Sheriff: Tennessee woman, 4 kids killed in murder-suicide

COLUMBIA, Tenn. – A sheriff says his detectives are trying to figure out why a mother would kill her four children and then herself at their home in Tennessee.

Maury County Sheriff Bucky Rowland told a news conference Tuesday that evidence points to a murder-suicide, but police don’t know what prompted it.

The sheriff said the teen-aged victims had been adopted and home-schooled in what appeared to be a loving home. He said police hadn’t previously been called to the residence in Columbia, southwest of Nashville, and their father wasn’t home at the time.

Rowland said an adult child found the bodies and called police after coming home from work Monday evening. He identified the dead as 55-year-old Cynthia Collier, 14-year-old Bo Li, 14-year-old Meigan Lin, 15-year-old Lia Lin and 17-year-old Kaileigh Lin.