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A murder-suicide is always a tragedy.
But when Kynath William Terry Jr. allegedly marched into the hospital maternity ward and murdered his wife and then himself, he also created an orphan — and two grieving families.
This is a senseless horror.
Families are scrambling to explain what happened. And the hospital is looking into preventing this from ever happening again.
On Sunday, March 1, a horrific shooting took place at Homewood, Alabama’s Brookwood Hospital.
The victim was a patient at the hospital’s Women’s Center.
24-year-old Precious Johnson had just given birth. She was the victim, police say, of a murder.
She was the only victim. But she was not the only target of gunfire.
Authorities report that her husband, 19-year-old Kynath William Terry Jr., also died — having shot his wife multiple times before turning his weapon on himself.
Hospital maternity wards are not necessarily common sites for a murder-suicide.
However, it appears that the couple had been having marital difficulties.
Johnson reportedly did not want her husband or in-laws present for the delivery.
It reportedly came to a surprise to the aforementioned in-laws that Kynath was violent.
Similarly, it is unclear if this murder-suicide was the first incidence of violence or simply the final escalation. In most cases (about 75%) of spousal murder-suicides, it is the latter.
Naturally, in addition to grieving (and bewildered) family members and loved ones, a man shooting his wife multiple times and then killing himself has shaken the hospital.
Danne Howard is the president of the Alabama Hospital Association.
She spoke to multiple outlets, including WVTM and WBRC, following this senseless act of violence.
“There are a few places in our world where we should feel safe — at church, our hospitals, and our homes,” Howard told WBRC.
“Unfortunately, things happen and we do not feel safe anymore,” she acknowledged.
“We want to assure the public that our hospitals and our health care providers consider safety just as important as providing quality health care,” Howard emphasized.
WVTM conducted a walkthrough of the hospital’s maternity area the day after the shooting.
The reporter and camera operator were not stopped or challenged during their route, despite the presumably heightened sense of alert.
It is possible or even likely that a reporter with a camera operator were noticed but not flagged as suspicious amidst a breaking news story. (That, in and of itself, can be a security concern.)
We can also point out that a casual walkthrough will likely become more difficult in the future, as a direct result of this unthinkable crime.
Additionally, maternity ward murder-suicides are generally less likely to spawn copycats than other forms of shootings.
The terror of murdering your partner is different than the terror of slaughtering a room full of strangers, even if the two crimes famously overlap at times.
People who murder their partners are often motivated by a sudden change or loss of control, coupled with a fear of how their image or reputation will change.
Was Johnson planning to leave her husband? Had she already left?
Perhaps the investigation will turn up answers. For now, we’re heartbroken for her, her newborn, and for her entire family that she was unable to leave that marriage alive.
