John Hogan

Case record

John P. Hogan was a retired Santa Clara County sheriff's deputy and a private investigator.

The offence

Hogan shot and killed his 17-year-old daughter and three stepchildren in their Merced, California home. The estranged wife of Hogan was away from the house while the shootings occurred.

Victims

The three older children were identified as:

• Melanie Willis, 17
• Stanley Willis, 15
• Stuart Willis, 14

Hogan’s daughter was identified as Michelle Hogan, 5.

Investigation

Christine McFadden was Hogan’s ex-wife and the mother of Melanie Willis, Stanley Willis, Stuart Willis, and Michelle Hogan. She returned to the home shortly after 7 a.m. and found Hogan’s former home with Hogan’s ex-husband’s truck in the driveway. She found her elder daughter, 17-year-old Melanie Willis, dead in a hallway of the gray ranch house outside her bedroom.

McFadden then went to a neighbor’s house and called police. When she returned with deputies, she found the bodies of the three other children and Hogan.

Mark Pazin, area commander with the Merced County Sheriff's Department, said:

"Who knows what goes through people's minds when they kill their own offspring? I can't even begin to speculate what thoughts were going through his demented head," said Mark Pazin, area commander with the Merced County Sheriff's Department.

Pazin also said Hogan left an eight-to-10-page typed letter in the master bathroom. Pazin said the letter expressed Hogan’s distress over the end of his marriage to McFadden.

A Merced County Sheriff's Cmdr. Mark Pazin said:

"How else would you be able to forever hurt your ex-wife than by taking away four of her most cherished items, her children?" said Merced County Sheriff's Cmdr. Mark Pazin.

Pazin said investigators were not aware of any threats of violence.

Merced County Sheriff’s Cmdr. Mark Pazin said Hogan had left a letter and some biblical passages in the bathroom.

Arrival and discovery timeline

Timeline

• 6 a.m. — Christine McFadden set out on her morning walk with a neighbor.
• shortly after 7 a.m. — McFadden returned and found her ex-husband’s truck in the driveway and her 17-year-old daughter, Melanie Willis, dead in the hallway outside her bedroom.
• later — McFadden returned with deputies and found the bodies of Stanley Willis, Stuart Willis, and Hogan.
• yesterday afternoon — Dr. Tom Willis arrived at the crime scene.
• Wednesday afternoon — a memorial Mass took place for the children at Our Lady of Mercy School.

Arrest

There was no arrest described.

Trial

There was no trial described.

Sentencing

There was no sentencing described.

Appeals

There were no appeals described.

Outcome

Hogan was found dead in the master bedroom with his daughter, Michelle Hogan, on his lap. Both were dead. Hogan committed suicide the same day by shooting himself.

Aftermath

McFadden was described as crying inconsolably after discovering the deaths. A neighbor said:

"That poor woman -- she was just devastated," said a neighbor, who declined to give her name.

McFadden was also described as emerging from her neighbor’s home later in the morning, sitting on the edge of the sidewalk outside her home and crying inconsolably, rocking back and forth.

McFadden made a 911 call after she discovered her oldest daughter’s body. In the call, McFadden screamed to the dispatcher:

"My ex-husband has killed my children," McFadden screamed to the dispatcher, gasping and sobbing.

A retirement resolution from the county Board of Supervisors said:

"He was admired by his peers . . . . His judgment was usually sound, and his decisions were logical and appropriate."

Our Lady of Mercy School held a memorial Mass for the children. Stuart was in eighth grade there and Michelle was in preschool there. The older children also had graduated from the school, which they attended from age 3. Stuart’s class sang "Amazing Grace." Former students joined current ones and community members at the memorial Mass.

Statements about the children included:

• Coby LaMattina, Melanie’s friend, said:

  "I've cried so much I have no more tears left,"

• Principal Brenda Feehan said:

  "The three older ones had great senses of humor and a dry wit. They had great spirits of adventure."

• Principal Ralf Swenson said that Melanie, a junior at Golden Valley High School, was ranked second in her class of 467 students with an unusually high 4.5 GPA and was involved in speech and student government. The election scheduled for Friday was for vice president of next year’s senior class.
• The killings were described as shocking Our Lady of Mercy School.

Other family and background details included:

• The couple had married in late 1995.
• McFadden filed for divorce and obtained a restraining order less than three years later, claiming that her husband was verbally abusive and used foul language around the children.
• McFadden wrote:

  "My husband has a very bad temper, and when he gets angry, he explodes,"
  in her application for a restraining order in June 1998, three months after filing for divorce.

• The divorce was granted last year.
• Friends said Hogan was "extremely moody" and that he did not have a close relationship with his stepchildren but doted on his own young daughter.
• Friends said the three older children remained close to their father, Dr. Tom Willis, a Bakersfield veterinarian.
• Hogan had worked as a deputy for the Santa Clara County sheriff's office from 1983 to 1993, when he retired for an undisclosed medical reason.
• In recent years, Hogan had worked as a private investigator.

Other details

Violence in Merced County was described as including multiple murders involving children. The account listed:

• In the summer of 2000, a Delhi teenager beheaded his mother and was found sitting naked in her blood, reading the Bible.
• Three weeks earlier, an intruder with a pitchfork broke into a rural farm house and stabbed three children, killing a boy and girl and injuring one of their older sisters.
• The attacker was gunned down as he lunged at sheriff’s deputies.

The killings were described as a string of high-profile crimes involving children in Merced County, and it was said that authorities never discerned a motive for the pitchfork incident. It was also said that the Delhi beheading subject was recently found competent to stand trial.