US: Children find mom, dad dead

Four children returned from school to find found their parents dead in an apparent murder-suicide, police said. A law enforcement official said a reason for the deaths was not known, the New York Daily News reported Wednesday. Investigators said the father, Thomas Hayes, greeted his 13-year-old at the front door Tuesday afternoon and told her to go pick up her siblings at school. When they returned to their Long Island home, "the door was locked, and they walked around to the rear," where they saw their mother, Sherrelle, "apparently dead on the [kitchen] floor, Nassau Deputy Inspector Kenneth Lack said. On the rear door was a note apparently left by the father that asked that emergency services be called because the parents either needed help or were sick, Lack said, paraphrasing the note. Police found the father's body upstairs. Newsday reported the father stabbed the mother then hanged himself. Authorities did not speculate on a motive, although the man's lawyer told media his client was depressed after being convicted for stealing property he thought was abandoned while working as a union fire inspector.