A woman who shot her two children, their father and a cousin in California's Central Valley before committing suicide took video of herself on her iPad as she smoked methamphetamine prior to the killings, the police said.
The apparent murder-suicide by 23-year-old Aide Mendez began on Sunday morning when she argued with the father of her two children, 33-year-old Eduardo Lopez. Police arrived to find Lopez outside the Silver Lakes Apartment with knife and gunshot wounds, said Lt Mark Salazar, homicide commander for the Fresno Police Department.
They heard a muffled shot from inside the first-floor apartment and discovered Mendez had killed herself, her boyfriend's cousin, Paul Medina, 27, as well as her two children, 17-month-old Aliyah Echeverria and Isaiah Echeverria, 3.
Police told The Fresno Bee that Mendez was found in the bathroom, and the children were found in the apartment's bathtub, where they had been shot at least once. The boy was found dead on the scene, Salazar said.
Police tried to resuscitate the girl "We do know that drugs played a key role, but we don't know to what extent," Salazar said. "She was seen prior to the shooting smoking methamphetamine. She recorded herself on an iPad showing her and Paul Medina smoking meth. We know the power of meth."
Salazar said the time stamp on the iPad video would have to be tested but preliminary information indicated it was recorded within a few hours of the murder.
"Her actions just seemed bizarre; her mannerism, the way she was moving her hands and her facial expressions," Salazar said, noting other drugs may have been involved but that it would take weeks before the toxicology reports were complete.
Lopez remained in critical condition last evening at Community Regional Medical Center with stab wounds and a gunshot wound to the neck, said Mary Lisa Russell, a hospital spokeswoman. A 7-year-old girl who was a family friend was staying overnight in the apartment, but escaped unharmed.
Authorities said on Monday they had yet to piece together a motive, but said family members reported that Mendez had lost a baby several years ago, and was still grieving over the loss.
Police recovered three firearms in the apartment; two of them used. "There's some things we just don't know because most of the people in that house are dead and the one person who is alive can't speak right now," Salazar said.