Leisure World Couple Die in Murder-Suicide

Authorities on Friday were trying to determine what led an 82-year-old man to stab his 83-year-old live-in companion to death and then turn the knife on himself in a murder-suicide that shocked the Seal Beach Leisure World community.

Seal Beach police said Robert Shumann stabbed Margaret Brown multiple times early Thursday and then stabbed himself to death. Their bodies were discovered several hours later by members of Shumann’s family, Police Sgt. Tim Olson said.

Residents said the couple had moved into the gated retirement community about six months ago and had been involved in a car wreck just weeks before.

“I would see them going to the trash, and they would be holding hands. They’d go to the laundry, and they would hold hands,” said Joan Carbajal, 69, who lives across the street. “I’m amazed. At our age, who’s that much in love? Who’s that tight?”

Added Vincent Cordi, 77, who lives in the same single-story stucco complex as the couple: “It’s a surprise. It’s a shock. They looked pretty healthy to me. They enjoyed playing cards while they did their wash. They seemed like a nice couple.”

However, next-door neighbor Bill Miller, 80, said the surprise to him was “the violence of it.” Miller said Shumann and Brown often quarreled.

“I’d hear big noises,” he said. “I’d hear closet doors closed in succession -- bam, bam, bam. Loud voices. They carried through these tissue-paper walls.” Miller said he was awakened at 6:45 a.m. Thursday by “a loud, solid wham” next door.

“I heard the female; she seemed to be upset,” he said. “She said, ‘I’m going to scream.’ Then I heard his voice. Then I heard a muffled scream, like he might have put his hand over her mouth.”

Then, Miller said, he heard the woman say: “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, forgive me.” Shortly after that, there was another scream.

“In my mind, something nasty was going on,” he said. “I was going to call 911, but then it quieted down.”

The deaths underscore what experts believe is a growing national trend of murder-suicides among the elderly. Studies are rare, but it’s estimated there are as many as 200 each year involving people 55 and older, according to Donna Cohen, a University of South Florida professor who has studied the phenomenon.

Cohen’s research has found patterns in these cases: nearly all are perpetrated by men; most stem from untreated depression; less than a third involve cases in which there’s evidence the couple talked about committing suicide together; more common are cases where there is a history of domestic violence.

“In the past, we never thought of older people engaging in such aggressive behavior,” Cohen said. “There was this mythology that these incidents were mostly suicide pacts or altruistic mercy killings. But that’s not the case.”

In the last 13 years, there have been three murder-suicides and one attempted murder-suicide at the Seal Beach Leisure World, authorities say.

In 2001, a man tried to kill his wife with a hammer, then slit his throat; both survived. In 2000, an 81-year-old man shot his wife of 55 years to death and turned the handgun on himself. Both had had serious health problems.