Police investigating grisly Calgary murder scene
- Thread starter Praxius
- Start date
I've been reading all about this since it happened, and the whole "mental health" angle is making me gag. Sure he was mental, just like all the other men that murder their wives and children. They're called family annihilators and they murder their families because they can't handle the responsibilities they've undertaken. What man who murders his family isn't mentally ill? What man who murders his family isn't just a murderer, when it comes down to it.
From his colleagues at work "
But Lall's boss at a Calgary architectural firm said there were no outward signs that anything was wrong.
"I saw (him) on Friday afternoon last week before the weekend and ... we had a very enjoyable end-of-the-week conversation about what we each were going to be doing on the weekend with our families, and about dinner reservations at restaurants that he was hopeful to make," Rob Adamson of the architectural firm Cohos Evamy said Friday.
"It was a total surprise to me that there's allegations or suggestions that Joshua had some significant mental health issues."
He said there were no indications from any of the other 175 employees that anything was wrong."
I know all the people that are quoted describing Josh Lall, although I didn't know Josh. If there were no outward signs, then Josh was doing a pretty good job of hiding the fact that he was having difficulties with his responsibilities. Apparently he was sane enough to do that.
Looking at the timeline, I also have difficulties believing this was some sort of "instant breakdown". Amber was in Banff until Tuesday evening. Josh took the week off work. He carefully planned the murder of Amber first, thereby ensuring that she couldn't help his wife. Then he murdered his wife so she couldn't help the children. Then he murdered the defenseless children. If he was delusional and irrational, he wouldn't have waited for Amber to return from Banff, he wouldn't have gone downstairs to her apartment to murder her first. Everything about this screams planned murder rather than sudden mental break.
All the talk about the golden boy who always was the best makes me think that this golden boy was afraid he was going to fall off his pedestal and he couldn't bear the imagined shame. He's a complete loser, murderer, pathetic excuse for a man ... but that's just my opinion.
And furthermore, sure the exams are difficult, but not that difficult. If it was that much of a big deal, he could have delayed taking them until a later time, as there is no deadline for them.
I don't think so. Scott Peterson did the very same thing, and he was described with the very same words. Scott was helpful, successful, always willing to put others ahead of him, everyone that knew him from school and university spoke highly of him, he was intelligent ... just another golden boy that couldn't handle it. If we stop looking at Josh as a great guy, and see him as a man that murdered not only his family, but the other person in the house that could have helped, we see a carefully planned, premeditated murder. He was obviously suicidal ... since he committed suicide ... but he was not going to do it alone, he was selfish and arrogant enough to think that he should take everyone with him.
I couldn't help but think that something more had come out within the family. The instant I heard he waited for the tenant to come home, and killed her first, my mind screamed 'affair'. He killed everyone who could have 'known' what it was that set him off, and left the baby to live, because she didn't know whatever it was that set him off. Just my gut reaction from the order of it.
I don't think there was an affair. I think he was overwhelmed by the financial responsibilities, his optional impending exams for professional accreditation, and meeting the expectations of those around him. He didn't want to fail at anything because, based on what everyone is saying about him, he'd never failed at anything in his life. What's really bugging me is that everyone is putting this down as "he had a breakdown", so we should feel sorry for this amazing guy that snapped. He wasn't an amazing guy if the solution to his problem was murdering his family and Amber Bowerman. As an occupational therapist he was well aware of mental health options, and he certainly had coverage through work for counseling if he needed it. This guy made a choice, and that choice seems to include calling dad and claiming that he was hearing voices. That, to me, looks like a ruse ... that he had already mapped out what he planned to do, he arranged for his parents to arrive after the murders to collect his youngest daughter, he gave the world an excuse for his actions (hearing voices), and then he annihilated his family. He didn't murder them while Amber was away, and leave Amber to report the murders, he waited for her to be home so the murders could be left undiscovered until his parents arrived on Wednesday evening. Killing himself in the baby's room is sick, but I bet he had some idea about his parents finding him dead and the baby alive ... like a happy moment in all the tragedy.
I doubt any of us can really understand what goes through a person's head when they're in the mindset to kill in any circumstance other than self defense - especially when it's their loved ones. The price of true understanding would be far too high: we'd have to walk in their shoes, feel what they feel, conclude what they conclude.
I've wondered if we don't all have the hidden (even to ourselves) capacity to commit such atrocities - what is that horrible trigger that takes an apparently once normal functioning person to such an unimaginably heinous place in their head? Is it something they're predisposed to? Is it a cumulative thing that could happen to any one of us given the same set of circumstances?
I've been wondering about that poor little baby too - will she be raised by family? Will she be forever imprinted with the knowledge of what happened to her parents and siblings?
These tragedies are never over when the media packs up and migrates to the next tragedy... this incident will envelope this family for a lifetime - several lifetimes probably.
It horrifies, it boggles. Ultimately all we can do is send our most compassionate heartfelt wishes for healing for the family members left behind. :-
--(
I've wondered if we don't all have the hidden (even to ourselves) capacity to commit such atrocities - what is that horrible trigger that takes an apparently once normal functioning person to such an unimaginably heinous place in their head? Is it something they're predisposed to? Is it a cumulative thing that could happen to any one of us given the same set of circumstances?
I've been wondering about that poor little baby too - will she be raised by family? Will she be forever imprinted with the knowledge of what happened to her parents and siblings?
These tragedies are never over when the media packs up and migrates to the next tragedy... this incident will envelope this family for a lifetime - several lifetimes probably.
It horrifies, it boggles. Ultimately all we can do is send our most compassionate heartfelt wishes for healing for the family members left behind. :-
--(
I doubt any of us can really understand what goes through a person's head when they're in the mindset to kill in any circumstance other than self defense - especially when it's their loved ones. The price of true understanding would be far too high: we'd have to walk in their shoes, feel what they feel, conclude what they conclude.
I've wondered if we don't all have the hidden (even to ourselves) capacity to commit such atrocities - what is that horrible trigger that takes an apparently once normal functioning person to such an unimaginably heinous place in their head? Is it something they're predisposed to? Is it a cumulative thing that could happen to any one of us given the same set of circumstances?
I've been wondering about that poor little baby too - will she be raised by family? Will she be forever imprinted with the knowledge of what happened to her parents and siblings?
These tragedies are never over when the media packs up and migrates to the next tragedy... this incident will envelope this family for a lifetime - several lifetimes probably.
It horrifies, it boggles. Ultimately all we can do is send our most compassionate heartfelt wishes for healing for the family members left behind. :-
I don't know about it being all that difficult to understand ... Josh was suicidal, but he wasn't going to let his family go on without him, so he killed them too. End of story. Well, not exactly, he had to wait for Amber to come home and murder her first because if she came home after everyone (except Anna) was stabbed, there was a slight possibility that someone could have survived. I see this as a very selfish, arrogant act by a man that thought his family would be better off dead than without him. He apparently had some strong religious beliefs, so it's quite possible he believed in an afterlife where murderers and people that commit suicide are re-united with their family in heaven.
I think it goes a bit deeper then just some religious issue, as there have been friends/family who have reported that days prior to this occuring, he was apparently hearing voices and all that good stuff, he claimed to his father that he was having a nervous breakdown..... so to me this sums up to an untreated mental condition that might have very well kicked into full swing faster then anybody could have known and thus, there was little time to treat it.... since his parents were getting ready to fly to see him when this all occured. Religion might have had something to do with the way he reacted to this mental condition that occured, but religion didn't create it.
Added:
And if you want to link it or direct it to Religion being responsible, then you're going to get into some muddy water in regards to what created those voices and who's voices he was hearing.... which get's more into a religious debate.
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I don't think there is any rational explanation for this debacle. The guy went completely friggin looney. The stories his neighbors tell about how wonderful the guy was, was obviously a bloody charade that could no longer be maintained by the killer when he finally broke and slaughtered everyone close to him. Leaving Anna alive was just one more thing about the total chaos that was his mind in his final minutes.
Unless the child was protected by the mother, which the autopsy reports claim (She had injuries which could be related to defending someone) and perhaps he might have figured he already killed the child (thereby the child was roaming around the house alone.)
I have another therory but I'll leave that one for now.
I don't believe for a moment that religion was behind this. This guy was a family annihilator, the kind of guy that decides he can't handle what he's undertaken, so he will chose suicide. He also sounds like a control freak ... 3 and 5 year old daughters were not allowed to play with Barbie dolls because of the image they portray (and here I thought they were dolls that our imaginations controlled), children were on a strict schedule (posted on the the fridge) of 30 and 60 minute activities all day every day, and there's probably a whole lot more. That info came from the 23 year old babysitter.
I think this guy needed money and, in order to have the big salary increase, he needed to complete his accreditation exams. I also think that he wasn't ready for those exams and, although he had no barriers to delaying them, he had to be Mr Perfect in his mind and the eyes of those close to him. In his mind, he had to outshine the cream of the crop that graduate from the faculty. It wasn't enough to be in that small, accomplished, professional community, but he wanted to be better than all of them by trying to overachieve. He couldn't do it, and that was too much for him ... so suicide was his choice. As the control freak that he probably was, he decided that his family would not adhere to his strict rules without him, so they were going with him.
I think he was a selfish, arrogant, pathetic excuse of a human ... and I don't believe a word about hearing voices. The only voice he heard were his own thoughts telling him that he'd rather commit suicide than not be better than everyone, and what better way to make sure the family follows his wishes than to kill them too. I understand that Anna will be adopted by family, and I sure hope it isn't his family.
He also asked his boss what the future held for him ... leadership was the answer. Should have sounded good to him, but I guess he wanted instant everything and working his way up through the ranks was beneath him.
I think I read somewhere that the killer was found in the baby's room, dead, and the baby was lying in her crib. The rest of the family was found in the master bedroom.
I interpreted Anna being left behind as his gift to his parents. I think he was rational enough to wait for Amber to come home, to stab her in the back, murder her first, go upstairs where his wife was probably preparing the children for bed, stab mom to death, and then stab his daughters. Timing was crucial in successfully completing the murders, and he timed it pretty good so no one could escape or report it. I can't imagine the horror the children would have experienced knowing that their dad was so strict, and then being stabbed to death by him. Anyway, he killed himself in Anna's room and reasonably expected that his parents would be the first to arrive at the scene the following evening. I think the voices thing (which weren't present on Friday) was the excuse he gave to his parents so they could describe him as mentally ill rather than a vicious, loser, family annihilator. Does Joshua Lall actually expect us to believe that he had a sudden onset of rage filled, crazed, imaginary voices, violent schitzophrenia at the age of 34 with no prior indications or affect? He worked with well educated professionals, most of whom have at least 2 university degrees ... and we're supposed to believe the guy was going off the deep end and not one person noticed? He under estimates everyone if he thinks we should believe that.
Anna was in the crib, Josh was on the floor next to the crib. Mom had defensive wounds from trying to protect her 3 and 5 year old daughters in the master bedroom. All three were found there, on the second floor ... no way out.