When the horrible news began to come out of Abington, Massachusetts, a suburb south of Boston, that a family of five had been found shot to death in their condo, we began watching this story, wanting some answers about how it could happen.
Yesterday, the sheriff confirmed what most had suspected, that Joe Zaccardi, 43, had shot and killed his wife Deirdre, 40, and their three children — 11-year-old Alexis, and 9-year-old twins Kathryn and Nathaniel — before then killing himself.
At his Facebook page, Zaccardi had referred to himself as “unemployed and going crazy,” but his page also showed that he was a children’s book author, with four books out since 2012.
A children’s book author? Killing his own precious children?
This has really weighed on our mind in the last few days.
We hope and assume that some enterprising Boston Globe journalist is knocking on doors and tracking down what he or she can about Joe Zaccardi and what made him commit this despicable act.
Unemployed and crazy? Yes, the stress can be unbelievable when you’re trying to provide for a family. But that doesn’t really explain how you could point a firearm at your own child and pull the trigger.
If you have any idea what led Joe Zaccardi to do such a thing, we’d like to hear from you. Drop us a line.
