A distraught son killed four of his family before turning the gun on himself as they met to discuss winding up his late mother’s affairs.
Joe DeLucia Jr, 59, opened fire inside the family home on Wyoming Court in Syosset, on Long Island, just before noon on Sunday.
Neighbors heard anguished wailing, crying, and screaming before DeLucia fatally shot himself in the chest on the front lawn minutes after the massacre.
His mother, family matriarch Theresa Martha DeLucia, 95, died on August 19 and was buried on Friday, which he was still greatly distraught about.
Distraught son Joe DeLucia Jr (left) killed four of his family before turning the gun on himself as they met to discuss winding up his late mother’s affairs
His mother, family matriarch Theresa Martha DeLucia, 95, died on August 19 and was buried on Friday, which he was still greatly distraught about
DeLucia, who has mental health issues, is believed to have been unable to handle the prospect of moving out of the family home, where he lived all his life.
Real estate agent Mary Macaluso was asked to come to the house on Sunday to discuss selling the property, but arrived to find a crime scene.
Neighbor Randi Marquis told DailyMail.com that Theresa’s will declared the house should be sold and anyone living there had to move out.
‘He was afraid that he was going to be homeless… His sister told me that he stopped taking his medicine on Saturday, and once he stops taking the medicine, that’s it,’ she said.
‘He had this planned. I don’t know where he got the gun from.’
Police said psychiatric medicine was found in the home during a search.
The victims were DeLucia’s brother Frank DeLucia, 64, who flew in from North Carolina, sister Joanne Kearns, 69, from Tampa, and another sister, Tina Hammond, 64, from Long Island, along with her 30-year-old daughter Victoria.
All four were found shot to death in the den at the back of the house when police went in after finding DeLucia’s body outside.
One of the sisters was said to have offered to DeLucia in at her home and look after him, and it is not clear why he turned her down.
Marquis explained that the gathering was supposed to double as a birthday party for one of DeLucia’s sisters.
She was at home organizing food for the party, intending to come after Macaluso was finished discussing the house sale, when she realized something was wrong.
‘When I saw the ambulance I just knew,’ she said, though she initially only thought DeLucia only took his own life.
‘When I went over to the neighbor and a neighbor said, “he took all of them”… It was selfish.
‘I didn’t see this coming. God forbid I was going to be there. I was going to go there and sing happy birthday and I told them not to eat I was going to bring a lot of food.’
DeLucia opened fire inside the family home on Wyoming Court in Syosset, on Long Island, just before noon on Sunday
Officers found a man with a self-inflicted gunshot wound on the front lawn of this Syosset, New York home on Sunday – and four other victims inside
Marquis said DeLucia was born with the umbilical cord wrapped around his neck and and was deprived of oxygen during birth.
She said he was a retired paramedic who worked as a mechanic in Hicksville and drove himself to work, then home right away to look after his mother.
‘He loved his mom. He was always there. He was there every day in the hospital,’ she said.
Marquis said DeLucia’s sister, with whom she was close friends, told her she was worried about her brother in the days after their mother’s death.
The neighbor spoke with DeLucia, who was talking about ending his life.
‘I told him in the Catholic religion you don’t do that… now is not your time. All your sisters and brothers are here,’ she said.
Marquis said Theresa had a bad fall in April and her daughter said her health began to decline after she stopped going to physical therapy.
‘I was close with Terry, I took care of her sometimes, visited her, cooked for her, her children used to play in my backyard,’ she said through tears.
‘I was also very close with one of the daughters and I met all of her siblings again [at the funeral] on Friday.’
Marquis said the 30-year-old woman was Theresa’s oldest grandchild, who had just finished university and was figuring her life out.
‘She was also like a daughter to me, since I have four boys but never a daughter,’ she said.
DeLucia posted this number plate as matching his state of mind, though it was not clear if it was his car or just one he saw
Police said they responded to a call about shots fired in the quiet cul-de-sac
DeLucia’s social media posts painted a picture of a deeply unhappy man who was frustrated with the world and his place in it.
On August 18, the day before his mother died, he changed his Facebook cover photo to an image of a car number plate reading ‘DEPRSSED’.
Other posts complained about friends trying to get mechanical work, the struggles of the New York Jets NFL team, and the standard of paramedic training.
‘If you do not like my price and feel that I am too expensive then go to another shop. I am not running a charity,’ a post from last September read.
‘I have bills to pay. tools and equipment cost money. Even if I am looking at your vehicle that takes time.’
Another post declared Bad Day by Daniel Powter to be ‘my theme song for work’.
Police said they responded to a call at 11.58am about shots fired in the quiet cul-de-sac where they found a man suffering from a self-inflicted gunshot wound on the front lawn.
Macaluso said she was supposed to be meeting relatives at the home at around noon – but by the time she arrived, authorities had already closed the street.
‘The kids were all here for the funeral, and they asked me to come look at the house,’ Macaluso said.
Rusted chairs and other junk sit outside the old house the siblings were planning to sell
Cars in the driveway of the home that will never be retrieved by their owners
She explained that one of Theresa’s children asked her to meet with the family so they would know what to do before listing the home, which is estimated to be worth nearly $900,000 on Zillow.
The family wanted the assessment done quickly because two of the family members came from out of town for the funeral, and were headed back soon.
DeLucia lived in the house his entire life, and neighbors said losing the home was just too unbearable for him.
‘I didn’t think that he’d take his whole family, his siblings,’ one neighbor told Fox 5 New York.
‘I thought maybe he was distraught and he did this to himself only.’.
Other neighbors noted that they heard gunfire, as they remained shaken up by the grisly scene.
‘At first I heard it was a murder-suicide, and that’s pretty bad,’ Mike Steffens told ABC 7.
‘And then I heard four people murdered and then a suicide, so it was something you don’t hear very often, let alone in your own town.’
Another resident, Wendy Paisner, called the murder-suicide a ‘tragedy for the family’ in her remarks to NBC 4 New York.
DeLucia lived in the house his entire life, and neighbors said losing the home was just too unbearable for him
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