The father of two young Canadian sisters who were found dead inside his apartment on Christmas Day is suspect in what investigators are calling a holiday homicide.
The bodies of Aubrey Berry, 4, and Chloe Berry, 6, were discovered after police were called to Andrew Berry’s Oak Bay, British Columbia apartment around 5pm.
A related source told police the power had been out for some time in the 43-year-old father’s apartment after he failed to pay his electricity bill.
He was found with self-inflicted wounds and transported to the hospital. Another male was found in the home, while police have not released his identity.
Aubrey Berry, 4, (left) and Chloe Berry, 6, (right) were found dead by police on Christmas Day at their father’s apartment
Police were called to Andrew Berry’s Oak Bay, British Columbia apartment around 5pm Monday
Andrew Berry was found with self-inflicted wounds and transported to the hospital. He was named the only suspect
It seems the children’s mother, Sarah Cotton, ended their marriage in 2013 after three years together, and complained he was an unfit father during their ongoing custody battle.
Online court records show government agency Ministry of Children and Family Development began investigating the suspicious dad in 2015, after Aubrey told her mother that he touched her ‘inappropriately’.
During an examination in 2016, the agency discovered a ‘soft spot’ on Aubrey’s head after a visit to her father, according to the Vancouver Sun.
The father’s visits were supervised. Supreme Court Justice Judge Victoria Gray later allowed him holiday and overnight visitation rights.
‘The father is a loving father who has much to offer his daughters. It is in the best interest of the girls to have significant parenting time with the father,’ Gray wrote, according to court documents.
Cotton previously filed a restraining order after their split in 2013, when she also accused him of abusing her.
She claimed Berry ‘pinned her to a bed’ in September 2013 during one of his furious outbursts, the newspaper reports.
The report said the father was verbally abusing toward the mother in front of the children and declined to attending parenting classes.
Closer investigation by the Office Representative of Children and Youth will play out after the completion of the police and coroner’s.
‘It will be several months before we’re in a position to decide whether we’ll be conducting a full investigation,’ child and youth representative Bernard Richard told the newspaper.
