Three generations of family slaughtered in Christmas massacre after police snub emergency call
By DAVID GARDNER
Last updated at 16:27 27 December 2007
Three generations of the same family were slaughtered in a bloodbath that left six people dead on Christmas Eve, after officers failed to respond to an emergency call.
Police called to the house in Seattle, Washington on Monday but didn't check any further than the locked gates of the rural property at the end of a long dirt road.
It wasn't until a postman went to check up on his colleague who hadn't turned up for work that the tragedy was discovered two days later.
The victims were a boy aged three, a girl of six, a man and woman in their thirties and a couple in their sixties.
The only surviving member of the family and her boyfriend were arrested after the bodies were discovered on Boxing Day.
Police sources named the suspects as Michele Anderson, 29, who lived in a mobile home in the grounds, and her boyfriend Joseph McEnroe, also 29. They were charged yesterday with six counts of murder.
Detectives were still trying to uncover a motive behind the killings that happened as the family gathered to celebrate Christmas together with grandparents Wayne and Judy Anderson, who were understood to be among the victims.
The other victims were said to be the Andersons' son, Scott, his wife, Erica, and their two children, Olivia and Nathan.
Sherriff's spokesman Sgt. John Urquhart said the suspects went to the crime scene after investigators had arrived, were questioned and then arrested. He said "three generations of one family" were gunned down in separate parts of the house.
Ben Anderson, a grandson of the Andersons, claimed last night that money could have been a factor in the deaths.
"She felt she wasn't loved enough and everyone didn't appreciate her and she was pushed out of everyone's life," he said, referring to Michele Anderson.
Investigators were trying to determine why police officers didn't further investigate a call for help on Christmas Eve that came from the house.
The call ended after about 10 seconds, and the operator reported hearing "a lot of yelling in the background that sounded more like party noise than angry heated arguing."
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