A 5-year-old girl witnessed her mother’s husband gun down her mother, aunt, and grandmother before killing himself — and now the murderer’s family has custody of the girl, leaving her mother’s family with no access.
The Nassau County Sheriff’s Office cited “privacy” issues for not identifying the victims of the July 24 shooting or their relationships, but family members of the murdered women had no such qualms.
The sheriff’s office said the 5-year-old escaped the murder house and ran to a neighbor’s home after the bloody shooting on July 24, WTLV reported. The neighbor called 911. Deputies entered the home through the unlocked front door and found one woman dead in the dining room, another in the bathroom, and the third in a bedroom.
The killer, identified as 34-year-old Christopher Rowell, was 0n the living room floor with what Sheriff Bill Leeper described as a black, SKS-style rifle beside him. He had a gunshot wound to the head and survived several days on life support.
Leeper said the little girl heard a gunshot — Rowell killing the woman in the dining room — and came out to investigate. Another woman grabbed her and dragged her into the bathroom, but Rowell killed that woman too — drenching the little girl in her blood — before moving on to the bedroom to murder the third woman. Then he went to the living room and “had the courage” to shoot himself, Leeper said.
“[She is a] very strong, brave, beautiful girl,” Leeper said of the girl. “She is with other relatives and is safe … She’s certainly been through a traumatic experience that you want no child to go through.”
Family members identified the victims as Rowell’s wife, Marissa Rowell, her sister Alisha Fogarty, and their mother Sandra Fogarty.
“He took the lives of three beautiful women,” said Steven Hallmark, a cousin. “This selfish act that he has done … he did not deserve them.”
Hallmark said Marissa Rowell was in the process of leaving her husband, who he said had a pattern of troubling behavior, including non-involvement with the little girl, staying out late drinking, and other abusive behavior. And now, Hallmark said earlier this month, the killer’s mother has custody of the fourth victim in this tragedy — the 5-year-old girl — and the victims’ family has no contact with her.
Neither Hallmark nor police identified the killer as the child’s father, but it’s presumed that he was.
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[Featured image: Sandra Fogarty, Marissa Rowell, and Alisha Fogarty/GoFundMe]
