SALEM -- A mother and three children were found shot and strangled to death in a house fire in Northeast Salem Tuesday, medical examiners said Wednesday.
The yet-unidetified mother and a 4-year-old child were each shot twice in the head, a 3-year-old child was shot once in the head and an infant was likely asphyxiated, Dr. Larry Lewman with the Oregon State Medical Examiner’s Office said.
An autopsy was pending on the father, whose body was found in a vehicle in Cottage Grove.
Firefighters carried the four bodies out of the burning home in the 2500 block of Fisher Road around 5:30 a.m. Tuesday morning.
The husband is a "person of interest" in the murders, Lt. Dave Okada with the Salem Police Department. said. His dead body was found around 11 a.m., inside a vehicle in Cottage Grove, about 60 miles away.
"At this time investigators believe this to be a domestic related murder-suicide situation," Okada said.
Police have not yet released any names. They said the dead woman's husband was also the father of the slain children.
"It was just really surreal what was going on down there. I basically witnessed people screaming and saying that there were people in the house and I just feel bad for the family,” said neighbor Dan Grove.
Nearby, a delivery driver on Tuesday discovered the body 21-year old Devan Matlock along the road about 4:20 a.m. near the intersection of Fisher and Devonshire Streets. That case "may be connected," Lewman said Wednesday.
Courtesy KGW.com
