Police say they believe the on-duty Berlin police officer who fatally shot his former girlfriend and then killed himself Monday afternoon had been trying to “rekindle” his relationship with her.
A little more than 24 hours into the probe, police said Tuesday they had found nothing remarkable in Officer Jeffrey Strock’s personnel files indicating he could commit such a violent act in killing 51-year-old Julie Fandino outside her home in Barre Town.
And, in the hour leading up to the deadly confrontation, police say, Strock showed no outward signs of anything amiss, making four traffic stops before pulling his department-issued cruiser into Fandino’s driveway.
Washington County State’s Attorney Rory Thibault called Fandino’s death a “senseless” killing.
“You can’t cook up a worse scenario,” Thibauilt said Tuesday.
“A uniform law enforcement officer while on duty, ostensibly out there to protect the public,” the prosecutor said, “deviates from that mission of compassion and taking care of the community to go and just commit an absolutely heinous act.”
Jennifer Hall, a longtime friend of Fandino, described her as a person always willing to help others and ready to offer kind words of support.
“Above everything else, her kids were everything to her,” Hall said, adding that Fandino had two sons and a daughter. “Julie was the type of person who put everybody above herself.”
Maj. Dan Trudeau, head of the Vermont State Police criminal division, said at a late Tuesday afternoon press conference that the probe is still in the early stages as investigators work to put together a timeline of events leading to the shooting.
Strock resided in Brookfield, and for about five years, Trudeau said, Fandino lived there with him, describing the relationship as “on again, off-again.”
“She moved out in December 2019,” the major said, adding, “Mr. Strock was in a relationship with another woman who he married so that caused some obvious conflict.”
Fandino had lived in the Websterville Road apartment since that time, according to Trudeau.
“Our belief today,” Trudeau said, “based on information that we have is that he had gone to Fandino’s apartment yesterday afternoon around 1:40 in an attempt to get this relationship back together.”
Fandino, according to Trudeau, had broken off that relationship some time ago.
“I think he was there to try to, again, rekindle that,” the major said.
Strock, who the major said had separated from his wife, also had some “potential” relationships with other women that investigators are trying to sort through.
“It’s kind of a little bit complicated,” Trudeau said.
So far, according to the major, that timeline of events Monday has revealed:
— 10:55 a.m., Strock, 58, a part-time officer, signs on duty with the Berlin Police Department.
— 12:02 p.m. to 1:02 p.m., Strock carries out four traffic stops on Route 62.
–1:40 p.m., Strock, in his cruiser, arrives at the apartment house of Fandino at 84 Websterville Road.
— 1:51 p.m., Strock, using his .45-caliber duty weapon, shoots Fandino several times on the porch just outside the back door. Then, he shoots himself.
— 2:19 p.m., Randy Gonyaw, the building’s landlord, drives by the residence and sees the Berlin police cruiser in the driveway. He stops to see what has happened. He then finds the bodies outside the home and calls 911.
Colette Gagnon, who lives on Websterville Road near the residence where the shooting took place, said she was in her home Monday afternoon when she heard “popping” sounds.
“I knew gunfire was what it was,” she said Tuesday.
However, Gagnon added, she didn’t know if it was just someone outside shooting at targets.
She said she went to see what happened and that’s when she saw the Berlin police vehicle parked in the driveway of the home. She said the landlord had already arrived at the residence.
Gagnon said she had asked him if everything was OK.
“He said, ‘No it’s not OK,’” Gagnon recalled he told her, adding that he said he found two bodies on the ground outside the residence. “He said he just called it into 911.”
According to Gagnon, the property owner told her that Fandino had said to him that she had recently “broken it off” with her boyfriend, and she asked the property owner if he ever saw her boyfriend’s vehicle in the lot to check it out.
“He said the vehicle was there and he checked it out,” Gagnon said.
Trudeau said at the press conference Tuesday that Fandino’s adult daughter lived with her at the apartment but was asleep at the time of the shooting.
Strock was wearing a body cam, but it is not clear at this point if it was turned on at the time, the major said.
“Whether it was active is the million dollar question,” Trudeau said, adding that a security camera from the Barre Town Middle & Elementary School located next to the apartment building did provide some footage. “It is helpful to the investigation and I’ll just leave it at that.”
Strock had been employed as a part-time officer by the Berlin Police Department since 2003, and as a part-time deputy with the Washington County Sheriff’s Department since 2006.
A review of the personnel files from those two workplaces, according to Trudeau, didn’t reveal anything “noteworthy” or out of the ordinary.
“They didn’t really give us a lot of information,” he said. In addition, interviews with those who worked alongside him yielded few clues. “He was a pretty private kind of guy and not really well-known outside of work is the overall theme we’re getting.”
In talking to some family and friends, Trudeau said, there have been “some hints of depression and self-harm,” and it wasn’t clear at this time if Strock had been seeing a therapist.
Strock had retired about three years ago from a job at the Price Chopper grocery store, Trudeau said, and currently owned a route delivering Pepperidge Farm products.
Hall said she became friends with Fandino when they worked together years ago at the West Lebanon, New Hampshire, Price Chopper grocery store. Fandino had been the bakery department manager and most recently worked at the Price Chopper in Berlin.
About two hours before the shooting Monday, Hall said, Fandino had posted a “Happy Birthday” message to Hall’s Facebook page.
“I’m sorry for the world because the world lost an amazing person,” Hall said.
Another friend posted Tuesday on Fandino’s Facebook page expressing shock over her loss. “An angel was gained in heaven and this world has lost a beautiful soul.”
Thibault, the Washington County prosecutor, said it was the third domestic violence homicide in Washington County within the past four years. That includes, he said, a murder-suicide that took place on July 4, 2018, in Barre.
In that case, 29-year-old Courtney Gaboriault of Barre, an employee of the Department of Public Safety, was shot to death on the morning of the Fourth of July, by her ex-boyfriend, Luke Lacroix. He then shot himself.
“The greater Barre area was traumatized by the murder of Courtney Gaboriault by Luke Lacroix,” Thibault said Tuesday. “Seeing that here again, it’s unfortunately a stark reminder that most homicides in Vermont are based on domestic violence.”
The prosecutor said he had little interaction with Strock, having only met him once. The officer, according to Thibault, had only submitted between five and 10 criminal cases a year, mostly dealing with traffic matters or misdemeanor offenses.
“From my standpoint,” Thibault added, “from what I have at my disposal, there wasn’t any clear legal record of concerning behavior on his part.”
He said even though the suspect in the case has killed himself, a full investigation into what transpired remains important.
“Were there warning signs, where there are any other red flags about his demeanor, his behavior?” the prosecutor said of the questions that investigators will be looking into.
“I think this is a case,” he added, “that people will talk about and want to analyze for a long time.”
Clarification: The lead of this article has been updated to more clearly attribute the explanation from police of Jeffrey Strock’s motivation for going to Julie Fandino’s home.
Read the story on VTDigger here: Police are tracing on-duty officer’s steps leading to fatal shooting of ex-girlfriend, himself.