Suicide note in Addison family tragedy reveals financial woes

Thomas Mangiantini wrote "tell my family I love them" shortly before killing his wife, two sons and himself in their Addison home, a source who saw the suicide note revealed.

Nearly four months after the family tragedy, the Daily Herald obtained the contents of the 126-word handwritten note that police found in Mangiantini's pants pocket while investigating the Nov. 25 shootings.

In the note, an apologetic Mangiantini describes the family's dire financial problems. Mangiantini said he and his wife lacked college degrees, technological training, and he complained about their dwindling insurance coverage.

"Depressed," the 48-year-old man wrote, "more every day. Rock bottom. Can't sleep. Can't eat. Losing weight rapidly. No job future. Who will support the kids? We can't. I won't let them suffer. God help us. I'm in a corner with no way out. I'm sorry."

The man's hours at work recently had been cut back, and his wife lost her job months earlier. The morning before Thanksgiving Day, police rushed to the 200 block of South Wisconsin Avenue in Addison after Mangiantini's wife, Elizabeth, 46, frantically called 911 before sounds of gunfire rang in the background.

Officers arrived within minutes. They found the slain woman, fatally shot once in the head. The couple's two boys - 12-year-old Angelo and Tommy Jr., 8 - were found with fatal head wounds, lying in their beds in a shared upstairs room. Police suspect the children were asleep when shot because neither had defensive wounds. Thomas Mangiantini sustained a single gunshot wound in his mouth.

The violence came less than six months after another suburban father, Kevin Finnerty, ignited his Arlington Heights house in a blaze that killed him, his wife and their son. Two other children survived.

Each case is unique, but some common elements, such as a psychotic break, triggered by overwhelming financial, marital or untreated depression issues, can conspire to produce a shocking crime. A homicidal parent often is motivated by the desire to alleviate their child's real or imagined suffering, experts have found.

Dr. Phillip Resnick, director of forensic psychiatry at Case Western School of Medicine in Cleveland, is widely regarded as the nation's leading expert on the topic. He said Mangiantini's words fit the classic profile of a severely depressed individual.

Resnick said these extreme family tragedies rarely are the result of an impulsive act and, in 95 percent of the cases, the man is the perpetrator.

"Fathers have a proprietary sense of ownership of their family, and if they feel they've failed, due to severe depression or unemployment, they may feel they don't want to subject the whole family to that humiliation," Resnick said.

"In (Mangiantini's) depression, he cannot conceive of asking for help. He has tunnel vision and sees it as a hopeless situation without any other way out."

At the family's request, Addison police have not released the note to the public. Chief Timothy "Bill" Hayden said Wednesday police are having the note analyzed by a handwriting expert to ensure its authenticity, though little doubt exists Thomas Mangiantini was its author.

"Tell my family no services for me," Mangiantini wrote. "Feed me to the coyotes. I will rot in hell for this. I have no choice. Life will go on."

He ends with: "Tell my family I love them."

More than 600 mourners attended a joint service for the well-known family, active in community schools and sports. Grown men wept. Parents hugged their children tight. Teachers, classmates, neighbors, police officers and even strangers prayed, sang and tried to comfort the couple's families. In moments of amazing strength and grace, Elizabeth Mangiantini's parents and siblings embraced Thomas's family and spoke with love of the man they knew since the couple married in 1991.