Multiple Killers May Have Been Involved in Gage Park Family's Slaying: Police

Chicago Police say there may have been multiple killers involved in the gruesome murders of six family members found brutally killed in their Gage Park home earlier this year.

“Detectives are being very methodical in their investigation,” police spokesman Anthony Guglielimi said in a statement. “We continue to interview family members and associates to validate our timeline and establish motive for the senseless killings but at this point we have not publicly identified any persons of interest or suspects.”

Autopsy reports released Thursday indicate the scene inside the bungalow on the quiet city street was far more disturbing than anyone had imagined.

The Chicago Sun-Times reports officers arrived at the scene in the 5700 block of South California Avenue to find a “bloody mess,” though the doors to the home were locked and the family’s belongings relatively untouched.

The bodies of four adults and two children, ages 10 and 13, were found around the house.

The first body was on an enclosed porch at the back of the house, where 58-year-old Rosaura Martinez was discovered in her pajamas, stabbed five times and lying in a pool of blood, according to the report.

On the opposite end of the home, her husband, 62-year-old Noe Martinez Sr., was found dead with a cooler of tamales and a tray of coffee cups nearby. He had been beaten and stabbed along with 13-year-old Leonardo Cruz, who was found on the living room floor next to a textbook, ruler and pencil, the Sun-Times reports.

Alexis Cruz, 10, was found with multiple stab wounds, including three to his heart, and more to a lung and his liver. His body was left on an area rug in the basement, a book bag containing a binder of drawings nearby.

Noe Martinez Jr., 38, was found upstairs, his body marked with knife wounds. He was reportedly battered to death in the head, just a few feet from where the children’s mother, Maria Herminia Martinez, sat at a table, her body covered in multiple gunshot wounds.

“This investigation is very much open and active,” Gugliemli said.

Since day one, mourning relatives and community members have asked who would do this and why. Investigators said last month they were considering the possibility the family may not have been the intended targets.

Many houses look alike along 57th Street and California Avenue, a typically quiet neighborhood on the city's Southwest Side.

Investigators found no signs of forced entry and said all the doors were locked when they arrived. Former Interim Police Supt. John Escalante, however, said one theory — that of a murder-suicide — has been deemed implausible.

Three types of knives or other bladed cutting instruments were used to carry out most of the killings, according to investigators, but those weapons were not at the crime scene. A rifle was found in the home but did not match the weapon used in the shooting death.

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