Update: Josh Powell's sons were struck with an axe before house fire

[Tx4obama]

@BreakingNews Breaking News
Update: Josh Powell's sons were struck with an axe before house fire - @q13fox bit.ly/xn9fPV
https://twitter.com/BreakingNews/status/166721934715916289

Powell boys were 'chopped to the neck' with ax before blast

Josh Powell's two young sons Charles, 7, and Braden, 5, were murdered by "chops to the neck" as well as carbon monoxide poisoning proceeding an explosion, the Pierce County Medical Examiner said.

The blows were delivered with a hatchet or small ax, Pierce County Sheriff's deputy Ed Troyer said.

SNIP

http://www.q13fox.com/news/kcpq-fiery-explosion-believed-to-have-killed-josh-powell-and-his-2-young-sons-20120205,0,7485907.story

This is so awful and sad.

[NRaleighLiberal]

1. unspeakable, and unbelievably sad, sick and twisted....

no other words....

[MADem]

2. Despicable cretin. If there's a hell I hope he rots in it. nt

[Honeycombe8]

3. OMG. The caretaker who dropped them off must've been screaming Holy Murder outside....

unable to do anything.

The family tried to keep the children away from him. The Judge decided to let him have unsupervised visits, sadly and horribly. That Judge has some explaining to do...when this guy was the #1 suspect in his wife's murder, the kids were witnesses to some events of the murder night, and there was definitely evidence of his guilt. The Judge just totally ignored all that, looks like.

[tammywammy]

6. He was allowed supervised visits

He shut the door before the social worker could get inside.

[grasswire]

7. he kept the supervisor from entering the house

She was there to monitor. He grabbed the boys and did not let her enter. She phoned her supervisor and reported smelling gas. She should have called 9-11 instead.

[LadyHawkAZ]

10. If she'd known this would happen I'm sure she would have. Hindsight's 20/20

I don't think anyone could have seen something like this coming.

[izquierdista]

17. Is that you, Condi?

Apparently a few were prescient.

[LanternWaste]

35. Prescience in this case being little more than guessing correctly.

Prescience in this case being little more than guessing correctly.

However, I'm sure we all feel like we would know what to do in any given situation we have nothing to do with-- as long as the situation is over, and we've read many different stories about it, and had ample time to convince ourselves that we're, well... prescient.

[Kennah]

21. All DSHS employees are mandatory reporters

Even vague, incoherent threats get reported and 9-1-1 is called. I would probably call 9-1-1 first myself, but I'm an IT nerd at DSHS and not a caseworker on the front lines. Someone in her shoes probably makes mandatory reports on a regular basis, and it was probably instinctive to call the supervisor.

I heard it on the news this morning, and I was sickened all day.

This is one of those times when I wish I believed in Heaven and Hell.

[rustydog]

8. Actually,they were supposed to be supervised visits

On this day, the children bounded out of the car ahead of the "sitter" and the "loving father" let them in, locked out the sitter and commenced to commit murder.

[Honeycombe8]

36. Oh, I see. Still...if I had been the Judge, I would've kept the children away from him.

That Judge has some explaining to do. I wonder if he's sleeping well tonight?

[LiberalEsto]

34. I agree with you about the judge

What kind of fucking imbecile judge lets little children have even supervised visits with a suspected murderer of the kids' mother?

Those supervised visits SHOULD have taken place at a neutral location such as the social services agency.

[Luciferous]

4. Those poor babies :(

[rustydog]

5. My heart aches

If there is a heaven, there must be a Hell. If I ever pray for anything, it is that there is a hell and Josh is burning htere for all eternity. Those poor completely innocent children brutally murdered by their father.

My heart aches

[sabrina 1]

9. Omg, that is pure evil. How could a father do that to his own children?

Poor babies, and they trusted him and probably even loved him

[pecwae]

29. When they're little like

that they probably did. They knew no better. He was their Daddy, no matter what. The innocent are always the ones who suffer most.

I can't begin to fathom the depths of evil in a soul such as that man. My mind simply can't wrap around it.

[LadyHawkAZ]

11. I just want to cry

WTF is wrong with people?

[qanda]

12. My heart breaks every time I think about this case

I don't know how those grandparents will go on. My thoughts and prayers are with them.

[mrs_p]

13. One of the sickest things I've ever heard.

Poor babies.

[abelenkpe]

14. ..

Those poor kids!

[DianaForRussFeingold]

15. OMG, I'm going to be sick...!

I feel so bad... I Couldn't sleep last night, and now, after hearing this...

[CaliforniaPeggy]

16. The terror that these innocent boys must have felt...

I am sickened by all of this.

[Lil Missy]

18. Oh my God.Why the hell was that necessary if he was going to blow them up anyway?

There are no words

[HipChick]

19. I can't believe there are folks defending this monster..

Not in this thread...but on Facebook...anyone that killed his kids like this is more than capable of killing his wife...factually, yes all this proves is that he killed his kids...but

[riderinthestorm]

20. No words. Small sob nt

[JCMach1]

22. Wish I hadn't read this thread...

[Tx4obama]

23. If you have your TV on Tuesday, I think you're going to hear about it a lot

I have CNN on at the moment and they just now mentioned it.

Earlier in the evening no one was reporting on it yet.

My guess is that all the networks will be talking about this throughout the day.

Edited to add...

They also said that the father used TEN gallons of gasoline.

[JCMach1]

26. While it doesn't seem the case-worker could be blamed here, the judge should be on someone's list

and God, I feel for the grandparents who had gotten custody.

[alphafemale]

24. hell is for children. nt

[HughBeaumont]

25. I've long since stopped believing people are generally good. Now that conviction is solidified.

If there's a hell, I hope this "dad" is getting impaled in it.

[pecwae]

27. I know.

The horrible cruelty shown towards the world's most innocent, children, elderly and animals, is beyond sickening. Forget about being ashamed of being from a geographical area or group, this kind of shit makes me ashamed to be human. It's rare to glimpse any connection with the words humane and human. When there is a connection the act needs to be saved up and kept to recall at times like this because there just isn't enough to go around.

[PassingFair]

28. This guy is obviously an abomination and an anomaly....

or this wouldn't be such disturbing news.

People are generally good.

[WI_DEM]

30. The man was a gutless coward. That's probably how he did away with the wife, too.

hacked her up.

[grasswire]

31. the kids had begun to talk about seeing mommy in the trunk of the car

Wait.

The only corroboration for that story is the grandparents who claim to have heard it from one of the boys.

So we really don't know if it is true. And it's hearsay. Not admissable.

Everything must be considered here. The grandparents have provided a motive for him killing the boys, but it is hearsay.

Where is the car? Wasn't it examined previously?

[Liberal_in_LA]

32. really sad

[MicaelS]

33. Powell sounds like a Family Annihilator

Inside the Minds of Family Annihilators

Annihilators are overwhelmingly male (95 percent, he estimates), and mostly white and middle-aged. They feel inadequate as men and have often suffered childhood abuse. Having felt powerless as kids, many try to exert strict control over their households and seek to create an idealized version of family that they never experienced. When the economy is in decline, jobs are scarce, tensions are high, and the control these men seek becomes harder to maintain.

According to Websdale, these men fall along a continuum between what he calls "livid coercive" killers and "civil reputable" ones. The former are driven by rage: they are controlling and sometimes abusive figures who derive self-worth from the authority they exert at home. But that behavior typically plunges the marriage into crisis, often prompting the wife and children to try to leave. The resulting lack of control triggers feelings of humiliation, eventually leading the father to reassert his power in a final paroxysm of violence.

The "civil reputable" killer, on the other hand, is motivated by a perverse form of altruism. "His entire identity is in his family," says Richard Gelles, dean of the School of Social Policy and Practice at the University of Pennsylvania and an authority on domestic violence. The father is almost always considering suicide as the only escape from some sort of financial crisis. Murdering his family members, then, becomes a way of rescuing them from the hardship and shame of bankruptcy and suicide. "There is no other solution but the one you find today," wrote Russell Gilman, a Scottsdale attorney who murdered his wife and two kids after the family finances fell apart, in a note he left behind. (Economic duress can also play a role in rage killings, though it's not usually the main trigger.)

This narcissistic sense of chivalry is evident in the way many of these perpetrators execute their victims. The professional wrestler Chris Benoit, who murdered his wife and son and then hanged himself in 2007, is believed to have sedated the boy before strangling him.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

37. Powell was a monster