A pair of Australian identical twin sisters shot themselves in a bizarre joint suicide pact on a US shooting range, but one survived, police said as the distraught parents headed to the US yesterday.
The sister, who survived despite suffering head wounds, was interviewed for two hours by the local sheriff’s office, but refused to explain why the 29-year-olds did it, local sheriff’s office captain Louie Perea said.
“A reason for the shootings is still unknown ... We asked that question more than once and the survivor declined to answer,” Perea said at the sheriff’s office in Arapahoe County.
The surviving twin was “devastated, frustrated, distraught, angry at times,” Perea said, according to the Denver Post newspaper, while he told Australia’s AAP agency the incident was “somewhat bizarre.”
Officials confirmed the suicide theory as the parents flew from Australia to identify their daughters, who the local sheriff’s office said had been in the western state of Colorado for five weeks.
Investigators have “met with the surviving sister, who has confirmed that they had planned to commit suicide together and did in fact shoot themselves,” a statement by the county sheriff’s office said. “Based on the physical evidence collected, the surviving sister’s statements and video surveillance footage from the shooting center, they believe that this incident was indeed a suicide and attempted suicide.”
The double shooting occurred on Monday afternoon at Family Shooting Center in Cherry Creek State Park, east of Denver.
A surveillance video showed the women fall backwards simultaneously from the shooting stall, but not the actual shooting, said the Denver Post, which added they shot at targets for about 80 minutes before turning the guns on themselves.
The guns used were both .22 caliber — one revolver and one a semi-automatic, officials said, adding: “One victim was pronounced dead at the scene, the second victim was transported to an area hospital for treatment.”
Washington state resident Jacky Sole was quoted by the Post as saying the twins were her cousins, were unmarried and had no other siblings. One was outgoing, the other quiet and reserved, she added.
Sole had not known they were in Colorado, but they had traveled to the US in the past, usually independently before meeting up once they had arrived, she added, declining to name her cousins until authorities do.
“Once in a blue moon they would e-mail their mom and say: ‘We’re OK,’” Sole said, adding that the pair had sometimes lived and worked in the US and Canada for short periods.
One of the sisters had been scheduled to return home on Tuesday, when her 90-day cultural visa expired, she said.
The incident was the third suicide involving rented guns at the Family Shooting Center since 2004, the Denver Post reported.
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