SANDY, Utah (AP) - After hearing screams and pounding at her front door, Kathy Peterson found a hysterical woman and three young girls cowering, one of the girls covered in blood. She heard gunshots nearby in the middle class Salt Lake City suburb of Sandy as she opened the door and brought them inside to safety.
"He's killing everybody and he's trying to kill us," the terrified woman told Peterson through tears.
Just outside the home, police said Wednesday, Jeremy Patterson had shot and killed Memorez Rackley and her 6-year-old son and critically injured her 9-year-old son.
Authorities said the two were or had been in some sort of relationship, and the killings they described as targeted happened Tuesday afternoon just after Rackley picked her boys up from elementary school.
Rackley was walking about six blocks from the school when she flagged down a driver - the same woman who showed up at Peterson's door.
The unidentified female driver picked up Rackley and her boys but her car was then rammed by a pickup truck driven by Patterson, who got out and opened fire. Also shot and injured was the driver's daughter, Sandy police Sgt. Jason Nielsen said. Patterson then killed himself.
The extent and nature of Rackley and Patterson's relationship and the motive for the shooting remained unclear Wednesday as detectives probed leads, Nielsen said.
Rackley was married to another man, but Nielsen did not provide more details. Patterson was not the father of her children, he said.
Nielsen said investigators are still trying to determine if the woman who picked up the family just happened to see them or knew them.
Peterson said the woman who showed up at her door said she was driving her two daughters and another girl home from the same elementary school when Rackley flagged her down asking for help.
After getting the woman and children inside, Peterson said she said a prayer and gave the girls teddy bears until paramedics arrived to take the mother and her daughter to the hospital. The girl was shot in the leg and was hospitalized Wednesday stable condition, Nielsen said.
The suspect lived in the nearby suburb of Draper, where neighbor Patricia Briennieson described him as a muscular man who looked like a body builder and had a mixed-martial arts sticker on the back window of his pickup truck.
Court records did not show previous criminal charges or requests for protective orders filed against Patterson.