On the surface they seemed to be the perfect family. Sam Friedlander, 50, of Cross River, New York was an attorney and proud father to two children. His wife Amy, 46, grew up in Penn Wynn, Montgomery County and earned an MBA from the University of Pennsylvania. She was formerly the vice president for Chase Manhattan Bank as well as a partner at a college tutoring program.
But sometime between Monday and Tuesday, police say Sam snapped. According to investigators, he shot his 8-year-old son Gregory and 10-year-old daughter Molly in their torsos as they slept in their beds. They then say he bludgeoned Amy to death with a piece of furniture in their bedroom before turning the shotgun on himself in the basement. The bodies were discovered Tuesday afternoon by a state trooper after someone at Sam’s office called out of concern when he didn’t show up for work.
Investigators say the couple was in the midst of a divorce and that the Friedlanders had a court date scheduled this week. Friends of Sam say that Amy was emotionally abusive toward her husband and that the couple had been sleeping in different rooms.
“We knew about the stresses the family was experiencing, the house was for sale, there was a divorce in the works and we knew that they had financial difficulties,” said the family’s rabbi Carla Friedman.
While people close to Friedlander told authorities he was acting irrationally in recent weeks, they are still shocked by the violent crime.
"He was always out on the front lawn building forts and always out there playing with them,” said the family’s neighbor Michelle Dienst. “It’s just hard to believe.”
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