Florida

Community Donating to Children in Home After Murder-Suicide

Since the shooting, residents in the city as well as business owners have come together to help support kids who may never look at the holidays the same

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Residents in a Florida city are stepping up to help the four children found inside of a home where three adults were found dead on Christmas Eve in what investigators are calling a murder-suicide.

The four children – all under the age of 10 – were inside the Lakeland home when 30-year-old Leighton Josephs entered and shot both 30-year-old Racheal Ramsey and 27-year-old Christopher Pine to death before during the gun on himself.

An uncle of Ramsey said at least two of the children belonged to her and are currently with their grandparents.

Since the shooting, residents in the city as well as business owners have come together to help support kids who may never look at the holidays the same – bringing holiday gifts to open and food to eat.

“It touches my heart,” William Dunn, who owns a non-profit group in the area, said to NBC affiliate WFLA-TV. “I get a lot of people that give to me so I want to give back. The community really comes together on tragic stuff like this.”

“We’re familiar with traumatic events, of course this is just horrible, but many of our boys come from those situations so we wanted to lend a helping hand,” said Dr. Joseph Davis, who runs a group home for boys that come from traumatic situations in the area.

Officials are collection donations through Thursday afternoon that will be given to the children and their families.

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