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A family photo album and a Bible both remarkably survived after multiple fires were set in a house where a twisted family member killed his eight relatives.
“If that doesn’t make you think something higher is involved,” Interim Yellowstone County Sheriff Kent O’Donnell said as he addressed the media following Sunday’s tragic events at a house just outside Billings, Montana.
Sheriff O’Donnell described how one of his deputies was sifting through the ashes of the destroyed house when he came across the “largely intact” family photo album and Bible belonging to homeowner Barbara Smith.
Smith, 72, and her 73-year-old husband, Dana, were having dinner at the house with their blended family when, deputies believe, their son, Alan Smith, 44, who had recently been kicked out, came to the property and started shooting, Sheriff O’Donnell said.
The killer is believed to have arrived at the house around 5:50 p.m. local time, and neighbors reported hearing a sound “like fireworks” 10 minutes later.
At 6:01 p.m., a female inside the house called 911, telling the dispatcher that people were hurt, as gunshots could be heard in the background, said Sheriff O’Donnell.
English (US)