Hartly victims in suspected murder-suicide identified

Police have released the names of the elderly couple found dead inside their Hartly home Tuesday afternoon. 

John James, 87, and his wife, Mary James, 81, died in a suspected murder-suicide, said Melissa Jaffe of Delaware State Police. 

Police responded at 11:30 a.m. Tuesday to the 4000 block of Arthursville Road for a check on welfare call, Jaffe said. Officers arrived to find the couple deceased. 

The cause and manner of deaths are still to be determined, Jaffe said. The bodies have been turned over to the Division of Forensic Science to undergo autopsies.

Patrol cars and forensic vehicles blocked a view of the home from bystanders Tuesday, but no crime scene tape surrounded it. The bodies could be seen being loaded into the vehicle.

Neighbors congregated in driveways Tuesday as the police investigation continued. They said an elderly couple lived in the house.

Brian McGinnis, 45, said he knew the couple as "good people," but the man suffered from dementia.

"He didn't know who you were when you talked to him," McGinnis said Tuesday, adding that he wasn't surprised by the day's events.

Keith DeFrancesco, 59, has lived across the street from the couple for 27 years and found the couple living there to be nice. 

"I am shocked," DeFrancesco said. "Over the years, we would shoot the breeze together."

On Wednesday, passersby stopped on Arthursville Road to see where the incident happened. One woman who wouldn't give her name said she often had coffee with Mary James and that she was a very pleasant woman. 

Other neighbors walking by the house speculated on what happened, but DSP has been tight-lipped about the cause of death for each.

One neighbor who just found out about the incident on Wednesday said she didn't know the couple but that it was "tragic."

This story will be updated as new information is provided.

Reach Jerry Smith at jsmith17@delawareonline.com. Follow him on Twitter at @JerrySmithTNJ.