TUSCARAWAS COUNTY — A shooting reported before a graduation party in Ohio is being investigated as a ‘likely’ murder-suicide, WOIO, a CBS affiliate in Cleveland, reported.
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The Tuscarawas County Sheriff’s Office (TCSO) said deputies were called to a home in Dover Township on reports of a shooting just after 1:30 p.m. on Sunday.
A 911 caller said people were getting ready for a graduation party at the home when they heard the gunshots.
“The graduation party was for a child who resided in the home but was not in the home at the time because the party, which had not yet begun, was to be a couple of hundred yards away from the home on the property,” the sheriff’s office wrote in a release shared on social media.
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The 911 caller told dispatchers a man inside the home reportedly shot his wife and then himself.
When deputies got to the scene, they found a 54-year-old man dead on his bed and a 53-year-old woman on the floor near the bed,
The woman was transported to a nearby hospital, where she was pronounced dead.
“While there is still evidence to process and information to gather, preliminary indication suggests that Murder-suicide is the most likely cause due to evidence and witness statements at the scene,” TCSO said.
The official cause and manner of death for both the man and the woman, whose identities have not been released, have yet to be determined.
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