A 10-year-old boy woke up to discover his father killed his entire family and mother before killing himself, Oklahoma Police said on April 23.
In a press conference, Oklahoma City Police Sgt. Gary Knight said that the father, Jonathon Candy, had argued with his wife, Lindsay Candy, “sometime overnight.”
Knight said Jonathon Candy armed himself and fatally shot Lindsay Candy on the downstairs floor of their home at Mirage Street.
“At that point, he systematically went through the home, shooting and killing their children,” Knight said, adding that one of the children had been found slain in his own bed.
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Knight said Jonathon Candy then killed himself.
All three of the deceased children were between the ages of 12 and 18. They have been identified as Dylan Candy, 18; Ethan Candy, 14, and Lucas Candy, 12, police said. Lindsay Candy was 39 years old and Jonathon Candy was 42, police said.
The youngest child — the 10-year-old who called police the following morning at 9:35 a.m. — told investigators he “slept through the whole thing.”
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“We don’t know why he was left unharmed. I know that’s the question that everybody asked, it’s a question we had, too,” Knight said. “In the end, nobody is ever going to have the answer to that.”
The family had no known history of domestic abuse reports with law enforcement, Knight said. The surviving child has been placed with family.
“It was a horrible thing for everybody — the officers who were there, the people who heard about it, for the investigators and crime scene analysts who had to go inside — and it was certainly most horrible for the young man who woke up and found the carnage,” Knight said.
Knight said that because the suspect in the shooting is dead, there is no one to charge with a crime. However, they intend to investigate why Jonathon Candy did what he did.
“Make no mistake about it. What happened inside that residence was nothing short of a massacre,” he said. “Those children were hunted down and killed.”
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If you or someone you know is in crisis, call or text 988 to reach the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline or chat live at 988lifeline.org. You can also visit SpeakingOfSuicide.com/resources for additional support.
