My. God. This is far worse, far more depraved of an act than I ever considered possible. He is pure evil. A complete monster.
I’ve followed many horrible cases over the course of the years; none have caused me to bawl like I did today.
I have a 4 year old daughter. She is the light of my world and I am the light of hers. She looks to me as her protector, her biggest fan, the fixer of all things she encounters in life. How anyone could disregard such a sacred bond is beyond my level of comprehension.
MOO, IMO, this is how I think things went down:
- I think he fantasized for a long time about killing Shannan. He clearly, to me anyway, looked at her with complete contempt. I DONT think he was sure he could go through with it, though. The Cervi disposal was contrived as part of his fantasy to kill her / provide him with a plan if he felt he could do the deed during the next argument. Maybe he felt close to the point of killing her before and chickened out that time. Maybe he was waiting to feel that type of rage again to see it through once and for all. The photo of the doll was part of the prep work.
- Narcissists aren’t that clever. They weave bits and pieces of truth into their lies. I do believe they had a fight when she got home. I believe she was too exhausted to continue arguing and eventually acquiesced. She was also still madly in love with him. We all eat lies when our hearts are hungry. I believe they were intimate immediately after that but she couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong. I would bet the fighting immediately started up again after that. I’ve had plenty of fights with my own husband in this manner. There’s a cool down period before things begin escalating again. Shannan was found in a nightgown and underwear. She was ready to go to bed. It sounds like he either admitted to the affair while they were laying in bed after they finished having sex or she was sitting on, or standing close, to the bed. In her immense emotional agony, she said something she KNEW would hurt him... that she’d take the kids away. It’s only natural to want to inflict the same level of pain on those who hurt us. He then sat on her chest, on top of the blankets, and strangled her. This would account for the lack of defensive wounds. Or perhaps he waited until the second cool down and strangled her while she was asleep.
- I don’t think he ever considered killing the girls prior to that day. I think one of two things happened during that 45 min drive: he either had a moment of “remorse” because the girls were freaking out over seeing their mom wrapped in a sheet or he simply convinced himself that killing them was the decent thing to do. Let them be with their mom in heaven. Save them the pain of being raised in a motherless home. This is how a sick mind works: in his narcissism and selfish thinking, there was no other logical way to proceed but to allow them to be together in the afterlife. Sick stuff.
- He has no reason to lie at this point. Again, as a narcissist, he feels absolved of his sins and forgiven by the only true being who can “judge” him: God. He now has a clear conscious, in his mind, and his soul is free to seek redemption by his jail religion.
The entire situation, from start to finish, is so self serving. He doesn’t see it that way, sadly.