The man behind Montgomery County’s grisly murder-suicide Thursday was picking up his three children to spend Thanksgiving with them when he shot them and his ex-wife to death with a rifle that he then turned on himself, officials said Friday.
Police identified the killer as 40-year-old David Peter Brockdorff, of Frederick, Md., and his former wife and eldest victim as Gail Louise Pumphrey, 43, of Woodbine, Md. They refused to name the children other than to say that they are two boys, aged 12 and six, and a 10-year-old girl.
According to officials, the former couple met at Unity Park, she in her Ford Taurus and he in a Nissan Altima that had been reported stolen in Frederick on Sunday. During the exchange of the children, Brockdorff killed his family and then himself, according to Assistant Chief Wayne Jerman.
Everyone but the gunman was found inside the cars; Brockdorff was discovered in the woods 100 yards away. Authorities assume the killings took place in the cars.
It’s unclear what set Brockdorff off, but police and a family friend described previous domestic disputes since their 2005 divorce.
Area resident John Hallman told The Examiner he met Pumphrey when she sold her wedding ring from her ill-fated union with Brockdorff to him after posting a classified ad. He said he and Pumphrey became friends, and even had their children play together.
Hallman said he knew immediately after befriending Pumphrey that hers had been a troubled marriage and that she was eager to part with the diamond ring that symbolized it. Hallman’s wife now wears that ring.
“He was really angry about the divorce,” he said. “We repeatedly told her, ‘Don’t meet him alone.’ I don’t think she wanted to get divorced, but she felt like she had to.”
Hallman said that when Brockdorff and Pumphrey were married, they lived in a beautiful home in Frederick. She worked as a flight attendant while he was an electrician. Hallman said he believed the relationship crumbled, though, when Brockdorff developed a drug problem and began cheating on his wife.
Police did not say why Brockdorff and Pumphrey chose to meet in Unity, a small township near Damascus, but the park is in between Frederick and Woodbine, near Interstate 70.
One day after the murder-suicide, residents were still reeling from the tragedy. Gunshots are not unheard of in Unity, because the area is popular with hunters. Violence, however, is.
Residents interviewed painted a picture of a sleepy, agricultural community where neighbors know each other by name. It’s a place where people convene at the Sunshine Country Store, where regulars pay their tabs at the end of the month and gossip in the aisles.
“You don’t hear about this here,” said Eric Cary, a Damascus resident for 15 years. “It’s just numbing.”
This year, 15 people have been killed in Montgomery County in 11 incidents. Of those, nine have been domestic cases, and seven of the victims have been children slain by a parent.
