Friends tried to help NC man who killed family

RALEIGH, N.C. — Hours before William Maxwell slaughtered his family and killed himself, relatives and friends worried about the real estate developer gathered at his home to see if they could lift the normally happy dad from his funk.

The youth basketball coach and active church member had been stressed lately, friends said Thursday, and the people closest to him were worried enough to meet for more than three hours Monday afternoon.

"Billy was very passionate about everything about life, about his kids, about work," said George Rose, a 53-year-old developer who attended the gathering. "And he just didn't seem his normal, upbeat self. I think a lot of people who were close to him were concerned about him. And we were definitely in that category."

Authorities say Maxwell shot and killed his wife, Kathryn, 43, and their two teenage children. The parents' bodies were found in the kitchen of their upscale home, along with that of their son, 15-year-old Cameron; daughter Connor, 17, was found in an upstairs bedroom.

Since the killings, friends of the Maxwells have struggled to reconcile their image of William Maxwell as a dedicated family man to one who could gun down his wife and the children they sent to a private, religious high school.

Several friends said they had noticed or heard of changes in Maxwell's behavior, but they were unwilling or unable to point to anything specific. They described him as having a mental illness, but said they didn't know if he had seen a doctor or had a specific diagnosis. They hinted at financial issues – he was a developer in a down economy, after all – but said they thought Maxwell understood that those problems would pass.

A day before the killings, Maxwell spent 90 minutes chatting on longtime friend Adam Ancherico's porch, waiting for the kids from the church class to arrive for a dinner of baked ziti and homemade cookies that Kathryn Maxwell had cooked.

Maxwell was stressed from work but not visibly angry, Ancherico said. He planned to take the family to Disney World in a week. His son was excited about the trip.

His belief that Maxwell suffered from a mental illness is based on "just me knowing that my Billy wouldn't do something like that," Ancherico said. "He's not been walking around town with people saying, 'Oh, he's about to snap.'"

Maxwell's father, Bill Maxwell, said Thursday that bankers told him that his son had no financial issues.

"He was financially sound," said Maxwell, 75, of Fayetteville, adding that both he and his son were multimillionaires. When his son learned that the land he bought for a housing development wouldn't support septic tanks, Maxwell Sr. offered financial help that his son turned down.

And, he said, he knew of no mental issues.

He described his own state of mind as being "like one of those 45 rpm records. When you leave the needle on there, it runs out of music and goes around and around and makes that sound. That's what's going on in my head and my heart."

Earlier Thursday, Fayetteville police released recordings of the two 911 calls from the Maxwell home. In the first call, at 6:38 p.m., a voice is heard quietly moaning before the sound of a gunshot. A 911 operator tries in vain to get someone to speak.

On the second call, apparently made about 80 minutes later at 8:01 p.m., a man who identifies himself as John Fox describes the scene. A woman is heard in the background saying, "I knew it. I knew it."

"We've been trying to contact our daughter, and it appears they are in the kitchen," Fox said. "And we can't get in the house but we can see through the door."

When the operator asks if the people have wounds, Fox says: "Yeah, there's blood all over the place."

The family obituaries identify John Fox as Kathryn Maxwell's father.

Police spokeswoman Theresa Chance said in an e-mail that police "followed our abandoned 911 protocol" after the first call was disconnected. She did not immediately respond to a request for details about that protocol. She also said police continue to investigate who made the first 911 call.

Records show Maxwell received a handgun purchase permit in December 2007 and a concealed handgun carry permit in January 2008, said Debbie Tanna, a spokeswoman for the Cumberland County Sheriff's Office, which issued the permits.

Still, friends say William Maxwell loved his family.

"I know if he was thinking right, he wouldn't have hurt his family," Rose said. "I still have that confidence that he loved them, and I can't explain what happened."

Said Ancherico: "You've got Monday night, and you've got the rest of his life, which was totally different."