5 in family shot dead in murder, suicide

A FAMILY of five, including three children, were found shot dead in what appears to be a murder-suicide in the state of Pennsylvania, local media reported.

Police in the town of Sinking Spring – some 80 kilometres (50 miles) from Philadelphia – were searching the suburban home where the bodies were found, the local Reading Eagle newspaper said.

District attorney John Adams identified the dead as Mark Short, his wife, Megan, and their children Liana, Mark and Willow, the Eagle reported.

All died of gunshot wounds, Mr Adams told the paper.

Although the ages were not released, the youngest child was reportedly under the age of three. The family was profiled in an October 2014 article in the Reading Eagle because Willow, then five months old, had undergone a heart transplant when she was just one week old.

The shooting took place around 3:30pm on August 6.

It added that distraught family members hugged each other as they gathered outside the home waiting for news. –