Deaths of Woman and Her Children Ruled Murder-Suicide

On Christmas day, the bodies of one woman and her two young children were discovered on a sidewalk in Boston. Now police are ruling their deaths a double murder-suicide. Forty-year-old Erin Pascal and her children four-year-old Allison and sixteen-month-old Andrew were found unconscious outside a Northeastern University parking garage just before 1:30 p.m. and pronounced dead soon after. Police were able to determine that it was the children who fell first and then the mother, leading them to believe Pascal pushed her children off and then jumped herself. This is the third suicide to occur in that parking garage in seven months. It was discovered that a phone call was made earlier that day from the Pascal residence to police but the contents of that call have not been released. Law enforcement continue to investigate the incident and encourage those with mental health issues to reach out to services for help, such as the suicide hotline.