Home > Crime > Man Kills Sons Then Himself To Make Estranged Wife ‘Suffer The Loss’

Man Kills Sons Then Himself To Make Estranged Wife ‘Suffer The Loss’

February 4, 2013 at 11:25 am by Morbid

BOYNTON BEACH, FL — Police say a man broke into his estranged wife’s home and murdered his two youngest sons as their mother pleaded for him to stop. Before he killed himself, the man told the mother he was letting her live so she would have to suffer the loss of her children.

Victoria Zavala said that at around 2 a.m. Saturday she heard a commotion in her home and went to investigate. In the kitchen she found her husband, 45-year-old Isidro Zavala, dressed in black and strangling one of the couple’s teen sons with a rope.

Victoria begged Isidro to kill her instead, but Isidro told her he wanted her to suffer the loss of her two sons — 12-year-old Eduardo and 11-year-old Mario – before he shot himself once in the chest and then once in the head.

Police responding to Victoria’s call to 911 would find Isidro and his two sons dead at the scene. One child was found on the back patio and the other in the kitchen dining area. Mario had also been shot several times.

Victoria and Isidro had been married for almost 20 years, but Victoria filed for divorce on Oct 5. Isidro moved out of the home the couple purchased in 1999, and moved into a friend’s home nearby. As part of their divorce hearing, the couple were supposed to go to mediation this Tuesday.

Also found at the crime scene was a blue bag containing a Tec 9, extra ammunition, duct tape, cutting shears and a note dated Jan. 31 to the couple’s 19-year-old son who did not live at the home. In the note, Isidro told his oldest son that he was a good son and to take care of himself. Detectives found a second note, dated Jan. 21, at the home where Isidro had been staying, but did not release its contents.

The man Isidro had been staying with said that he last talked to Isidro on Friday, when he declined an invitation to a birthday party, stating he had “something important to do.”

Tags: Crime, Divorce, Florida, Isidro Zavala, Murder, Shooting, Strangulation, Suicide

47 Comments

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JGo555

Motherfucker. Literally. Worst part? The asshole REALLY FUCKING succeeded. I assume the marriage was always like this, psychological abuse and sadism and all around narcissism from him.
newstarshipsmell

Hmmmm… Attend a birthday party, or conduct a vicious, divorce-revenge double-filicide/suicide combo? Decisions, decisions… Glad this shitstain won’t have any more to make, since he seemed pretty shit at making them.
newstarshipsmell

And the poor friend’s gonna need a new couch. No one’s gonna want to sit down on a sofa they know some childkiller crashed on.
G.I.R.L.

I would not have been trying to negotiate. Did she not try to get him off of her son? These stories, again, have been very difficult to read. And as @JGo555 mentioned, the worst part is that he succeeded.
Athena

Shock is a hell of a thing. Adrenaline can shut a person down if they don’t know how to handle it.
Sam

That photo creeps me out. The arrogant, dominant look in the eyes and what looks like a blood trail from where he shot himself in the chest. Like he’s not just taunting her, he’s taunting everyone from beyond the grave.
Eliza Berntsen

Men that do such things are the lowest of the low. They will always have to be the ones in control and have the last word. They just can’t accept that it’s over, and that they are no longer in the No1 spot. Fucking asshole.
alphatroll

“Sorry dude, can’t make the birthday party, gotta kill the fam that day. But happy birthday!”
JohnQknowitall

This seems particularly heinous because it is within what we tend to think of as a “safe relationships,” but with selfish fucks all bets are off. I feel for the mother, but I don’t understand why she didn’t try to stop him? Strangralation, except in a “chicken wing” type of hold, requires two hands so he would be able to hold his gun at that moment. Had the son been a child in my care I would have done everything to stop it including kicking and scratching like a little girl or smashing anything I could lift against the back of his screwed up head.
JohnQknowitall

Excellent point.
alphatroll

I would hate to be the 19-year-old. Being called “the good son” by a man like that? Brrrr….
alphatroll

Apparently she walked in while he was finishing the job. Too late.
brandi

I just don’t get it. If i saw my estranged husband, strangling my son, I’d reach for anything to kill him with. Never would I sit back and watch someone harm my child and feel helpless. I’ve heard of the strength a mother can have when their child is in trouble, so my question is, where was her’s? Why sit watch, and beg and plead with him? i don’t care if he would’ve killed me in the process, I’ll know i did whatever i could to save my child.
OutOfBubbleGum

We can put a man on the moon, but we can’t make “razor sharp, deadly murder/suicide paper” that kills the author?
http://www.facebook.com/people/Craig-Ellis/1109178363 Craig Ellis

What an ugly, selfish goon. He is not worthy of the title “man”. Time and again we are all reminded there is no bottom to human stupidity or depravity.
LuvsHorror

What a coward.
Athena

Adrenaline is intended to give you strength and focus, but in the untrained body, it can do the exact opposite. Instead, it clouds and confuses your thoughts and weakens you with trembling as it courses through your veins. This may not have been what happened in this case, but I generally recommend against judging those who find themselves in such an unimaginable situation. We like to think we know how we’d react, but if we’re not familiar with how our body reacts to adrenaline, we could easily find ourselves being held hostage by it.
Evan Oswald

epic line! bahahahahrrarararar
Evan Oswald

what was the duct tape and cutting shears for?
kimbev69

he is one scary looking dude…how sad i would have had to stab him or something, i’m curious why she didn’t…he must have been using both hands on the boy…so he wasn’t pointing the gun at her or anything…no way my kids are going down without me
lespacino

Yeah, and getting to suffer the loss, just like his mother. Thanks, dad!
Dillon_Lewandowski

Worthless coward
Athena

On a side note, while this site’s write-up doesn’t mention it, the police chief is quoted in other articles as saying that she did try to fight him off.
brandi

If she felt in her heart that she did all she could whilst trying to control her forethought and emotions, then thats all that matters. Your body can have 2 responses at an instance such as this. adrenaline rush being the positive, and anxiety being the negative. Adrenaline pumping through our bodies when an emergency or life threatening situation occurs, is a positive response our body creates, giving us hightened sense’s, “super” strength, and little to no feeling of pain, as in what you’ve referenced is more anxiety, which is a fear based response to a percieved threat. I could see this woman being so scared, so fearful, that anxiety took over her body. I’m very sorry for her loss and in no way was i judging her, just curious of what must have been going through her mind, and why cowering was her instinct, instead of fighting back.
brandi

that would’ve been good to throw in there, lol just so that i wasn’t percieving the situation as in her begging, instead of beating his ass! Good job then MAMA! As long as she stood up and tried to save her babies, then she did right. Even if the out come was undesirable, she didn’t fail her children.
creamofflicka

I’ve said it before,.. Ladies, arm yourselves and learn to kill and hurt men swiftly. Like I tell my daughters, learning to defend yourself is like learning to install snow chains, Sure, you may want a man for the job,.. but you’ll never “need” a man for the job.
hicusdicus

What do you mean men? Lets change that to humans. I am a man and I would never do that.
Buffettgirl

Worthless, gutless, oxygen stealing fucktard… the survivor’s guilt the oldest son will more than likely feel is a lifetime sentence. If only “Dad” had failed in offing himself at least there would have been a lifetime sentence for him too and not just his oldest son…
JGo555

This type of selfishness does not happen ONLY in males. FEMALES are even more prone to this behavior than men. Women like to f*ck with feelings and mind games.
newstarshipsmell

Probably for some part of his diabolical plan that he failed to follow through on… thank God.
G.I.R.L.

Excellent point. Honestly, i never considered the crippling affects of adrenaline. I honestly don’t know what i would do in that situation.
Beansiegirl

Good Lord, I didn’t even notice what looks like a blood trail on his chest. Above his “heart”. With a party hat on and a drink in his hand. This kind of thing is so f&%king unnerving. I know no one else thought he was capable of this, but after 20 years of marriage, I have to think she had an inkling that he was capable of this. Not that I’m blaming the victim. Like Athena said, adrenaline and anxiety can freeze a person. This is just tragic.
http://www.facebook.com/edward.hickey Edward Hickey

That is one of the purest evil stories I ever read
TruTruTrue

I saw a follow up interview with the 20 year old son and it seems he’s also not all there. This dude went to a tattoo parlor the following day to get a Tat of his two brothers and his (piece of shit) dad on his chest (together). He also said he decided to bury all 3 next to each other. Someone should keep an eye on him too….
Jessica Stewart

The weak element in a marriage can be driven to this, as well as the strong. It is wrong to assume that he lost it because she stood up to him. The final play in a game can be made by the weakest element as well as the strongest.
Jessica Stewart

Practical and adorable!
EveryVillainIsLemons

I generally don’t wish that Hell exists or exists as a place where people are tortured all of the time, but in this selfish turd’s case, I’ll make an exception.
EveryVillainIsLemons

Interesting. Doesn’t the mother get a say in where her children are buried?
http://www.facebook.com/people/Rochell-Arnold/100000587657456 Rochell Arnold

WTF is wrong with people. I mean seriously, divorce sucks ass but I would never hurt my kids because of my idiot ex. Karma usually has a way of taking care of that shit. I feel so bad for the mother in this, I can’t imagine dealing with something like that.
Athena

Anxiety is a common side effect of adrenaline. Other common side effects include palpitations (abnormal heart beats), tachycardia (excessive heart rate) , arrhythmia (irregular heart beat), anxiety, headache, tremor, hypertension, and acute pulmonary edema (fluid buildup in the lungs that can lead to respiratory failure).

An adrenaline rush is not always positive. Adrenaline is a drug, and it affects different people in various ways. This is precisely why we practice earthquake (or fire or tornado or whatever) drills in school and why military, police, fire and EMT personnel go though drills meant to imitate real life. You fair better against adrenaline when you’ve had some experience with it.
captaingrumpy

Well , he won’t kill any more , will he ?.
http://www.krashthrills.wordpress.com/ Anthony Mandich

What a fucking asshole
http://www.facebook.com/Mrs.LDCannon Lena Cannon

what the fuck is wrong with people!! gah i just can’t even wrap my mind around level of crazy this is.
http://www.facebook.com/HamsterNinjaofDOOM Alecia Hendricks

Adrenaline turns me in to jello.
onlyme356

You actually don’t know what you would do in that situation. Ever heard of fight, flight or freeze? Our bodies will take over our minds in a situation like that and we have no way of knowing what we “would do” unless we have been through it because our minds are no longer in control at that point.
Prominent Prozac

I think it could be that the 19 year old was on the dads side in whatever was going on (We don’t really know all the details of their personal life, actions or relationship) and that’s why he got fathers praise. As for the follow up, I dunno, but people do some pretty weird shit when something so traumatic happens to them. At 19/20 he’s still just a punkass kid, that’s a lot to deal with, you never know how someone is going to handle something like this.
On the side, I gotta see the follow up myself
ShaunaH

yea but you know id have died trying to save my kids id have been the first to go not sitll be living because if my kids were dead you’d know he killed me first.