There are almost no occasions in which beating a spouse to death is an appropriate response. But for one father in New Hampshire who returned to find his children seemingly murdered by their mother, it kind of makes sense.
Last year, Christopher Smeltzer returned home one day to find his 4-year-old son strangled to death, his 7-year-old daughter seemingly also strangled (though she was only unconscious), and the guilty party -- his wife, Mara Pappalardo -- trying to hang herself.
Understandably, the man lost control. And what he did next may make him spend the next decade in prison. He picked up a flashlight and he beat his wife to death. Is it bad that I don't even blame him?
Beating someone to death is never the rational, intelligent way to handle a situation, but Smeltzer wasn't in his rational mind. Other reports claim he was using cocaine, which, admittedly, would make a person a bit more irrational. But even if he were completely sober, can any parent really believe they wouldn't do the same?
Putting myself in his shoes is a sickening task, but the idea that I might return home one day to find my children strangled by their father is almost too painful to bear. Would I kill him? Maybe. It's hard to say.
The rage I would feel would be unbearable. Can you imagine? No one could suggest that he was in his right mind. He had just found his tiny son cold and lifeless and the murderer was standing right in front of him. Spouse or not, it's hard to imagine a person who wouldn't do the same.
Our children are everything to us if we're good parents. I love my husband, but in that moment, I could see being so blinded by rage that good sense and love flew out the window.
This wife clearly had major, major problems. And yes, he handled it incorrectly. But who can really blame him and who can say how they would react given the same scene? I have to think that seeing my two children dead would make me want to kill, too. Was he right? No. But was he wrong? Maybe not that either.
Do you think he was wrong?
Image via labormikro/Flickr
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Comments 760
The shock, pain and outrage this man must have felt is something -- thankfully, we can't understand. My heart goes out to this man in so many ways. He will surely need mental help for the remainder of his life. Those poor, innocent children.........I can't really bring myself to feel sorry for his wife.
well i don't know what to think about this sad story, all i'm saying is that i do know myself ....I HOPE AND PRAY SOMEONE GETS THE HELP THAT THE LITTLE GIRL NEEDS SHE WILL NEED ALL SHE CAN GET..
Maybe I have too active an imagination. My first thought was "he was coming home all coked up - maybe she'd seen him coked up one too many times and had been beaten before (maybe even raped when he was high and getting aroused by beating her) and with her understandably screwed-up abused spouse thought-processes she was 'saving' herself and her children."
Yeah, time to put the murder-mystery books down.
We are all Mama Lions protecting our cubs. Clearly she was not in her right mind..did no one notice or care? Reminds me of that poor mom In texas who drowned her children. She clearly needed help..finally got on meds in prison and now has to live with the knoweldge of what she did! Sorry I digress but I have always felt sorry for her..she was sick..she loved and nurtured her children by all accounts and then snapped! This guy reacted out of horror and anger...I do understand..but he left his children with someone who was obviously "troubled" to say the least. We cannot ignore the symptoms of mental illness. depression and the like..if we do tragedies occur! I am sorry for all of them and hope the surviving child is okay and somehow as a happy life.