SEATTLE — A woman and her boyfriend, accused of slaughtering six members of her family as they gathered to celebrate Christmas Eve, pleaded not guilty Thursday to charges that could bring the death penalty.
Michele K. Anderson and Joseph Thomas McEnroe, both 29, entered the pleas in King County Superior Court to six counts of aggravated first-degree murder, as Michele’s one surviving immediate family member — her sister, Mary Victoria Anderson — watched from the front row, clutching her son’s hand.
Anderson and McEnroe gave detailed confessions when questioned by detectives, prosecutors say, but not-guilty pleas are routinely entered in potential death-penalty cases.
According to charging papers, when the pair arrived at the home of Anderson’s parents, McEnroe shot her father, Wayne, 60, in the head. Her mother, Judy, 61, rushed out from where she had been wrapping presents, and McEnroe killed her, too.
The pair hid the bodies, and when Anderson’s brother Scott arrived with his wife, Erica, both 32, and their two children, 5-year-old Olivia and 3-year-old Nathan, Michele and McEnroe executed them, the charging documents say. McEnroe apologized to the two children as he shot them in the head, according to prosecutors.
The two were arrested when they returned to the home in rural Carnation, east of Seattle, the day after Christmas, as detectives were processing the murder scene. Prosecutors have given no motive, but said Anderson told detectives her brother owed her money and that she was upset because her parents did not take her side. She also said her parents were pressuring her to start paying rent for staying in a mobile home on their property.
Deputy prosecutor James Konat asked the defendants whether they understood each charge against them. The defendants answered “yes” in barely audible voices, so quietly that Konat at one point told Anderson, “I’m sorry, you’ll have to answer out loud.”
Their lawyers entered the pleas of not guilty on their behalf.
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