By Carol Tannenhauser
Responding to a request for a wellness check at around 2:56 p.m. on Monday, the NYPD, with the assistance of the FDNY, gained entry to a fourth-floor apartment at 328 West 86th Street (West End Avenue and Riverside Drive), where they discovered four unresponsive individuals: a 41-year-old man with trauma to his neck; a 40-year-old woman with trauma to her neck; a three-year-old [boy] with trauma to his torso; and a one-year-old boy with trauma “around his body,” a police spokesperson said. EMS arrived and pronounced all four individuals deceased at the scene.
“That is all that is known at this time,” the officer said, although other sources reported that the deaths might have resulted from a murder-suicide. The investigation is ongoing.
Note: It was originally reported that the older child was a girl. He is now believed to be a boy.
Update, 8/29, 8:55 a.m.: Police have released the names of the deceased. They are:
Lopez, Edison
41-year-old male
328 West 86 Street
New York, NY
Witek, Alexandra
40-year-old female
328 West 86 Street
New York, NY
Lopez, Lucien
3-year-old male
328 West 86 Street
New York, NY
Lopez, Calvin
1-year-old male
328 West 86 Street
New York, NYFor more details, read the latest New York Times story here.
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This is awful. I shudder whenever I walk by the building where the nanny Josie Ortega killed her employer’s children. Horrible things can happen everywhere.
I’ll never forget that night. I lived down the street from the Krims.
It’s tragic and deeply disturbing when a murder-suicide occurs. Yet, it’s noticeable that the commenters on West Side Rag haven’t reacted to this incident with the same intensity as they typically do when a crime, such as a shooting, occurs a few blocks away. It’s important to maintain the same level of concern and engagement for all crimes and tragedies, regardless of where they occur.
I have no idea what your comment even means. This publication reports on…upper west side events…everything occurs here…on the upper west side…
We aren’t replying because a) we are shocked and horrified and b) it is unclear exactly what happened so it is pre-mature to speculate. I appreciate everyone’s restraint. I am beyond words but felt the need to reply to your comment.
The article was posted at 5pm and by 10pm you are unhappy with the lack of comments? Give it time.
What is there to say? When there are a lot of comments it is usually because there is someone who is blamed for not doing their job. Not in this case.
R.I.P.
Absolutely horrifying. I hope that the circumstances are fully understood ASAP, and that anyone involved who may still alive is brought swiftly to justice.
SO sad!! wait…. “police believe was a murder-suicide have been identified as the apartment building’s superintendent, his wife and young sons, law enforcement sources said — noting that one of the boy’s bodies was so bloody, he was initially misidentified as a girl.” Is it safe in that building?!
Other papers have reported that the apartment door was locked from the inside.
That’s pretty conclusive as to what happened.
Many of the claims in the Daily News article linked above are unsubstantiated, with the article title claiming the adult male is the killer despite no sourcing of that statement.
Facts that everyone is reporting: the door was locked from the inside and the male’s body was laying on the bed with a knife nearby while the female was in the hallway near the front door. Only thing inconclusive is motive. Additionally, statistically, women kill their families in cars or with pills. Men shoot or stab. Premeditated of course. Crimes of passion are another story. Never heard of a murder-suicide as a crime of passion though. Usually planned to some degree.
This makes me want to cry. I can’t — or don’t want to–imagine what those children went through, and the poor mother, assuming the father did it. Their suffering is unimaginable.
Absolute heartbreak. The poor, poor children. I can only imagine what they’d been through. I realize we don’t yet know exactly what happened, but I can’t stop thinking of the children. The poor children. 🙁 Thank you for reporting on this, difficult as it must be to do so.
Evil
The bodies of the boys were reported to be so “ravaged” police couldn’t tell their sex?? What the eff did this monster do? This guy who was supposedly “so nice.” You really can’t be too careful.
Another horrific incident of domestic violence. I hope those poor children didn’t have time to realize what was happening. Women, I know it can be tremendously difficult to leave abusers, but this is where the road leads. Call 1-800-621-HOPE (available 24/7) for help.
God bless them . And thank God they will all be in heaven.
Maybe this isn’t the time to get political, but will the death penalty ever enter polite discourse again?
The death penalty wouldn’t stop someone planning to kill himself after annihilating his family.
A lot of speculation in the comments, please let’s all wait for the official report before calling the father an abuser. No one knows what happened in that apartment. Good rest their souls.
The police have called it a murder-suicide, unfortunately.