Investigators in New Jersey, USA, confirmed on Monday that a 16-year-old boy shot and killed his parents, brother, sister, and a family friend on New Year’s Eve while one of his brothers and grandfather managed to escape.
After the horrific bloodbath which happened shortly before midnight on 31 December at their home in the Long Branch, New Jersey, police were called in for an arrest at around 11:43 p.m., said Monmouth County Prosecutor Christopher J. Gramiccioni in a statement.
According to the Gramiccioni, the suspect was taken into custody without incident.
While Monmouth County Prosecutor’s Office and the Long Branch Police Department have launched a joint investigation, the teen suspect will most likely face charges as an adult.
“We are confident that this is a domestic incident that is completely isolated,” Gramiccioni said, adding that “it’s a terribly tragic incident.”
Watch the video here: https://web.facebook.com/MCProsecutors.Office/videos/1586944951388364/
The deceased persons were identified as: Steven Kologi, 44; Linda Kologi, 42; Brittany Kologi, 18; and Mary Schultz, 70.
However, the shooter’s name was not mentioned.
The Monmouth County Prosecutor’s Office said Schultz was a family friend who visited on that fateful night.
Gramiccioni said at a press conference on Monday that the unnamed bloodthirsty teenager probably used a Century Arms “semi-automatic assault rifle” for the murders. The firearm was legally owned and registered to a family member.
The prosecutor did not comment on the suspect’s motive.
Although reporters questioned Gramiccioni on the suspect’s possible mental disability, the officer chose to speak on the attack which he described as an ‘isolated’ domestic incident.
Jalen Walls, who went to school with Brittany Kologi and lives a few blocks away from the home, told NJ.com in an interview that the suspected shooter required special assistance and was cared for by his mother.
“But he was fully functional and comprehended what we were saying,” Walls told the news outlet.
“The Kologis were very caring, loving people and always looking to do fun things with their kids…The suspect was a good kid. He was a little, you know, slow with learning disabilities, but he knows right from wrong,” Walter Montelione, Linda Kologi’s cousin, told WCBS-TV.
Fox News quotes a university spokeswoman as confirming that Brittany Kologi was a freshman at Stockton University in Galloway Township, N.J., where she studied health sciences.
“We are shocked and saddened by the reports of the death of freshman Brittany Kologi under such tragic circumstances,” Diane D’Amico, the Stockton University rep said to the news outlet, adding that counseling staff will be on hand for students.
Another grieving friend, Dave Farmer, said in a Facebook tribute that he played softball with Steven Kologi and “never had an argument or disagreement since” with him.
“‘I’m proud to say publicly that I knew and loved this man unconditionally and always told him when we parted, ‘I love you brotha!!!’” Farmer said.
Americans are bemoaning the fact that there are many kids out there with guns who don’t care about anything.
According to a report from The Associated Press, year 2017 witnessed the highest rate of gun violence, with Baltimore scooping a new per-capita homicide record as gunmen killed for drugs, cash, payback – or no apparent reason at all.
Baltimore recorded 343 killings in 2017 to bring the annual homicide rate to its highest ever – roughly 56 killings per 100,000 people – despite its shrunken size which has been reduced to about 615,000 inhabitants.
“Not only is it disheartening, it’s painful,” said Mayor Catherine Pugh in an interview with the news outlet shortly before the New Year Day celebrations to mark her first year in office.
A mix of factors ranging from illegal guns, the spiraling opioid epidemic, and systemic failures like unequal justice and a scarcity of decent opportunities for many citizens, have been cited as possible causes for the trend.
Others blame police for allegedly taking a hands-off approach to fighting crime since six officers were charged in connection with the 2015 death of Freddie Gray, a black man whose fatal spinal cord injury in police custody triggered massive protests that year and the city’s worst riots in decades.
“Killing this kid won’t bring back the victims but let’s do it anyway,” Grumpy said of the 16-year-old murderer.
“Life is not a video game. No one will re-spawn, and prison will not be fun,” another netizen added.
“Sadly this is how teens react nowadays, filled with a sense of entitlement and anger. My own son is generally a great kid, he is an Eagle Scout, he will be running cross country and track at a D-1 school next year, I have never had issues with drugs or alcohol etc. However the one issue my son has that has always concerned me is he does not know how to control his anger and the anger usually stems from simple things like if you ask him to clean his room or to take out the trash etc.,” said a concerned mother.
“He will take a very simple innocuous conversation and simply because he always feels as though he has to be right and also he lacks the ability to own his actions he will become combative and very hostile toward myself and his mom. At times I want to just beat the tar out of him but as a parent you try to navigate through in hopes that one day he will wake up. I think teens lack communications skills and they are influenced heavily by what they see in the media so you mix the two and this is the result.”
Norman Armstrong, a grieving father who spoke to reporters in the comfort of his wife, Yvonne, said they lost their 31-year-old son to gun violence.
Speaking with tears streaming down his eyes at the vigil, Norman said his late son, a father-of-three, was fatally shot at a Baltimore car-wash in September and the murder is yet to be unraveled.
“The kids out there with guns don’t care about anything,” said Norman Armstrong with pain and grief written all over his face.