James Kenneth McElroy Stabbed His family
July 24, 2008 by impqueen
Tampa, FL – Something put James Kenneth McElroy in a really bad mood on Tuesday night. A neighbor walking his dog saw McElroy in the driveway of his parents’ Carrollwood home around 9:00 in the evening, just looking up and down the street. The neighbor thought it was a little odd at the time, but the McElroys were fairly recent neighbors. The neighbor noticed the lawn needed mowing.  By Wednesday morning, James Kenneth McElroy’s family had been stabbed, and his father was dead, his mother and sister critically wounded.
James Kenneth McElroy, 21, lived with his parents, James and Karen McElroy, and his two sisters, 18 year old twins Michelle and Melissa. James Kenneth, who also went by “James C”, had a rocky relationship with his father – rocky enough that the elder McElroy was arrested in 2006 for domestic violence. Those charges were dropped when Karen McElroy told police her son had attacked his father, and the senior McElroy had only hit James in self-defense. James McElroy Senior’s mugshot looks like he did take a few hits, but James Kenneth was beaten so badly that he had to be hospitalized.
None of the McElroys have other criminal records, except James Kenneth, who’s been arrested four times for various weed-related, weapon-carrying, running from the cops hijinks. He lived on his own – “at large”, as one arrest record put it – for months at a time, although he had recently moved back in with his family. Interestingly, James Kenneth’s arrests had picked up after he moved back in – he was arrested in May of this year and again in June. As recently as SaturdaySaturday reviews
, officers were dispatched to the McElroy home for a dispute, but no report was filed and nobody was arrested.
On Tuesday night, something happened. Nobody really knows what yet. Only Melissa McElroy (MyspaceMySpace
) made it out of the house unharmed. At 4:16 a.m., she called 911 from a neighbor’s house to report that her brother was killing her family. James McElroy, 50, died at the scene.  Karen McElroy, 54, was stabbed and critically wounded, as was Michelle McElroy, 18. Both Karen and Michelle McElroy remain in critical condition at St. Joseph’s Hospital in Tampa.
On Wednesday morning, deputies spotted James Kenneth McElroy’s 1989 Jaguar in the parking lot of an apartment complex and arrested him. This time, he didn’t run. James Kenneth McElroy was taken to the Hillsborough County Jail on Orient Road, where he is being held without bond on multiple charges, including first degree murder, two counts of attempted murder, and weed possession.
9:15 am on July 24th, 2008
It’s strange how rotten family members are welcomed back again and again into the nest.
9:17 am on July 24th, 2008
I agree Wrybread, it’s a shame when parents are too caught up in denial, or ‘omg what will the neighbors think if I have my kid arrested’ to take care of their rotten eggs.
I hope the mom and sister make it through this.. Sadly though, this kid obviously should have had some kind of help–jail time, rehab, or something prior to his ‘break’.
9:46 am on July 24th, 2008
And sometimes I think it’s plain old obligation and guilt — “He’s my family. I have to help him.”
I find it especially weird since people generally are so casual about casting-off or losing touch with friends. The obligation to the family gene pool and indifference to true friends outside it has always puzzled me.
10:02 am on July 24th, 2008
You’re right Kitty, it is sad when parents won’t do what they should. I have 6 children and when my middle daughter was 19 she was hooked on meth and I found out she was pregnant and using. My ex said “well what can we do, she’s an adult”? Well I called the police and had her arrested for child endangerment! She was put in jail for 4 days. She wouldn’t speak to me for about 4 months, but then she got cleaned up and is the most amazing young woman and the best mom to my two granddaughters! Parents have to be strong and do whats needed, not just coddle them and say “oh you’re my baby” i’ll take care of you. What I did was the best thing and even my daughter says that!!
10:13 am on July 24th, 2008
Good for you Pepper
10:52 am on July 24th, 2008
WTF is up with FL? Sombody cut off the penis of the country and stop this shit.
R
1:22 pm on July 24th, 2008
WTF? The kid is a stoner, drivin’ a Jag, living with the ‘rents…and thinks ANY of his problems are bad enough to warrant murder?
This is what happens when you overindulge your kids, people. If you don’t teach them consistent consequence for their actions…Well, they’ll do anything they feel like, including (but not limited to) killing you.
1:35 pm on July 24th, 2008
I think I love you, Pepperann. Correction…I know I do.
2:34 pm on July 24th, 2008
Well…I agree that this kid seems like a real loser. But, given that his father beat him badly enough for the kid to be hospitalized earlier? This wasn’t a picture perfect family, and I can understand how he might have a resentment that would simmer until it turned into rage. No, there’s no reason to kill your parents, let alone your sister, and yes, he may have provoked his father in the earlier domestic violence episode. But I think it’s a rare case when a kid truly, truly explodes out of nowhere at his family; more often, I think it’s a history of dysfunction on both sides that eventually ends up with someone killing someone, and neither side completely blameless in the situation that led up to that point. My father beat the hell out of me when I was growing up, and I hated him for it. And I hated my mother more, for just standing by and pretending it wasn’t happening, and choosing him over me. And I hated my older sister, because when I confided that I couldn’t take it any more and was going to tell the counselor at school, she ran to tell my father to gain points with him, which meant, of course, hellacious beating and threats for me.
I fantasized about killing him many, many times–and if I had, anyone looking at it from the outside would have seen a “nice” Catholic family of stable civil servants with all the middle-class trappings, and I’m sure I would have seemed like a spoiled rebellious brat, too…and my claims of abuse would have been written off as “make-believe to save my butt, now that he wasn’t here to defend himself.” From the outside, that’s what it would have looked like, but from the inside, it was a whole different story.
Of course, I didn’t kill anyone, and the second I was legally old enough, I was out of there for good, and never looked back. So I certainly don’t condone what he did, since at 21 he did have plenty of other options. But if his father hurt him badly enough to be hospitalized, I understand why he might have lashed out. Because I doubt that was the first time. Yes, a kid can really push your buttons, especially a loser kid. And if it happened in 2006, then James Kenneth was already of legal age and probably physically a contender, so it’s not like his dad was beating up a 3 yr-old. But I really, really doubt that was the first time his father whaled away on him. You don’t go from “gentle spanking” to “hospitalization” just like that.
2:58 pm on July 24th, 2008
Very, very good point Leemouse. I’m so very sorry for what you had to go through.
I appreciate your honest statements to your resentment of others, who were not abusing you and why you felt the way you did, along with you candor, as to your feelings for your dad. I’m sure that was hard to type. You make a very, very strong point, especially, when referring to “how it looks from the outside” – you are so right.
I completely see why you would feel like you do. I also commend you on leaving and not “revenging”. You are a bigger person than I would have been about it. I mean that as an honest compliment from the bottom of my heart.
3:01 pm on July 24th, 2008
Who knows what the hospitalization was for? Frankly, people get taken to the hospital for “precautionary measures” all the time. He might have needed a couple of stitches or something. If he punched his dad, the kid should have expected to get hit back harder. That’s how that works. The term “hospitalized” has often unnecessarily dramatic connotations.
Furthermore, the charges got dropped. Not to say it never happens, but, in assault cases, a disingenuous “the kid started it” doesn’t fly too often.
Lastly, if shit was so awful, the kid never would have come back home. I include myself when I say I’ve never known an abused kid who didn’t take off at 18 without ever looking back. And I know what it’s like to be abused badly or often enough to want to kill. I slept with a butcher knife under my bed for months, just waiting for my dad to cross that line.
I agree that most kids probably don’t snap out of nowhere. But some do. Maybe this kid had reason? But it really doesn’t sound like it.
10:15 pm on July 24th, 2008
This kid is very strange looking – what a long and pointed face. I would love to know more about his family background.
12:34 am on July 25th, 2008
More info on his personal life and capture.
http://www2.tbo.com/content/2008/jul/25/me-friend-aided-in-stabbing-arrest/
3:30 pm on July 25th, 2008
Thanks for sharing your story Leemouse
11:37 am on July 26th, 2008
Wow…the skeletons are leaping out here! I thought I was fucked up. Check it out, folks, nobody here but us humans.
Harley, Florida is an incredible place. Like Arizona, Texas, California, a whole lot of the US population come down here for vacation and have the best time of their lives. So when their lives become unbearable back in the States, they pack their bags (and their fuckin’ U-hauls) and come on down here to shit in our nest. Orlando is for some reason the landing spot of many of these jackasses, and I do mean jackass, who would move to an Ocean State and live as far from the sea as you can get…but I do appreciate your penis imagery…more than once I have pissed off some Michigan dumbfuck tourist who wants to tell me about his great state by pedantically holding up his hand and saying “Let me show you what Michigan looks like…” at that point if I have had enough Coladas or Corona’s I stand up and say “Let me show you what Florida looks like.” No offense, I hope. Look, it’s always five o’clock somewhere.
5:54 pm on April 14th, 2009
mw and james worked at taco bell together.i was playing halo with him the day before this happened…
his dad was a fucking ass hole!you all would want him dead also!
7:34 pm on April 14th, 2009
well if he was a ass hole-why didn’t he move out? He was 21. Why try to kill your whole family because of dad? That’s fucked up. James is now the ass hole.
1:18 am on September 22nd, 2009
[...] me of this guy i new pretty well(i guess not well enough). Took me awhile to remember his last name:http://www.dreamindemon.com/2008/07/…ed-his-family/. My friends and i used to smoke with him all the time. He sold some really good weed. He even [...]
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