body and a .25-caliber handgun in a container in the kitchen. Sheriff's Office Cpl. Jennifer Bailey said Tuesday it was not yet known whether the handgun found was used in the killings.

The federal Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives agency was trying to trace the ownership of the pistol and shotgun.

Authorities said Wood left individual suicide notes to his wife and each of the three children, expressing his sorrow and love. There was one note left to his mother, father and sister, and one more that was not addressed to anyone in particular but that was more apologetic than the others.

In his sixth note, Wood described his "day-to-day stresses," Bailey said.

"That one talks about financial problems, how he was going to raise his family, stresses, how he tried a number of medications to control his depression, but felt he had gotten worse over time," Bailey said.

Jenkins said several medications were found in the house, including some used to treat depression and anxiety.

Bailey said deputies went to the house shortly after 9 a.m. Saturday, after Francie Billotti-Wood's father found the bodies. Her father, concerned because he had not seen members of the family for about a day, had gone to the house and forced his way in when no one answered the door.
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Jenkins said the sheriff's office had no record of domestic violence or other family disputes at the Woods' home..."

5 Houston children die in swamped car

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090419/ap_on_re_us/texas_storms

"

HOUSTON – Five Houston children died Saturday after their sedan slid into a rain-swollen ditch when the driver lost control while trying to answer a cell phone, authorities said.

John Cannon, a Houston police spokesman, told several Houston television stations that the driver of the car was the father of four of the dead children, all 7 or younger. Cannon said the driver was taken for blood-alcohol testing.

The father was among two adults and a 10-year-old girl who escaped the fast-moving current that swept the car 100 feet from where it left the road and made the vehicle inaccessible to emergency workers for hours, Cannon said.

Houston television station KTRK reported that police said the dead children included 1- and 3-year-old girls and three boys, ages 4, 6 and 7.

Cannon said a passenger told police the driver's cell phone rang, and the driver lost control when he tried to answer it.

Houston Fire Assistant Chief Omero Longoria said in the online edition of the Houston Chronicle that rescue workers found the car in 9 feet of water about 7:30 p.m. Saturday, 2 1/2 hours after the driver lost control.

The children's deaths brought the weekend death toll to six from massive storms that swept across southeast Texas.

A 76-year-old Fayette County man died Friday after his car got stuck in a flooded underpass in Schulenburg, midway between Houston and San Antonio. Frank Floyd, 76, of Hallettsville, drowned after he and his wife became trapped after driving into a flooded railroad underpass on U.S. 77, said Schulenburg Police Chief Randy Mican.

"It filled up with water pretty quick and the water kept rising," said Mican, who estimated the water depth reached 8 to 9 feet. "It's not common to flood that much."

Floyd's wife, Mary, 72, managed to escape and was taken to a hospital. Her injuries were not believed life-threatening, the chief said.

By 5 p.m. Saturday, nearly 5 inches of rain had fallen at Houston's Hobby Airport, a record for April 18.

The initial leg of an annual 150-mile charity bike ride involving more than 13,000 cyclists raising money for the National Multiple Sclerosis Society was washed out Saturday by the second consecutive day of heavy rain.

The 25th annual MS 150 had been scheduled for Houston to La Grange. It was scrapped after Friday's torrential downpours flooded the Fayette County Fairgrounds, where tents were set up for overnight accommodations for participants. Saturday's continuing rains made riding treacherous.

"The safety of our participants and volunteers is the first priority," the Lone Star Chapter of the National MS Society said in a statement.

Organizers of one of the nation's largest such events hoped clearing weather forecast for Sunday would allow for the second half of the ride from La Grange to Austin.

It was the wettest April 17 on record in College Station, where 2.94 inches of rain Friday broke a mark set 30 years ago when 1.68 inches fell. Houston also set a record for the most rain for the day, with the 1.9 inches topping the old mark of 1.85 in 1992.

At least 10 inches of rain fell Friday in Colorado County, about 70 miles west of Houston, closing some roads. Hail measuring 1.75 inches in diameter was reported Friday night in Laredo, along with some street flooding in Zapata County in the Rio Grande Valley.

More heavy rain fell Saturday, and nearly all of East Texas and portions of South Texas were under some kind of threatening weather advisory with tornado warnings and watches and flash flood warnings and watches in place.

U.S. 87 south of Cuero, about 80 miles southeast of San Antonio, was closed by a flash flood Saturday. A tornado was spotted in a rural area near Marquez, about 60 miles southeast of Waco. Firefighters reported a barn was toppled by high winds near Rosebud in Milam County, about 35 miles southeast of Waco.

In Robertson County, between College Station and Waco, authorities said a possible tornado during a thunderstorm Saturday morning downed trees and power lines and left some windows broken in Franklin, the county seat."

Alabama man kills estranged wife 3 others, self

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090408/ap_on_re_us/alabama_four_dead

"

PRICEVILLE, Ala. – A man facing a divorce trial shot and killed his estranged wife, their teenage daughter and two other relatives in rural north Alabama before returning to his home in a nearby town and killing himself, authorities said Tuesday.

Kevin Garner's body was found Tuesday afternoon near his Priceville home, which burned to the ground overnight. His divorce trial was to start Wednesday.

Garner apparently shot himself in the chest, said Travis Clemmons, chief investigator for the sheriff's office in Lauderdale County, where the four bodies were found earlier in the day in a home in Green Hill, a small community near the Tennessee line.

The victims were identified as Garner's estranged wife, Tammy, 40; their 16-year-old daughter, Chelsie; Garner's sister, Karen Beaty of Illinois; and Beaty's 11-year-old son, whose name was not released.

Investigators said the four were shot, apparently with a handgun, around midnight Monday. They did not know if Kevin Garner was licensed to carry a firearm.

It was one of eight mass shootings around the country — and the third in Alabama — in the last month that have left grief-stricken communities in shock.

Clemmons said a neighbor visiting the Green Hill house Tuesday morning saw a body through the door and called authorities.

Court officials said the Garners were in court Monday in advance of the trial and nothing seemed unusual.

"I just can't understand it," said Clemmons, "and with a 16-year-old and an 11-year-old kid, there's nothing rational about it."

In the divorce file, Tammy Garner sought custody of their daughter and alleged that her husband "has been both physically and emotionally abusive."

Kevin Garner accused her of adultery and of taking $38,000 out of their joint bank account when they separated May 27.

Michael Corley, chief deputy in Morgan County, where Garner's body was found, said Beaty and her son might have been on the witness list for the divorce case. He said investigators believe Garner was "unhappy" with proceedings and "after court adjourned it appears he set some of his plans in motion."

He said it appears the divorce was filed about a year ago but was just now coming up on the court docket.

"Now that we know the final end of it all it's just going back and putting the pieces together," Corley said. "We feel like this was solely a homicide, that he killed them, then went to the home. He used some type of accelerant that caused the home to burn very, very quickly, then walked about 200 yards back into a wooded area behind the house and took his life."

Jerry Knight, an attorney who represented Kevin Garner in the divorce case, said in an e-mail to The Associated Press that Garner "had a terrific work ethic and value system. I was terribly shocked and saddened by this unexpected tragedy."

Kevin Garner had worked at a Decatur chemical plant and Tammy Garner at a Huntsville department store.

Along with Garner's two-story house, which collapsed in the fire, a green Subaru Legacy belonging to Tammy Garner was found burned in the Morgan County community of Somerville, less than 10 miles from the burned house.

The five deaths follow the stabbing deaths of four people in a home in Hueytown, near Birmingham, on March 7, and the shooting deaths of 10 people on March 10 by a gunman in south Alabama who also took his own life."