Prosecutors say a man in Pennsylvania shot dead a couple in a homicide suicide Monday due to a snow removal dispute, the same day a major winter storm poured more than 30 inches of snow into parts of the northeast.
Jeffrey Spaide fatally shot his neighbors, James Goy, and his wife, Lisa Goy, before killing himself Monday morning when officers were called to West Bergh Street in Plains Township, about 15 miles southwest of Scranton, according to the Luzerne County District Attorney’s Office.
District Attorney Stefanie Salavantis said Tuesday that the office determines that no other suspects are involved and considers the incident a homicide-suicide. Salavantis said the office would close the case, pending a report from the office of the coroner in Lucerne.
Officers responded to a report of the shots shortly before 9 a.m. Monday when they found the bodies of the Goys on the street. Law enforcement officials said they later heard a firearm from Spaide’s home. According to prosecutors, authorities later determined it was his own gunshot wound.
Prosecutors said the Spaniards and the Goys were involved in disputes before the deadly encounter.
The video shows the Goys shoveling snow from their parking lots, pushing it across the street and throwing it on Spaide’s property. After Spaide asked the couple to stop throwing snow on his property, the neighbors got into an argument where they appeared to be exchanging obscene gestures and expressions.
Prosecutors said James Goy threatened Spaide and punched him, prompting Spaide to return to his home and return outside with a gun.
While the Goys admit he had a gun, prosecutors said they continued to shout names at him from the middle of the street. According to prosecutors, Spaide opened fire and shot the Goys before returning to his home to get another gun to deal with the murder.
After killing his neighbors, Spaide returned to his home where he shot himself when police arrived at the scene, prosecutors said.
The District Attorney’s Office in Luzerne County, the coroner’s office in Luzerne County, the rural police, the city fire and ambulance service, and the Pennsylvania State Forensic Services Unit were involved in the investigation.
These three deaths come alongside four others in the wake of the deadly winter storm that suspended flights, cut off electricity and closed schools and Covid-19 vaccination sites across the Northeast.
In Allentown, Pennsylvania, a 67-year-old woman with Alzheimer’s disease dies from hypothermia after straying from her home, NBC Philadelphia reports. Her body was found four streets away on Monday morning.
In Adamstown, Maryland, a 64-year-old man died after a recycling truck, in which he was driving in the back, overturned on an icy road at about 12 a.m., the Frederick County Sheriff said.
And two people – a 69-year-old woman and a 42-year-old woman – died Sunday in separate incidents in Pennsylvania, state police said. The 42-year-old woman died in an accident during the snowstorm in Tioga province, and the other 69-year-old crashed during slippery conditions during snow in Bucks County.
