Kansas City, MO: Man kills estranged wife, then himself

By CHRISTINE VENDEL
The Kansas City Star
A man lured his estranged wife to his Kansas City house Monday night on the premise that he needed help starting his vehicle, police and relatives say.

He said he was going into the house to fetch jumper cables. But he returned with a gun. Within minutes, both were dead.

Their 12-year-old daughter heard the gunshots that killed her mother and saw her father shoot himself.

The violence erupted about 10 p.m. in the 3800 block of East 60th Terrace.

Investigators Tuesday declined to release the names of the man and woman because they had not yet notified the man’s family.

Relatives said the woman about two weeks ago moved out of the home she shared with her husband. She took her three children, ages 21, 18, and 12, and moved in with her mother, Angela Spann. The couple had been married about 12 years, Spann said.

Kansas City police had not been called to the house before. The husband did not have a criminal record but reportedly was seen in recent weeks outside her workplace.

Spann said her daughter had complained that her husband would not contribute financially to the household expenses, but relatives were unaware of any prior abuse.

“I just saw him on Sunday,” Spann said. “He came over to my house and spoke to me. He was all right.”

Spann speculated that her son-in-law “just flipped.”

“I can’t believe it,” she said. “It seems like a nightmare. I don’t know why he would do this to her and to their children.”

Spann now is taking care of the three children — the youngest of whom is traumatized by witnessing most of Monday’s violence.

Police reports said the husband shot at the woman who ran out of the garage and into the street, yelling for help. He fired more gunshots at her, then dragged her body into his garage and closed the garage door.

Spann said the man walked into the dining room, told his daughter, “I love you,” then shot himself in the head. The girl fled the house, screaming.

Spann said her daughter worked two jobs and always put her children first.

“All she thought of was her three kids,” Spann said. “She made sure they had a roof over their heads and food in their mouths.”

Helen Darby, clinical operations officer for the Samuel U. Rodgers Health Center, said the victim had worked in their billing department for eight years and was “a much loved employee. Our hearts and prayers go out to her family.”