Police said three of the four children ran to their next-door neighbor's house before their mother -- identified as 33-year-old Tanya Thomas -- called them back home and killed them.
Brevard County Sheriff's Lt. Tod Goodyear said the neighbor called 911 after being awoken by gunshots coming from a home in Port St. John, about 45 miles east of Orlando, at 4:50am.
Shortly afterward, three children knocked on the neighbor's door and said they had been shot, Goodyear said.
Thomas came outside and called for her children to come back to the house. They obeyed and went home, according to Goodyear. The neighbor then heard more gunshots and called 911 again.
When deputies arrived on the scene at 4:54am, they found 17-year-old Pebbles Johnson suffering from gunshot wounds outside and heard four shots from inside the house.
The teen was taken to an ambulance in a police car, but she died before the ambulance reached the hospital.
Thomas then emerged with a gun, saw more deputies approaching her home and went back inside.
At 5:26am, one final gunshot was heard, Goodyear said. A SWAT team entered the home and found Thomas dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound and her three other children deceased.
Along with Pebbles Johnson, the juvenile victims were identified as Joel Johnson, 12; Jazlin Johnson, 13; and Jaxs Johnson, 15.
The motive for the killings was not known. A witness described as a friend of Thomas' told police he received a text message from her indicating that she wanted to be cremated with her children. No note was found at the scene.
Police had previously been called to the home for domestic disturbances, Goodyear said, most recently on Easter. Jaxs Johnson was arrested in April for a domestic incident involving his mother, but details of the incident were not immediately known.
The children's father was separated from Thomas but still lives in Brevard County, according to Goodyear.
Source: NYPost
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