The Cheshire Murders

1

Cheshire Emergency.

My name is Mary Lyons,

I'm the banking center manager.

We have a lady who is

in our bank right now

who says that her

husband and children

are being held at their house.

The people are in a car

outside the bank.

She is getting $15,000

to bring out to them.

That if the police are told, they will

kill the children and the husband.

Her name is Jennifer Petit.

P-e-t-i-t.

Okay.

Is she still in the bank?

Yes, she is.

Okay.

She's being held...

- Her husband...

- Husband and family is being held?

- Yes.

- At their house?

Yes. They're tied up.

She said they drove her here.

I'm trying to look

and see where she's gone.

She went outside, but I don't...

Oh, wait, I see her walking now.

She is petrified.

Again, facts like that I

can't comment on. Okay.

And a male survivor.

Upon arrival at

the victims' residence,

the first officer observed

two male subjects

exit private residence

and also observed

the private residence

fully engulfed in flame.

The suspect vehicle rammed the

Cheshire police officer's car

and continued

on Sorghum Mill Road.

Tonight, police removed

the body of one of the victims

after a home invasion leaves a

mother and her two daughters dead.

The suspects,

26-year-old Joshua

Komisarjevsky of Cheshire

and 44-year-old

Steven Hayes of Winsted

were caught while trying

to escape in the Petits' car.

Now, the only question

remains that why

did this happen

to the Petit family?

There's not one word that I

can use to describe our town,

but it's a phenomenal town.

It's known as the

bedding capital of Connecticut,

for bedding plants.

It was historically a farming

community. A lot of family farms...

And, as the state

of Connecticut grew,

as the cities surrounding

the town of Cheshire grew,

it ultimately became

a bedroom community,

which I think is the, uh, probably the

way most people think of Cheshire.

Returning now

to tonight's top story.

A mother and her

two daughters are dead,

their father severely injured,

after a home invasion

stunned the town of Cheshire.

The suspects

apparently set the house on fire

as well as some of the victims.

Jennifer Petit,

her cause of death

has been asphyxiation

from strangulation.

Her daughters Hayley and Michaela

died from smoke inhalation.

I got a phone

call here on Monday afternoon

from Billy's sister,

and I said, "Hannah, it's

about the girls, isn't it?"

And she said,

"These two men came in

"at what they think was

3:
00 in the morning

"and they beat Billy really

badly with a baseball bat

"and his head's all split apart,

"and then they proceeded to do

"all these awful things

to the girls,

"and they tied them

to their beds."

"About 9:
00, Jen was made

to go to the bank

"and withdraw money

"and then when she came

back from the bank,

"they set the house on fire

and killed them all

"so that they could try to cover

up their tracks, I guess,"

"but they got the two guys."

And all I could think was, "Who

cares if they got the two guys?

"We don't have our

loved ones anymore,"

"and that's all we had."

Wild Lingonberry. Have

you ever had that?

Lingonberry?

It's from England, somewhere.

The hardest thing I think

I've ever had to do in my life

was to tell my parents that

one of their other children,

their only other child,

was dead,

and their two grandchildren,

two of their four.

She quickly told

us that the home was set on fire,

but Bill escaped.

We went to the hospital and got

to see Bill for the first time.

He was badly beaten

and he tried to apologize to

us for not saving our daughter

and our grandchildren.

And we had to convince him that

he was in no condition

to be able to save anyone

and we were grateful...

That he was alive.

That he was alive.

This is the last sort of

picture that we had together.

My sister...

She was beautiful.

And she was usually, like, the

lead in the plays at school.

She was on the homecoming court.

She was captain of

the Trojanette team.

So she really was kind

of like a winner person.

Bill was a

committed, dedicated doctor.

Would leave at, uh,

7:
00 in the morning

and not be back home

until maybe 9:
00, 9:30.

When Jen was diagnosed

with multiple sclerosis,

Hayley really wanted

to raise money because

she felt like if she didn't do anything,

it was possible that her mother could die.

Hayley was able

to raise a little over $50,000

being a spokesperson for the MS

Society here in Connecticut,

receiving awards for that,

although you'd never know it.

I hardly

knew about Hayley helping with MS,

and that was just because she was

just so quiet about everything.

She could have bragged

about everything she did,

I mean, she was

a straight "A" student.

I think about her all the time.

It's hard not

to think about her.

You'll find just something

to relate to her about.

Michaela sometimes

shied away from adults,

but if she saw somebody

was having a difficult time,

she went to them and tried to

help with whatever she could.

Their lives

were just centered around

a sense of sociability,

uh, justice.

And if I didn't smile about

it, I'd have to cry.

Apparently,

these two losers followed.

Jennifer Hawke-Petit

and her 11-year-old daughter

to the Stop and Shop

on Sunday night.

They followed them.

And the first Cheshire police

officer to arrive at the scene

heard at least one of the girls

screaming from inside the house.

Those animals, what they did

to those poor people

of Cheshire,

I can't even believe that they're

gonna give them a trial.

What kind of laws do

we have in this state

where they don't just

execute those animals?

Well, Tony, the reaction

by the public certainly

is for that, but it is...

To destroy a family

the way those two did...

Heinous.

My verdict?

Fry 'em.

Hang 'em.

Do whatever you gotta do.

Make sure they ain't

gonna walk this earth again.

Can we switch?

Yup.

You need more?

Yeah. I'm gonna need more.

I don't think evil like this has

happened since In Cold Blood.

I really don't.

Not that I know of.

And we went from being a quiet, peaceful

town in New England to, overnight,

people installing alarm systems and

panic buttons and panic rooms.

People in town refer

to it as Cheshire's 9/11.

You know, life was one way

and then it's another.

God has promised to be with

us through thick and through thin.

All other ground

is indeed sinking sand.

Well, first of all, uh...

Thank you.

For all coming out today to

honor the memory of the girls.

I'd really like to

say thank you to

people from all over the state of

Connecticut and all over the country.

We've been

surrounded with love and

cards and flowers and prayer

from east to west

and north to south.

I met Jen at, uh, Children's

Hospital in Pittsburgh.

Before med.

She was a new nurse

and I was the know-it-all

third-year medical student.

I was trying to correct Jen

on how to take blood pressure

the correct way.

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