Deputies from the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office in Florida watched in horror Wednesday as their colleague Terry Strawn (right) — alleged to have just murdered his wife, child and grandchild — ignored their pleas to put down his gun and shot himself to death.
Strawn himself had summoned the three deputies to the gruesome scene in front of the local high school, where he’d been detailed as a school resource officer, calling into the department at 6:42 AM to say that he’d killed three family members, The National ENQUIRER has learned.
According to the HCSO, the 58-year-old deputy began his killing spree at his home in nearby Plant City, Fla., where gunned down his wife, Theresa Strawn (left), 54, and their granddaughter, Londyn Strawn, 6.
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He then drove to daughter Courtney Strawn’s house and shot her to death, according to Sheriff Chad Chronister.
“Our deputy, at approximately 6:42 this morning, came on air — came on the communications channel — and advised that he had emergency traffic,” Sheriff Chronister said at a Wednesday press conference.
“He went on to say he had killed his wife and granddaughter. He said that he also went over to his daughter’s house and killed his daughter.”
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Despite efforts by dispatchers and deputies who arrived on the scene “to try and convince him that suicide was not the answer,” the sheriff said, he took his own life with his service revolver, which officials described as the same weapon he’d used in the prior killings.
“I wanted to say how saddened and disheartened I am by the actions of this deputy and the senseless loss of these innocent lives,” Chronister told reporters.
Strawn, the department’s “Deputy of the Year” in 2009 according to the Associated Press but, in the emergency dispatch call that preceded his suicide, told the supervisor on the line that he’s faced financial and health problems that had led to his a desperate state, according to Chronister.
