35-year-old former Mormon missionary Lance Buckley, was discovered dead along with his wife and two young daughters, a year-and-a-half after he went missing 11 days after the birth of his second child,
The Stafford County Sheriff’s Office in Virginia said in a statement cited by Fox 5 D.C. that Buckley, his 30-year-old wife, Amy, their 5-year-old daughter, Claire, and 17-month-old daughter, Abigail, were found dead inside a home last Thursday in the Windsor Forest subdivision in the northwestern part of the county.
Earlier that day, authorities said they received a 911 call from a man identifying himself as Lance Buckley reporting a murder-suicide at their family’s home who then hung up the phone. Stafford County sheriff deputies later found the lifeless bodies of the family members on their arrival at the home.
On Monday, Arkuie Williams, state administrator for the chief medical examiner, told the Richmond Times-Dispatch that Lance Buckley’s death was a suicide, while the deaths of his wife and daughters were classified as homicides.
The family lived with Lance Buckley’s parents, who owned the home on Wilderness Court, according to The Free Lance-Star. It was unclear where Buckley’s parents were at the time of the tragedy.
Buckley went missing for three days in May last year after he caught a ride to Howard University in Washington, where he was enrolled in a Ph.D. program. His family thought he was graduating a few days later, but he did not.