Heathrow, FL: Answers hard to come by in family killings

Orlando Sentinel, The (FL) - Wednesday, June 17, 2009

Author: Linda Shrieves, Sentinel Staff Writer

What drove John Wood to shoot his wife and two children inside their Heathrow home and then turn the gun on himself?

Was Wood shamed by bankruptcy? Overwhelmed by the prospect of losing everything -- the $300,000 home, the boat, the cars? Afraid of being poor?

It was probably a combination of factors. Though extremely rare, cases like the Woods' -- in which a once-successful father murders his family then kills himself -- have spiked in the past year, experts say.

Police on Monday said that John Dillon Wood, 41, shot his wife, Cynthia, 40, and their children, Aubrey, 12, and Dillon, 10, and then turned the gun on himself in their Heathrow home. Neighbors described the Woods as a happy family.

Incidents of familicide -- the term sociologists and criminologists use to describe the act of killing one's family -- are rare. Yet in the first six months of this year, experts have seen more of these cases than in all of 2008.

A common thread in these killings is middle-class family men who have lost jobs or faced another economic crisis, said Richard Gelles, dean of the University of Pennsylvania School of Social Policy and Practice.

"Economic change has really left them with a very damaged sense of self and of what the rules of the game are," Gelles said. "You put in 25 years with a company and you get laid off? They start thinking: How did this happen? . . . I played by the rules, but the rules changed."

These families tend to have been doing well financially until disaster strikes. When he can't provide for the family, the father thinks he isn't doing his job, said Jay Corzine, chairman of University of Central Florida's sociology department.

"In some cases, the shooter believes that by killing himself and then his family, they'll have a better life on the other side," Corzine said.

But by their nature, these are domestic-violence murders, and advocates for battered women say it's important not to overlook that.

"It's a disturbing trend that we're seeing," said Carol Wick, executive director of Harbor House of Central Florida, which serves victims of domestic violence. "When they decide to kill themselves, they're not just killing themselves; they're taking their family with them. It's the ultimate act of control."

Middle class most affected

Middle-class families are far more likely to be the victims of familicide than the rich or the poor. Most of the men who kill their families are middle-class dads, ones who put family first and stepped up as Boy Scout leaders, Little League coaches and church volunteers. It's those people who have been hammered by the recession, Gelles said.

"The poor are not the ones getting clobbered; they've always been poor -- or they've fallen back into being poor," Gelles said. "The rich are less well-to-do [now than before]. But in the middle? They're getting clobbered."

The Wood family was entrenched in financial hardship. The couple had filed for bankruptcy in 2004 and struggled to repay $100,000 of credit-card debt. By 2007, they were in Chapter 7 bankruptcy and liquidating their assets.

Yet it appears that most people didn't know the family had hit hard times.

"They had the boat, the house, the Saks Fifth Avenue clothes," said Wick of Harbor House. "They had all the trappings to show that they were a perfect family."

Police said Monday there was no history of domestic violence or other disturbance calls to the Wood home. Gelles said that's typical of these sorts of killings. Wick said people don't know what was going on inside the home.

Family man?

Experts disagree on whether men who kill their families are controlling -- or are acting out of a warped sense of patriarchal duty.

But they all agree that, at a time when millions of Americans are being hit by job losses and financial strain, only a few kill themselves and their families. Most people deal with the stress in different ways: they internalize and get ulcers, they argue more with their spouses. Some even commit suicide. But a tiny fraction kill their families, too.

"You've got 1,200 men who kill their partners every year. Out of that group, in any given year, somewhere between three and six will carry out a familicide -- they kill their wives, kill their children, kill themselves," Gelles said. Yet in 2009, Gelles said, there have already been at least six familicides.

While these killers have usually faced financial disaster, they also share another characteristic: Nearly all were devoted to their families.

"They can't bear to hurt their family. They work, devote themselves to support their family," Gelles said. Even committing suicide and sparing the family is unthinkable to these dads.

"To commit suicide and leave the grieving family behind is inconceivable," Gelles said. "To them, this is an altruistic act: 'Look at the pain I'm not going to cause you.' "