Gunman shot wife in her hospital bed ‘out of love’

A man walked into his wife’s hospital room on Tuesday, fatally shot her, and then killed himself — a murder-suicide he foretold in a candid and emotional Facebook posting to friends and family.

Officials did not identify the New Hampshire man. But Dorcas Lavoie told The Associated Press that her brother, Mark A Lavoie, shot his wife, Katherine, “out of love” before killing himself at Wentworth-Douglass Hospital in Dover.

“They both loved each other very much,” she said, declining to comment further.

Police got a 911 call at 6.03am reporting gunshots at the hospital near the state’s sea coast. They found a man and a woman dead in a private room in the critical care unit. Assistant attorney general Jay McCormack said the killings were still under investigation. He said the victims’ identities would be released after family was notified.

In a 5.59am post on what appears to be Mark Lavoie’s Facebook page, he said his 49-year-old wife had suffered for years. “I want to start off by saying this is going to be officially ruled a murder/suicide when in all actuality it is a double suicide,” the post reads.

“My baby was trying to escape the bi-polar demons that have been swirling around in her brain since childhood and now because of my selfishness in dialing 911 she is experiencing the only thing she feared more than her illness... life support on a respirator.”

Friends wrote back, some pleading with Lavoie, who was 50, not to follow through. Within hours, the responses turned to shock, grief, and solace for Lavoie’s family.

At a news conference, hospital president and CEO Greg Walker said a “very sad and horrific event took place”. Walker said visitors in the critical care unit were restricted to small numbers of family members and the hospital had a policy banning firearms.

The hospital remained open after the shooting and Walker said services were not affected. Counselors were also made available.

In Lavoie’s posting, he

tried to explain his actions: “Though a difficult subject I hope my family whom I love dearly can make some sense of what I’m doing though unless you have dealt directly with mental illness,” it will be difficult.”