© The Assoicated Press/JD Pooley
Ottawa County Sheriff Bob Bratton pauses while speaking to the media, Saturday April 16, 2011, in Port Clinton, Ohio. Authorities say Alan Atwater killed his three children, wife and himself inside an Ohio farmhouse.
Ottawa County Sheriff Bob Bratton pauses while speaking to the media, Saturday April 16, 2011, in Port Clinton, Ohio. Authorities say Alan Atwater killed his three children, wife and himself inside an Ohio farmhouse.
The 911 call came in just after midnight, the Ottawa County Sheriff's Department said, and deputies arrived within minutes at the white-sided, two-story farmhouse in Oak Harbor, about 25 miles southeast of Toledo. They didn't enter the home until two hours later, after they'd tried to contact the people inside by phone and through a loudspeaker.
In an upstairs bedroom, they found Alan Atwater, 31; his wife, Dawn, 30; and their three children - 4-year-old Ashley, 2-year-old Isaac and 1-year-old Brady. The parents and two older children were on the floor, while the youngest was in a bed. All had gunshot wounds, authorities said.
"There has been a terrible accident at my house. My wife and three children are dead," Alan Atwater said in the 911 call, according to the sheriff's office. He told the dispatcher he had shot them.
