Five adults, one of whom was pregnant, were found murdered in a home in the southern Alabama city of Citronelle early Saturday.
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A man slaughtered a family of five – including a pregnant woman – before kidnapping his girlfriend and a three-month-old baby, police said.
After examining the crime scene, Mobile County District Attorney Ashley Rich said it was the most disturbing murder scene she’s ever seen.
Dearman, accompanied by his father, then turned himself in to the Greene County Sheriff’s Department in MS, a police statement said.
Lester told the Mobile County Sheriff’s Office that she went to stay at her brother’s house on Friday because of ongoing domestic violence perpetrated by Dearman. “Sad to say, one of the females was about five months pregnant”.
Sometime between 1:15 a.m. and dawn, Dearman returned to the residence and committed the murders, the statement said.
“It’s unprecedented here”, Burch told the Associated Press.
After the murders, Sheriff officials say Dearman forced Lester and the infant into a vehicle and drove to Mississippi. A 4-month-old infant was found alive at the scene.
The apparent revenge motive emerged after the arrest of MS suspect Derrick Dearman in the mass murder, with one police official calling the incident an “awful, gruesome scene”. Several weapons were recovered from the scene that may have been used as murder weapons. He will be charged with six counts of capital murder which includes the unborn baby of Justin and Chelsea Reed.
Investigators expected to be at the scene for a couple days. Someone at the home called police around 1 a.m. Saturday to report Dearman on the property – but he had vanished by the time cops arrived.
The Mobile Sheriff’s Office has identified the five victims as Robert Lee Brown, 26; Chelsea Marie Reed, 22; Justin Kaleb Reed, 23; Joseph Adam Turner, 26; and Shannon Melissa Randall, 35.
Prosecutors have already begun the process of trying to extradite Dearman from MS to Alabama, Burch said.
Later, Dearman apparently returned to the home and attacked the people inside, the statement said.
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After they arrived there, Dearman released Lester and the infant and then turned himself in at the MS sheriff’s department, Burch said. Burch said investigators believed the woman who contacted police had an undetermined relationship with Dearman.
