Murder Suicides

A couple who died in an apparent murder-suicide were identified Saturday by Los Angeles County sheriff's deputies. The bodies of Minnie V. Clifton, 69, and Jimmy Van Norman, 66, were found about 6:30 p.m. Friday after a report of shots fired in the 37300 block of 47th Street East, Deputy Bill Spear said. Clifton was on the floor with several gunshot wounds to her upper body, and Van Norman had a single gunshot wound to his upper torso, authorities said.

A Van Nuys woman shot and killed the 2-year-old daughter of her domestic partner and then fatally shot herself Friday afternoon, police said. "It appears to be some kind of lovers' quarrel," said Sgt. Mike Long of the Los Angeles Police Department's Van Nuys division. Police were called by a neighbor to a condominium in the 13600 block of Valerio Street at about 5:30 p.m. They found the bodies of the toddler and the 35-year-old woman, Long said.

A married couple found dead Thursday in their Oxnard home in what appears to be a murder-suicide were identified Saturday as Albert and Pilar Kessock. Authorities believe Albert Kessock, 59, shot his wife, 64, and then himself because both were suffering from serious illnesses. A neighbor found the pair in their Falkner Place home.

Police responding to reports of gunshots at a home Saturday found a couple dead in an apparent murder-suicide, authorities said. Residents told police they heard shots coming from a home in the 200 block of Bluff Road about noon, said Los Angeles County Sheriff's Deputy Steve Suzuki. Police found "a male and a female suffering from gunshot wounds. We believe this is a murder-suicide," he said. Investigators did not release additional details.

Tacoma has agreed to pay $3 million to the family of a woman who was shot to death by her police chief husband, and officials said the final package could total several million more. Lane and Patty Judson, the parents of Crystal Brame, said this month that they would drop their wrongful-death claim demand for $75 million and accept whatever the city's insurance would cover under conditions, including the establishment of a domestic violence counseling program for city employees.

"Terminally Ill Man, 87, Kills 86-Year-Old Wife and Then Self." "Older Couple's Deaths Called Murder-Suicide." "Illness May Have Played a Role in Elderly Couple's Murder-Suicide." Headlines such as these give the words "till death do us part" ominous new meaning--and related statistics are even more alarming. Each year, more than 500 homicide-suicides, or 1,000 deaths, occur among people 55 years and older, and experts say those figures are increasing.

Police are investigating the shooting deaths of an elderly couple at a hospital as a probable murder-suicide. Officers responding Thursday morning to gunshots at the Scripps Green Hospital in La Jolla found an 86-year-old man dead of a self-inflicted gunshot and his 95-year-old wife mortally wounded in her bed. She died moments later. The couple was identified as Gordon and Winsome Houghton of Spring Valley. The wife had been hospitalized with an undisclosed illness.