Father, 8-year-old son killed in murder-suicide in Pennsylvania, US

Police on Friday reported that a father and his 8-year-old son were killed in a murder-suicide inside a home in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, US, after officers responded to a report.

According to the investigators, police responded to a home in the Lower Makefield neighbourhood along the 500 block of Heritage Oak Drive shortly after 6pm Thursday for a wellness check.

Upon receiving no response at the door, the officers looked through the window and spotted an unresponsive boy on the living room floor.

Lower Makefield Police Chief Kenneth Coluzzi said that the police immediately knocked the door open to enter the home and discovered the 8-year-old boy on the floor along with his 47-year-old father who was on the couch.

Chief Coluzzi also revealed that both victims succumbed to gunshot wounds and the cause of death was a murder-suicide, NBC10 reported.

“From what we could determine from the crime scene it’s clear that it’s a murder-suicide at this point,” Chief Coluzzi said. “A father shot the individual. Shot his son.”

The police chief informed that, while the victims' identities were not revealed pending the notification of their family members, it was believed that there was no one else at home when the shooting occurred and police retrieved a handgun.

They are also interviewing the boy's mother to determine if there were any domestic issues with the family that could have led to Thursday’s shooting.

Coluzzi also shared that the boy attended school in the Pennsbury School District. “They’re going to be providing any grief counselling for his friends and things like that. His classmates,” Chief Coluzzi said.

Additionally, the police are also speaking with neighbours who are already dealing with the recent flooding that killed five people and left two children missing in the nearby Upper Makefield and damaged homes in Lower Makefield, according to Chief Coluzzi.

“It’s tough news. It’s always tough when this happens and there’s a child involved,” he said. “And we just had a lot of tragedy in Upper Makefield and Lower Makefield with the flooding and the children being lost in Upper Makefield and the loss of other lives and the property damage. So we’re just coming off of that and now we have another tragedy that we’re dealing with.”

The incident follows frequent mass shootings scattered across the US commonly prompted by personal conflicts.