Haight family murder suicide

[Bluebirdbluebell]

Here's a link to the article about this crime.

From the article:

Quote

A Utah man fatally shot his five children, his mother-in-law and his wife, then killed himself two weeks after the woman had filed for divorce, according to authorities and public records.

 

[Howl]

I've been following along on  WebSleuths.  Many in the this small rural LDS community in southwest Utah are devastated.  The kids, 17 to 4,  attended local public schools; the family was very involved in their local LDS ward (is that the correct term?) 

WebSleuths is worth a read.  There's a lot of dross, but a few nuggets from people who grew up or are currently LDS. 

The dad seemed like a stellar guy and a good Mormon (served his mission in Brazil, undergrad degree, got married, five kids, involved in the local LDS ward (church), successful businessman,  but had lost his job as an insurance agent in the last few months or so.  Police were called to the house once, several years ago, for unknown reasons. 

The area where they lived is a subdivision and based on photos, with new, large-ish houses (maybe 2,500 sq feet or so?). 

So, no reports that the wife worked, he's the sole breadwinner supporting his family of 6, loses his job, big mortgage AND this just occurred to me.  He has a 17-year-old son who will be going on his mission in a year or two and (according to the Mormon missionary WIKI) "Missionaries are expected to pay their own expenses while on the mission, often with assistance from family."

Did a big of googling and came across this piece on familicide,  on the 4 general categories of family annihilators: "In all of these cases masculinity and perceptions of power sets the background for the crimes. The family role of the father is central to their ideas of masculinity and the murders represent a last ditch attempt to perform a masculine role."

Early research in the UK outlined four different types of family annihilators; later research also refined this into two general types: livid-coercive and civic-reputable. 

Here's a data-driven overview: Family Annihilators- Psychological Profile

But yes, this guy fits right in the civic/reputable category: male head of household, middle aged (43), educated (undergrad degree), successful in business, perfect Mormon family (wife, 5 kids), yada yada. 

The article linked above notes that, despite being outwardly successful, there is an underlying personality disorder (depression, narcissism, etc.) 

Just google family annihilators, there is a lot of information. 

Side note: Thinking about Scott Peterson and Chris Watts. In each of those cases, there was a baby on the way and each man responded by starting a torrid affair and murdering the pregnant wife, so even though they are roughly considered family annihilators, they seem like a different category. 

 

 

 

[CTRLZero]

Not specifically to do with this tragedy, but might give some local culture.  I’ve been lightly researching all things LDS/Mormon (I blame the Daybells) and just finished a couple episodes on that area’s violent history.  Here is a link to an episode from The Year of Polygamy podcast. Episode on local history - Brigham Young era   The initial podcasts relate the individual stories of the plural wives of the founder, then expands into Utah settlement history.  The podcast author gives lots of links and suggestions for further research. 

That said, I wonder how a patriarch murdering his family members affects the belief of what happens in eternity.  My understanding is that they hold eternal family togetherness very highly in their religion.  

[hoipolloi]

What a horrific case. Itʻs all so unimaginable.

Re: family annihilators. Sadly, there is a substantial body of cases now. I recently listened to a podcast on the infamous John List, a classic family annihilator who could fit two categories: financial hardship and mental illness. The latter category is really obvious in this interview List did from prison, 30 years after his crimes.

[CTRLZero]

35 minutes ago, hoipolloi said:

The latter category is really obvious in this interview List did from prison, 30 years after his crimes.

His thought process about the afterlife is interesting.  He assumes they made it to heaven, thanks to his intervention, and they won’t remember his violence when they reunite.  In the meantime, he’s working on his own salvation plan of forgiveness to facilitate that reunion.  Typical sin now, pray later mindset, taken to extremes. 

[hoipolloi]

37 minutes ago, CTRLZero said:

Typical sin now, pray later mindset, taken to extremes. 

Yep. List was a real piece of work but the family dynamics were also screwy. Between his controlling mother and his contemptuous wife, itʻs probably not surprising that he just decided on annihilation. 

ETA: Should add that from the get go, he justified the murders by saying that he was worried about them all falling into lives of sin due to the impending foreclosure of his home. This is what he wrote in the confession letter to his pastor at the time of the murders. I have never forgotten this unbelievable postscript to the letter: "ʻP.S. Mother is in the hallway in the attic-3rd floor. She was too heavy to move.'"

Edited January 9, 2023 by hoipolloi

[TuringMachine]

3 hours ago, hoipolloi said:

What a horrific case. Itʻs all so unimaginable.

Re: family annihilators. Sadly, there is a substantial body of cases now. I recently listened to a podcast on the infamous John List, a classic family annihilator who could fit two categories: financial hardship and mental illness. The latter category is really obvious in this interview List did from prison, 30 years after his crimes.

I need to listen to that one. I'm from the area, so the List murders were our local ghost story. 

So I'm not a Christian, but if he wanted to join them in heaven wouldn't it have been better to confess and accept his punishment rather than to go to great lengths to get away, prevent his family from having a proper burial for weeks, then deceive a second wife?

[hoipolloi]

13 minutes ago, TuringMachine said:

if he wanted to join them in heaven wouldn't it have been better to confess and accept his punishment rather than to go to great lengths to get away, prevent his family from having a proper burial for weeks, then deceive a second wife?

You would think so but Iʻm guessing that his narcissism overrode his Christianity.

[catlady]

@TuringMachine, there’s a YouTube channel* where the host put out an episode on the List family last year; the second half is talking to his own mother because she grew up in the neighborhood and had been friends with the children.  Her perspective was really interesting; she genuinely liked the kids and talked about the interior of the house, but had virtually no interaction with the parents as they were never around or stayed elsewhere in the house while she visited.

*the channel might be called Morbid Midnight (primarily true crime); I’m at work and can’t access YouTube to look it up, but I can check on it later tonight.

[Bluebirdbluebell]

7 hours ago, Howl said:

I've been following along on  WebSleuths.  Many in the this small rural LDS community in southwest Utah are devastated.  The kids, 17 to 4,  attended local public schools; the family was very involved in their local LDS ward (is that the correct term?) 

The dad seemed like a stellar guy and a good Mormon (served his mission in Brazil, undergrad degree, got married, five kids, involved in the local LDS ward (church), successful businessman,  but had lost his job as an insurance agent in the last few months or so.  Police were called to the house once, several years ago, for unknown reasons. 

So, no reports that the wife worked, he's the sole breadwinner supporting his family of 6  7 loses his job, big mortgage AND this just occurred to me.  He has a 17-year-old son  daughter who will be going on his mission in a year or two and (according to the Mormon missionary WIKI) "Missionaries are expected to pay their own expenses while on the mission, often with assistance from family."

 

He had 5 kids. The oldest three kids were girls.

He  seems like a real monster. I'm sure his wife had an excellent reason for wanting a divorce. 

7 hours ago, Howl said:

Side note: Thinking about Scott Peterson and Chris Watts. In each of those cases, there was a baby on the way and each man responded by starting a torrid affair and murdering the pregnant wife, so even though they are roughly considered family annihilators, they seem like a different category. 

In the spoiler.

Spoiler

Chris Watts killed his pregnant wife and their two daughters.

 

[PennySycamore]

@catlady,  I don't think that the YouTube video talked to John List's mother.  He murdered her as well.  Maybe they talked to his late wife's mother.  Or maybe a neighbor.

I don't believe in the afterlife, but I can guarantee you, he'd not spending his in heaven.

Edited January 13, 2023 by PennySycamore
tiny riffle

[catlady]

I guess I worded that poorly; I meant to say that the host of the episode talked with his own mother, the mother of the host.

[Bluebirdbluebell]

Here's the real reason I created this thread. Someone created a thread on Twitter (link that shows how the community and religion sugarcoat male violence, even extreme violence like these horrible murders. Trigger warning:

Spoiler

Obituary for the Utah man who fatally shot his five children, mother-in-law and estranged wife: “Michael made it a point to spend quality time with each and every one of his children. Michael enjoyed making memories with the family.”

He was a shitty father and monster his family was trying to escape. 

Thread provided link to obit.

His wife's family made a political point about gun violence.

Spoiler

And if that’s not gross enough, the wife’s family put out a statement supporting … guns: “This is the type of loss that will continue to occur in families, communities and this nation when protective arms are no longer accessible.

“It is our desire that the media turn their attention to … the great works of God that can render a forgiving heart, how religion can heal and enlarge our capacity for love, and a return to foundational principles of peace within our nation.”

Here is a link to their full statement.

Quote

And finally, the family removed the murderer’s image from their GoFundMe photo and replaced him with … white Jesus.

 

[hoipolloi]

Thank you, @Bluebirdbluebell. Just coming here to post on that Twitter thread & the murdererʻs obit.

What the fuck is wrong with people? 

[CTRLZero]

7 hours ago, Bluebirdbluebell said:

His wife's family made a political point about gun violence.

I noticed this statement about the government removing guns will make everyone unsafe, when ironically, it was the murderer (patriarch) who removed the family guns so there’d be no competition when he started his killing.  Maybe the family would have had time to defend themselves, maybe not, if more guns were in the household.  More likely there would have just been a Wild West sort of shootout with possibly more collateral victims (like neighbors and law enforcement). 

[hoipolloi]

3 hours ago, CTRLZero said:

More likely there would have just been a Wild West sort of shootout with possibly more collateral victims (like neighbors and law enforcement). 

Too many Americans are obsessed with TV & Hollywood cowboy fantasies about shootouts and dodging bullets, the latter being almost an impossibility in a time when shooters use weapons like AR-15s. 

Missed the fact that Haight removed all other weapons but his before his murdering began. Makes that obit even more disgusting.

[Howl]

I read the obit about what a great guy he was. The link to the obituary is now gone. 

Were there ZERO red flags in his public life?  I have to wonder if his stellar accomplishments and the perfect public life as a well loved citizen were a way of keeping personal demons at bay, a public mask of sorts. For whatever reason,  it was no longer working in his nuclear family life, while the public persona continued to work flawlessly.  The divorce would have destroyed that perfect public persona. 

From the family's statement:  "Protective arms were purposely removed from the home prior to the incident because all adults were properly trained to protect human life."

This oddly passive statement is doing a LOT of heavy lifting.  Trying to read between the lines: 

Who were "all adults"?

Is the implication that Haight was such a selfless guy that he voluntarily removed all weapons because he feared he might hurt his family? 

Was Haight unraveling to such an extent that someone needed to get all weapons out of the house (family/church friends/wife/who knows) and it wasn't Haight who took them as reported on social media?  Can someone confirm if reports that Haight himself removed weapons from the home is correct?

I ask because there have been some errors on social media.  For example, numerous social media posts note that Haight "lost his job" or "was fired" before the murders.  The obit (I think) states that he owned a  successful insurance agency and sold it not too long before the murders. 

What a sad, sad thing for this family and all who loved them. 

 

Edited January 15, 2023 by Howl

[CTRLZero]

34 minutes ago, Howl said:

Is the implication that Haight was such a selfless guy that he voluntarily removed all weapons because he feared he might hurt his family? 

I thought it meant that he removed the weapons so no one else would have access.  But the family’s statement is so ambiguous that it could be read in other ways.  If it was a third party, there must have been red flags.  I didn’t get the feeling from the statement that the family was pleased the guns were removed.  Who else would have taken the guns, though.  Maybe white Jesus.  🤷‍♀️  

[hoipolloi]

53 minutes ago, CTRLZero said:

Who else would have taken the guns, though.  Maybe white Jesus.  🤷‍♀️  

Or at least one of the Quorum of the Seventy. 

2 hours ago, Howl said:

Were there ZERO red flags in his public life? 

I doubt it. It often turns out that these horrific acts really don't "come out of nowhere."

[Howl]

1 hour ago, hoipolloi said:

I doubt it. It often turns out that these horrific acts really don't "come out of nowhere."

This is true, but there are also situations where the perp was extremely successful in their public/personal life, and their crime really did seem to come out of nowhere. I'm thinking of David Russell Williams in particular (WIKI here) as possibly the most extreme example.   Nobody, at least anybody who has spoken up, suspected that while he had a successful career as a colonel in the Canadian Armed Forces (pilot, then commander of the largest air base in Canada), a lovely wife and lovely life, he had

• robbed 82 homes to steal women's underwear, which he kept secreted away in his home
• raped numerous women
• moved on to rape and murder multiple women

His wife had no idea; she was devastated.  Nor did seemingly, anyone else.  The sheer amount of crime perpetrated by this guy is astonishing; the list above is the tip of the iceberg. 

I have to think that sometimes there is a completely split off aspect of the perpetrator and they somehow keep their public/family persona completely separate from whatever insane compulsions are driving them;  the successful outward life protects them from suspicion. 

 

 

Edited January 15, 2023 by Howl

[hoipolloi]

1 hour ago, Howl said:

I have to think that sometimes there is a completely split off aspect of the perpetrator and they somehow keep their public/family persona completely separate from whatever insane compulsions are driving them;  the successful outward life protects them from suspicion. 

Think youʻre right. In Haightʻs case -- where he & his family were members of a close-knit, all-encompassing LDS community -- I wonder if anyone around them was capable of seeing problems. Sadly, controlling behavior and worse might just be seen as normal. 

[Howl]

Just found this in a Daily Mail piece: "Haight removed all guns from the home prior to the alleged killings, Tausha sister Jennie Earl told The Associated Press, leaving the family 'vulnerable.'"

This, to me, makes the family's statement even weirder. 

Link to the Daily Mail article here, with the family photo and the same family photo with the photo shopped Jesus.  It is beyond utterly bizarre. 

Although an informal setting, it's a formal family photo of sorts, and I had to notice that the wife is wearing a floor length dress, and the daughters are also wearing modest  dresses.  What look like modesty panels may be Mormon garments.  Maybe just a regular, conservative Mormon family?

[Howl]

Article posted on Deseret News about the funerals and memorial service.  (Deseret News is published by a subsidiary owned by the  Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints)

Murdered Enoch family laid to rest as community mourns   Hundreds remember the loving mother, her five children, and their grandmother

The article quotes the executive director of a local nonprofit that provides help and shelter to victims of domestic violence and sexual abuse. Utah Lt. Gov. Deidre Henderson also spoke at the memorial. Her cousin was murdered in an episode of domestic violence in August.

After her cousin was murdered, Utah’s lieutenant governor is pushing for statewide domestic violence assessments

I did a quick google search "how does the LDS church deal with domestic violence" and quite a few articles popped up from 2018. 

Link to the church's Help for Victims of Abuse page HERE.   

Rob Porter -- remember him? In 2018 the Trump staff secretary was revealed to be a dangerously abusive asshole in both his previous marriages.  He is (was?) LDS.   Both of Porter’s ex-wives said that their LDS bishops encouraged them to remain married to Porter. 

Apparently, the publicity was sufficient for the church to change its policy, which now reads:  “Members should never be encouraged to remain in a home or situation that is abusive or unsafe...Church leaders should never disregard a report of abuse or counsel a member not to report criminal activity to law enforcement personnel.”

Apparently not working too well, though. 

HuffPo 2018: The Mormon Church Has A Domestic Violence Problem LDS culture and theology creates an environment where abusers can thrive.   Deepish dive into the dynamics that lead Mormon women to stay in abusive marriages and worth a read.  

Domestic Violence: What Is It and What Can We Do about It? from an LDS woman's perspective. 

Salt Lake Tribune, 2018: Mormon bishops are told to ‘believe the sisters’ when they learn of marital abuse — but they don’t always do so   

"In the past week, a number of women have shared traumatic stories of domestic abuse and of LDS bishops who failed to believe them or take action to protect them.  Much like a former White House staffer’s ex-wives, who alleged their lay LDS leaders either didn’t help them or cautioned them against hurting their husband’s career, other women say their bishops were similarly insensitive. 

They instead were told, they said, to lose weight, dress better, please their husbands more, read scriptures together, go more often to an LDS temple, fix their own behavior, repent and forgive their husbands.  Some were called liars and homewreckers. They were accused of being cold, sexually unresponsive and indifferent to their husbands’ needs. 

Despite fears for their safety, these women report being counseled to stay in dangerous relationships, preserving their marriages at all costs."

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[hoipolloi]

The Daily Mail article quotes someone who knew the family and described the murderer as follows:

Quote

 

An account from a friend of the family on social media offered some potential insight on the father-of-five's allegedly unstable mindset in the buildup to the murders, as well as his abusive behavior.

'He was a two- faced abusive monster,' the post circulating on social media from a friend of the family reads.

'My brother and sis-in-law were good friends with them for years. My brother said he was controlling, manipulative, and mentally abusive for years but no one knew how bad until recently. 

'He would demand she have dinner on the table ready when he got home. No one ate until he took the first bite. 

'If she was preparing dinner and he would call and say he wanted something else, she had to start over. 

'Once he was late coming home so she let the kids start eating. When he got home and saw them eating without him- he threw all the food on the floor and made her start dinner all over again.'

The post, which was reshared by several people close to the family, insisted that Haight 'controlled' his wife's friendships, and that days before her murder, Tausha missed an appointment with a women's crisis center. 

'She was in the process of finally working to get herself and the kids away from him when he did this,' the account further asserted.

 

If true, the murderer sounds like an absolute monster. Again, how many people outside the family saw this behavior, including their fellow church-goers? Did his family see this behavior?

[hoipolloi]

An account of Friday's (1/13) funeral for the seven victims.