NEW YORK _ The bodies of a U.S. Air Force servicewoman and her two small kids were found inside their smoke-filled Staten Island home in an apparent triple murder, with her husband taken into custody Saturday while wandering the streets of Brooklyn, police said.
A concerned friend of the mom walked into the grisly scene after arriving to check on the family around 10:30 a.m., only to find the front door wide open and the victims inside, police sources said. Cops responded to the two-story house on a dead-end street to discover a small fire burning and the bodies of the slain family members all together in the same bedroom _ but no sign of the father, who was also in the Air Force.
A 3-year-old boy and his 2-year-old sister were possibly drowned in the home's tub and then carried into the room where their mother's lifeless body was found with severe injuries to her head and face, sources said. Cops responded to the address once before on a domestic incident, although it was unclear if any violence was involved.
"The medical examiner will determine the cause of death," said NYPD Assistant Chief Kenneth Corey at an afternoon news conference. "However, we are treating this as a homicide investigation."
Both husband and wife were assigned to Fort Hamilton in Brooklyn, sources said. Cops were questioning the father Saturday afternoon, although no charges were yet filed.
A friend of the mom, standing alongside another woman in military garb outside the home on Palisade Street, remembered the victim as "a beautiful person." All three victims were pronounced dead at the scene, said Corey.
The 36-year-old father was found randomly walking along a street in Bay Ridge shortly before 8 a.m., and taken to a nearby hospital for evaluation. The family's Staten Island home sits about two miles from the Verrazzano Bridge, linking the island to Brooklyn.
The victims' names were not immediately disclosed. Air Force authorities referred all calls about the case to the NYPD.
