Ongoing custody battle likely cause in deadly Pa. spree
It's not clear what specifically happened to make Iraq veteran Bradley William Stone snap and kill his ex-wife and five of her relatives, seriously wound another, then stab himself to death in suburban Philadelphia.
But an ongoing custody battle with his ex-wife, Nicole Stone, over their two young daughters seemed to be at the center of it, Montgomery County District Attorney Risa Vetri Ferman said.
"There's no reason, no valid excuse, no justification for snuffing out these six innocent lives and injuring another child," Ferman said. "This is just a horrific tragedy that our community has had to endure. We're really numb from what we've had to go through over the past two days."
Stone, 35, was found Tuesday afternoon in the woods near his home in Pennsburg, dead from self-inflicted stab wounds. The discovery ended the saga of one of the deadliest rampages in the region. Police SWAT teams mounted an intensive two-day search for Stone, swarming neighborhoods, closing area schools and leaving residents on high-alert for the man authorities said was armed and dangerous.
New details have emerged about the killings that took began in the early morning hours on Monday. Ferman said the attacks were clearly premeditated.
The first victims, according to an affidavit of probable cause released by authorities, were Nicole Stone's relatives in the town of Souderton. Stone shot Patricia Flick, his ex-wife's sister, and Flick's husband, Aaron. He attacked the Flick's daughter, Nina, 14, in her bed, where she suffered massive blunt force and cutting and lacerating injuries to her face and skull, court documents say. Stone also attacked the couple's son, Anthony, 17, who was critically injured defending his sister, and survived when he barricaded himself in a bedroom, Ferman said.
From there, Stone went to his ex-wife's mother's house in Lansdale, where he killed her mother, Joanne T. Gilbert, 57, and her grandmother, Patricia Hill, 75.
The murderous rampage ended in Harleysville, where police and court documents say, he killed his ex-wife in her apartment. Nicole Stone was there with their daughters, Kayla, 5, and Shannon, 8.
The affidavit says shortly before 5 a.m. on Monday a neighbor heard glass shattering, a loud band and the girls yelling, "Mommy, mommy, no!" The neighbor says she heard a man's voice say, "We have to leave now."
Ferman said Stone drove away with the girls back to Pennsburg, where he left them with a neighbor and asked him to take the girls to their stepmother, Stone's current wife with whom he had an infant son. The girls, as well as Stone's widow, are in protective custody, Ferman said.
Stone and Nicole Stone divorced in 2012, but they have been locked in a custody battle over the girls, made worse when he learned that his former wife had recently sought treatment for drug abuse, the Inquirerreports.
Stone filed an emergency request for custody this month but a judge rejected his petition on Dec. 9, Ferman said.
Friends and relatives have set up a gofundme site for Anthony Flick that has raised more than $13,750.
Contributing: Associated Press