Jurors hear woman’s taped confession in family killings in Carnation

SEATTLE – Michele Anderson admitted to the slayings of six members of her family, calling herself a “monster” in a taped interview given just hours after the bodies were discovered in her parents’ rural Carnation, Washington, home in December 2007.

The interview was played for jurors Tuesday in Anderson’s trial for six counts of aggravated murder. She is accused of helping her former boyfriend kill her parents, Wayne and Judy Anderson; her brother, Scott, and his wife, Erica Anderson; and the younger couple’s children, 5-year-old Olivia and 3-year-old Nathan.

If convicted, Anderson, 37, faces life in prison without the possibility of parole.

The bodies were discovered Dec. 26, 2007, two days after they were shot during a Christmas Eve gathering at the home of Wayne and Judy Anderson.

Three hours after King County sheriff’s deputies were summoned to the home, Michele Anderson and her then-boyfriend, Joseph McEnroe, drove up to the property and claimed they had planned to get married in Las Vegas but got lost and headed back home instead, according to police. That was when detectives interviewed the couple.

Transcripts of the interview were handed out to jurors and the media.

Thirty-nine pages into the 112-page transcript, Anderson dropped the pretense of having gone to Las Vegas and began her lengthy confession: “It’s my fault … I’m sorry … It’s not Joe’s fault. It’s all me.” Joseph McEnroe is serving a life sentence for his role in the slayings.

Anderson told King County sheriff’s Detective Scott Tompkins she planned to kill only her brother, who she claimed owed her money. Then, she said, “I freaked out” and the five other members of her family were also gunned down.

Anderson said she first shot her father, Wayne Anderson, but when her gun jammed, McEnroe also shot him.

After her mother was killed, Anderson and McEnroe then cleaned up the house and waited for Michele’s brother, sister-in-law and young children to arrive, she said.

After the family of four arrived for the holiday party, Michele Anderson started quarreling with her brother over the money he owed her; she then shot him, she told investigators.

Once all four adults were killed, she said they knew they had to kill her young niece and nephew.

“I just thought if they saw their parents dead that they’d be scarred for life,” she says on the recording.

“I felt so bad, like what the hell have I done?” she says at one point. “I’m a monster.”