American Police have charged a 23-year-old man in connection with a "senseless" killing spree that left seven people dead, including the suspect's girlfriend and her five young children.
Adam Moss will be formally arraigned today and charged with the murders of Leticia Aguilar, her five children and a Sioux City businessman, police chief Joe Frisbee said.
Moss was arrested shortly before midday yesterday after a massive manhunt sparked by the gruesome discovery of Moss's alleged victims.
The bodies of Aguilar, and her children Claudia, Zack, Larry, Lisa, and Michael, were found on Thursday by the family's babysitter Donna Stabile. None of the children were fathered by Moss.
Just half an hour earlier police had been called to the home of businessman Ronald Fish across town after a co-worker, concerned about the 58-year-old's absence from work, stumbled on his body after going to his home to check up on him.
Police do not believe the two sets of victims knew each other.
Frisbie said the only common denominator was Moss, who in addition to dating Aguilar, had for some years been a friend of Fish, who owns a tire company in the small Iowa town.
Police were unable to say what drove Moss to commit the massacre.
The victims died "absolutely senseless deaths," said Frisbie, although he would he not comment on the manner of their deaths, except to say they were "extremely brutal."
The slayings were some of "the most heinous brutal homicides I have ever witnessed," Frisbie told reporters, adding that officers who witnessed the grisly crime scenes would be offered "stress evaluation," and counseling.
Authorities think Aguilar, 31, and her children, who range in age from five to 12, were killed last Tuesday. A truant officer for the Sioux City Community School District had attempted to contact the family on Tuesday without any success.
Once the police identified their suspect, they launched a massive manhunt for him finally cornering him at a site they had under surveillance.
"It's just been a white knuckle ride all night long," said Frisbie, at a press conference Friday afternoon. "We obviously had a very dangerous situation in this community."
The 23-year-old has a police record dating back to 1994 and just last Thursday, Moss's brother Jason was granted a permanent order of protection against his sibling after Adam Moss threatened him.
The massacre has shaken this small town on the Iowa, Nebraska border in the US Midwest, with its population of some 85,000.
It comes just a day after police in California nabbed a 27-year-old Ukrainian immigrant suspected of carrying out a violent rampage in Sacramento 10 days ago in which his pregnant wife, son and four other members of his family died.
After 10 days on the run, Nicolay Soltys was captured Thursday hiding under a desk in the backyard of his mother's home.
AFP