Ervin Antonio Lupoe Kills Wife And 5 Kids

A man who fatally shot his wife, five young children and himself Tuesday had earlier faxed a note to a TV station claiming the couple had just been fired from their hospital jobs and together planned the killings as a final escape for the whole family. "Why leave the children to a stranger?" Ervin Lupoe wrote.The station called police after receiving the fax, and a police dispatch center also received a call from a man who stated, "'I just returned home and my whole family's been shot."Officers responding to 911 calls placed by the man, and rushed to the home in Wilmington, a small community between the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, about 8:30 a.m., apparently within minutes of the killings. Officers could still smell the gunshot residue in the air.

Ana Lupoe's body was found in a downstairs bedroom with the bodies of the couple's twin 2-year-old boys. The bodies of an 8-year-old girl, twin 5-year-old girls were found alongside Lupoe's in an upstairs bedroom.

The man had telephoned and sent a fax to KABC-TV that indicated “he was despondent over a job situation and he saw no reasonable way out,” said Lt. John Romero, a police spokesman.

The television station reported that the two-page, typewritten letter made clear he was going to kill his family and himself.

The letter said the man and his wife worked as medical technicians at a Kaiser Permanente hospital in Los Angeles, and had recently lost his job after a dispute with an administrator, the station reported.

The administrator, the letter said, had asked them on an unspecified day why they had come to work, and then added, “you should have blown your brains out.”

Two days after the confrontation, the letter said, they lost their jobs and began planning their deaths and that of their children.

Kaiser Permanente identified the man and woman as Ervin Antonio Lupoe and his wife, Ana. The company in a statement confirmed that they were former employees but did not address the circumstances of their death.

Although the police are treating the case as a murder-suicide, Deputy Chief Kenneth Garner said they were still collecting information and sorting through a discrepancy.

Jose Maldonado, 27, who lives around the corner from the family, said he often saw the man, who appeared to work nights, in the front yard playing with his children and walking with them in the neighborhood. His younger brother played with the oldest daughter and by appearances, they seemed a happy family, he said.

He said the family had lived in the neighborhood for at least five or six years.

Yolanda and Oscar Lopez, who have lived in the neighborhood for three months, said they had seen the couple walking in the neighborhood.
“There’s so much pressure from the economy and people out of work and stuff,But adults, they know there are other options. You don’t have to do this.” said Mr. Lopez, 28.

It was the fifth mass death of a Southern California family by murder or suicide in a year.

On Dec. 24, a man dressed up as Santa Claus invaded a Christmas Eve party at his ex-wife's parents' home in suburban Covina. His ex-wire and eight of her relatives died from gunshots or in the house fire he set. The man later killed himself.

In October, an unemployed financial manager despairing over extreme money problems shot and killed his wife, three children, mother-in-law and himself in their home in the Porter Ranch area of the San Fernando Valley.

In June, five members of a Turkish-American family, clad in black, were found dead in an upscale home in San Clemente. Investigators say it was apparently a suicide pact but the reason is a mystery.