Father ‘murdered family and then hanged himself’

Postmortem examinations are being carried out today on a Hampshire family after Andrew Case apparently stabbed his wife and two young daughters to death, before hanging himself in the family home in Fordingbridge on the edge of the New Forest. One report said the children’s throats had been cut.

Police removed the bodies of Andrew Case, who was 32, nursery teacher Vicki Case, 31, and their daughters Phoebe, two, and Nereya, one, from the modern house in the quiet market town last night.

Postmortems are being carried out on the adults today. Police would not say if they were looking for anyone in connection with the deaths, but neighbours and extended family members told reporters what had happened.

The four bodies were found yesterday morning by the children’s 56-year-old grandmother, Linda Haskell, who had been expecting to look after them for the day. After getting no answer when repeatedly phoning the family, she came to the house.

A neighbour, Alayna Brooks, told how she rushed over to help Haskell when she heard her screaming "all my babies are dead!" as she ran from the house. Brooks said she entered the house and found Vicki Case dead in the dining room with a plastic bag on her head.

She said: "The first thing I thought when I saw the woman dead was 'Are the babies alive?' I went upstairs and the man was hanging. I shook his leg and said: 'Just wake up - you've got a family!'"

"But it was just not happening. It was the most appalling thing I have ever lived through. I was distressed and I saw the two little girls side by side in the double bed. They were dead."

Haskell called emergency services from the street, but the family were declared dead when a doctor arrived on the scene. Specialist counselling has been offered to the ambulance crews who attended.

It is understood the family had just returned from a week’s holiday in Weymouth, while Brooks said the couple had seemed to be very happily married.

The only indication of a motive to have emerged so far was given by local businessman Hau Chow, who had previously employed Vicki Case in his Chinese restaurant. He told reporters: "I think maybe they had financial problems because they were renting that house. They had to sell their own house." ·