My stomach was in knots Wednesday- across the news wires a manhunt ensued as another piece of walking talking human garbage was being sought in the brutal and gruesome murders of 4 family members.
Laura Stone Mortimer 41, and the couple’s children, Charlotte, 2, and Thomas, 4, known as Finn, and the children’s grandma and Laura’s mother, Ragana Ellen Stone, 64 were found by police who went on a wellness check, were scattered about the residence in a crime scene of horrific magnitude.
The events that lead to the murders of these 4 innocent lives will never be accurately revealed; they never are in the majority of cases where intimate partner homicide took the lives, in this case, of an entire family.
On Thursday police captured Thomas Mortimer, alive, and took him into custody. He left 2 handwritten notes. One note was left on the kitchen counter as though he was contemplating suicide. The other note written was very matter of fact in the dining room area.Depending on who this mass murderer secures as his defense attorney, Mortimer was clearly not mentally impaired, he was not insane, temporarily or otherwise, at the time of murders. An insane person does not plan out the murders down to how, when and where. An insane person cannot disassociate themselves from anger and rage. At all times an abuser is in control and it is virtually impossible to prove that otherwise.
Earlier in the day, on and off, Mortimer and his wife argued. When you have worked on these cases for over 20 years it is easy to see what happened. The words “It is over or I have had enough” come out with conviction from a women who is no longer going to allow being abused either emotional or physically. Given this woman’s position in the community, often quoted in magazines and business journals, police were never called to the home prior to Wednesday.
For women like Laura that I see and assist, all too often the shear embarrassment of what is going on behind closed doors is exactly where they want to keep it hidden, from the outside world. They believe they can take care of this often deadly problem themselves. But without the prescription for safety, the plan that includes the evidentiary abuse document and video, and techniques on how to disarm potential threats provided in the book "Time’s UP," we can expect others to lose their lives in battle just as Laura, her mother and children did.Sadly for Laura, her own mother and children, they join the ever growing list of lives lost in the home, on the battlefield, by an angry spouse, controlling and obsessive spouse.
I hope as she enters heavens gates that my mother is the angel assigned to greet Laura and her children. Just as I work to save, what I term the “Silent Mary Jo’s” (as was Laura), on earth, working to keep women and children alive, I imagine my mother, who lost her life on the battlefield, is helping those who journey into the heavens that did not have the opportunity to escape. My mother is happily baking her famous cherry cake smiling and singing some corny song as she awaits to greet those, like her, whom I was unable to reach in time.
It is better to be a safe and alive "Mary Jo" than "a dead Jane Doe.
Been there, done that…” Susan Murphy- Milano has turned a tired phrase into demonstrable realism through the gift of her newly published book, "TIME'S UP: A GUIDE ON HOW TO LEAVE AND SURVIVE ABUSIVE AND STALKING RELATIONSHIPS
