Boy, 13, kills his parents, gran and great-aunt ...goes to school then kills himself
A BOY of 13 who slaughtered his family, went to school and later returned home to commit suicide was inspired by the Amityville Horror massacre, police believe.
Marcelo Pesseghini is said to have dreamt of becoming a hitman.
He shot dead his parents, grandmother and great-aunt – then spent the day at his lessons before returning home to kill himself.
Police found five bodies after storming a property in northern Sao Paulo, Brazil.
“Everything seems to indicate that Marcelo killed his parents and relatives,” a spokesman for Sao Paulo Civilian Police’s homicide department said yesterday.
He said Marcelo told a friend he wanted to kill his parents. In a statement to detectives, the friend said: “He always told me he wanted to become a hired killer.
“He had a plan to kill his parents during the night, so that no one would notice, and escape in the parents’ car and live in an abandoned place.”
The killing spree has chilling similarities with the case of 23-year-old Ronald DeFeo Junior, who murdered his parents and four siblings in their beds at the family home in Amityville, Long Island, New York, in 1974.
Rumours of a haunted house and supernatural events surrounding the murders have spawned a string of Hollywood movies, starting with The Amityville Horror in 1979.
Detectives are investigating Marcelo’s fascination with the massacre after it emerged he had posted a photograph – known as the Amityville Ghost Boy, which shows the “ghost” of the youngest victim – on his Facebook page on December 9, 2012.
As with the DeFeo murders, the Pesseghini family were mostly found dead in their beds.
First there was Marcelo’s father Luiz, 40, a police sergeant with 19 years service. Then there was the grandmother, Benedita de Oliveira Bovo, 65, who lived in a different section of the house, and the great-aunt Bernadete Oliveira da Silva, 55. Marcelo’s mother Andreia, 36, who had served in the military police for 16 years, was found on her knees in the bedroom.
Each victim had been shot in the head with a pistol.
After the shootings it appears Marcelo caught a lift to school from a friend as usual.
Teachers and pupils said it had been a “normal” day and he had given no indication that he was troubled. CCTV footage taken from a security camera has emerged showing him later in the day, casually walking home after school, apparently without a care in the world.
Soon after arriving home, he died from a shot to the left temple.
His father’s police-issue service revolver was found nearby.
Another revolver was found inside a backpack he had taken to school on Monday.
Police say there was no sign of a break-in and ruled out an act of revenge by criminal gangs.
Amityville killer DeFeo took a bath and went to work as usual after his massacre. But he did not kill himself and remains in jail.
