The suspect in the Newton, Massachusetts, weekend slayings of a couple celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary and the mother of the 97-year-old woman has finally been placed under arrest, authorities said.
Middlesex District Attorney Marian Ryan said police have detained Christopher Ferguson and charged him with killing 73-year-old Gilda “Jill” D’Amore after an autopsy revealed her death a homicide. Ferguson was also charged with two counts of assault and battery with a dangerous weapon causing grievous bodily injury and robbery.
Additional charges in the death of Bruno D’Amore, 74, and his mother-in-law, Lucia Arpino, are expected after those autopsies are completed. Ferguson was expected to appear in court on Tuesday. It was not immediately clear if he had an attorney who could comment on his behalf.
The victims and the suspect live in Newton, but Ryan said there appeared to be no connection between them.
Here’s a closer look at the series of events that led investigators to Ferguson, as described by Ryan Monday night:
- At approximately 10:14 a.m. Sunday morning, Newton police received a call after a close friend and neighbor of the victims entered the home on Broadway in Newton. She was concerned as the couple planned to renew their wedding vows on the occasion of their 50th anniversary. When they didn’t arrive for the service, the friend went back to the house to see what was holding them up.
- When she entered the home, the friend found all three residents with serious injuries and called 911. The individuals were pronounced dead at the home at 10:20 a.m.
- All three victims suffered apparent stab wounds and blunt force trauma. Jill D’Amore sustained more than 30 stab and blunt force traumatic injuries, primarily to the upper body and head.
- There were obvious signs of a struggle in one of the rooms in the house, including broken furniture and a glass paperweight covered in blood. A knife with reddish-brown stains was found in the kitchen.
- The police also discovered evidence of a forced entry in the basement. One of the windows was open and several of the other windows had their screens torn off and removed. The garage door, which was at the back of the house, was also open, and near that door was one of the screens that had been torn from a cellar window.
- Forensic specialists processed the floor outside the bedroom where the fight had taken place. The surface of that floor was a ceramic tile. They processed that floor with Leukocrystal Violet, a chemical known as LCV that can be used to identify bloodstains that aren’t visible.
- Having done so, investigators were able to find bloody footprints on the tile floor in the hallway. Like fingerprints, the skin on people’s feet is unique and leaves a comparable impression. Investigators were able to collect several of those footprints.
- They also observed bloodstains, passive droplets consistent with blood dripping from an object near those prints, and were also able to recover what they hope are multiple fingerprints that may match the screens and windows that were removed.
- Police were able to obtain video of the area of 455 Albemarle Road, which is about 4/10 of a mile from the Broadway home and about 100 yards from what investigators believe is Ferguson’s Washington Street home. The video shows that around 5:20 a.m. Sunday, a man without a shirt or shoes was walking unsteadily.
- Several officers, when shown that video, were able to identify the individual depicted in the video as Ferguson, whom they knew.
- Late Monday afternoon, the lab was able to match one of the prints taken from the hallway tile floor in the Broadway house to an impression taken from Ferguson. That was what led to obtaining the arrest warrant against him.
Ryan said the above details represent only “a brief summary of what has really been tireless work” by Newton police, state police and members of the district attorney’s office.
“I don’t think any of us who were here yesterday and found out about the family reunion at church, waiting to celebrate a very happy occasion, without dear family members showing up, and then learning about the deaths, didn’t have a sense of the great tragedy and loss that occurred,” he said. “And this kind of work, this kind of really dogged evidence-gathering and prosecution in this short amount of time in an attempt both to determine what happened to these family members and to restore a sense of safety to members of the family. community”.
The Associated Press contributed to this article.
