July 13, 2001, Manila Bulletin, Racist message found in home of slain family

July 13, 2001, Manila Bulletin, Racist message found in home of slain family

SYDNEY (AFP) -- A racist message scrawled in blood has been found in the home of a Filipino family murdered inside their Sydney home, Australian media reported yesterday.

Citing police sources, local newspapers said the undisclosed message had been written with the blood of Philippines-born lawyer Teddy Gonzales, 46, his wife Mary Josephine Loiva, 43, and their 18-year-old daughter Claudine.

The family, which lived in the leafy middle-class suburb of North Ryde, were stabbed to death in a ferocious attack described by police as an "outrage."

"Obviously any murder is a tragedy, but in this particular case it's an outrage," one of the most experienced homicide investigators in the New South Wales police force, Superintendent Mick Plotecki, said

The bodies were discovered by the 20-year-old son of the family, Sef, a law student, when he returned home in the early hours of Wednesday after a night out with friends.

Detectives said they had commissioned a task force, codenamed Strike Force Tawas, to track down the killers.

Police believe the family moved to Australia from the Philippines' capital, Manila, in the early 1990s.

The Sydney Morning Herald newspaper said Teddy Gonzales was found stabbed to death in a hallway while his wife's throat had been cut. Both victims had also been stabbed repeatedly.

Their daughter, a final year high student at a Catholic private school, was found in an upstairs bedroom, her throat cut also.

Detectives described the house as having been ransacked.

Fr. Kevin Dadswell said the family were regular parishioners in the Sydney suburb of Blacktown's St Michael's Catholic Church.

"They were a very devout family," the priest told the Daily Telegraph.

"We have a mass at 8.30 a.m. every morning and Mr. Gonzales would come about three or four times a week on his way to work."

Neighbours and friends described the attack as evil.

"We are all so shocked. Why would anyone want to do such a horrible thing to such nice people?" family friend Irene David said.

Investigators are remaining tight-lipped about a possible motive for the slayings, and declined to reveal the wording of the message left in the living room of the family's two-storey home.

Brother

BAGUIO (AFP) - The brother of a Filipino lawyer brutally murdered along with his family in Australia asked the Philippine government yesterday to actively participate in a police probe into the killings.

Businessman Frederick Gonzales, younger brother of victim Teddy Gonzales, said he learned of the killings only Wednesday night and has yet to get in touch with authorities in Manila.

"We want to know the truth," he said, as he fought back tears in the family's hometown in Baguio City.

"We urge the Philippine government through the consul to Australia to seriously look into it (murder) so that we will know the truth. We want justice."

Meanwhile, a close friend of the family said that two weeks before the murder, Sef called his relatives and told them an Australian teenager tried to mug him while on his way home.

The family said it was not clear whether this could have anything to do with the murders, but stressed all angles should be explored.