ERIE, Pa. \u2014 Erie police say relatives described years of controlling behavior and isolation inside the family at the center of last week\u2019s mass shooting, while investigators also revealed the gun used in the killings had been involved in a previous domestic violence case.<\/p>\n
Police Chief Rick Lorah provided new details Wednesday as investigators continue piecing together what led Matthew Stone Sr., 45, to kill members of his family and two other women at a home on Perry Street before taking his own life.<\/p>\n
Family members told detectives Stone exercised significant control over his wife, Michelle Stone, their children and grandchildren, according to Lorah.<\/p>\n
Relatives said Stone controlled the family\u2019s finances, including Supplemental Security Income received for one of the children, and restricted when family members could leave the home or spend time with relatives.<\/p>\n
Police said family members described the behavior as occurring for years and becoming increasingly controlling after Michelle became pregnant with the couple\u2019s first child. Contact with extended family became more limited over time, and Michelle stopped maintaining contact with friends.<\/p>\n
Lorah also disclosed that Erie police had responded to a domestic violence incident involving Matthew and Michelle Stone in 2019.<\/p>\n
A firearm was involved in that case \u2014 the same .40-caliber handgun police say was used in Friday\u2019s homicides.<\/p>\n
At a preliminary hearing in the 2019 case, Michelle changed her original statement and the charges against Matthew Stone Sr. were withdrawn, according to Lorah.<\/p>\n
Police said no additional domestic violence incidents involving Stone were reported to the department after that case. Outside of the 2019 incident, Stone had no criminal history and was legally permitted to possess the firearm.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are still questions we cannot answer, particularly about why this happened,\u201d Lorah said, as police outlined what investigators have learned from family members, records, communications and evidence recovered from the home.<\/p>\n
The Oct. 9 shooting claimed the lives of Michelle Stone, 44; Angelina Stone, 24; Jonathan Stone, 19; Matthew Stone Jr., 21; Twila Tanner, 51; Lora Roberts, 37; a 5-year-old boy; a 22-month-old girl; and Angelina Stone\u2019s unborn child.<\/p>\n
Police previously said all of the victims had been killed before officers arrived at the Perry Street home. Matthew Stone Sr. was found dead from an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound.<\/p>\n
Investigators have not identified a definitive motive for the killings.<\/p>\n
The investigation remains ongoing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ERIE, Pa. \u2014 Erie police say relatives described years of controlling behavior and isolation inside the family at…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":307645,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[136,138,137,296],"class_list":["post-307644","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-erie","tag-erie","tag-erie-headlines","tag-erie-news","tag-local"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307644","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=307644"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307644\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/307645"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=307644"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=307644"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=307644"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}