Delivered from Evil: True Stories of Ordinary People Who Faced Monstrous Mass Killers and Survived by Ron Franscell Page A
Authors: Ron Franscell
Tags: True Crime
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wanted to be left alone.” Despite the bumps, Huberty finished his internship, and the Ohio embalming board licensed him in 1966.
During that time, James met Etna Markland, a California girl who was a substitute teacher at a local grade school. They married in a private religious ceremony, moved into a small, tidy house in Massillon, Ohio, and started a family. They eventually had two daughters: Zelia in 1973 and Cassandra in 1977.
But even then, James didn’t seem right. Coworkers, neighbors, and even the pastor who married James and Etna saw a man shadowed by inner demons that were clawing at his guts. Even in calm moments, he seemed barely able to control his anger at the world.
He kept snarling German shepherd guard dogs and hoarded food in his basement in fear of a coming holocaust. He forced his two little girls to take karate lessons because he feared the people around him.
In 1969, not long after earning his license, James quit the funeral business for good and became a welder at a Canton power plant, piling up overtime and taking night courses at Malone College until he earned a bachelor’s degree in sociology in 1976.
JAMES O. HUBERTY GREW INCREASINGLY FRUSTRATED AFTER LOSING HIS JOB AS A WELDER IN OHIO. HE MOVED TO MEXICO, THEN TO SAN YSIDRO, CALIFORNIA, IN SEARCH OF RICHES, BUT ONLY GREW ANGRIER.
San Diego, CA, Police Department
Etna kept the Massillon house in pristine order and, at least in the early years of the marriage, was generally considered a good woman raising two fine girls. James was another story. Neighbors often grumbled about the thumping they heard coming from the Huberty house at night. They didn’t know for a long time that James had built a shooting range in the basement.
James’s fascination with guns started in childhood. Neighbors said guns were displayed in almost every room of the little house, and James often sat just inside his front door with a shotgun on his lap. Just sat.
Local cops came to the house more than once, sometimes because the Hubertys were complaining about the neighbors, sometimes because the neighbors were complaining about the Hubertys. Twice, the Hubertys were hauled in on minor charges.
In 1980, police charged James with disorderly conduct in a dispute at a service station. The reporting officer said a belligerent James simply wouldn’t calm down, even after police intervened. He pleaded guilty and was fined only court costs.
A year later, Etna was charged with four counts of “aggravated menacing” for waving James’s Browning 9 mm semiautomatic pistol—the same gun he later used in the McDonald’s shooting—at neighbors during an argument. The charge was reduced to disorderly conduct.
NOTHING TO LIVE FOR
In 1982, James Huberty’s fragile world began to crumble.
He was laid off from his welding job of thirteen years when his employer, Babcock & Wilcox, closed the plant.
“I got no job or anything,” he told Etna. “I’ve got nothing to live for.”
A coworker recalled even more chilling words. An embittered James talked about “shooting somebody.”
“He said that if this was the end of his making a living for his family,” the coworker said later, “he was going to take everyone with him.”
Etna believed James had a nervous breakdown after the layoff. His politics became frighteningly radical as he blamed irrational enemies—capitalism, secret government initiatives, America’s rich, former President Jimmy Carter, minorities, or the shadowy darling of 1980s conspiracy theorists, the Trilateral Commission—for his ruin. Voices in his head urged him to kill himself. He told people he was a German, even though he wasn’t. He feared a nuclear war was only days away.
Then he had a brainstorm. They would sell their house for a big profit and move to Tijuana, where they had once vacationed. There, James said, they would “make a lot of money,” although he never truly had a plan.
“We’re going to show them who’s boss!”
During that time, James met Etna Markland, a California girl who was a substitute teacher at a local grade school. They married in a private religious ceremony, moved into a small, tidy house in Massillon, Ohio, and started a family. They eventually had two daughters: Zelia in 1973 and Cassandra in 1977.
But even then, James didn’t seem right. Coworkers, neighbors, and even the pastor who married James and Etna saw a man shadowed by inner demons that were clawing at his guts. Even in calm moments, he seemed barely able to control his anger at the world.
He kept snarling German shepherd guard dogs and hoarded food in his basement in fear of a coming holocaust. He forced his two little girls to take karate lessons because he feared the people around him.
In 1969, not long after earning his license, James quit the funeral business for good and became a welder at a Canton power plant, piling up overtime and taking night courses at Malone College until he earned a bachelor’s degree in sociology in 1976.
JAMES O. HUBERTY GREW INCREASINGLY FRUSTRATED AFTER LOSING HIS JOB AS A WELDER IN OHIO. HE MOVED TO MEXICO, THEN TO SAN YSIDRO, CALIFORNIA, IN SEARCH OF RICHES, BUT ONLY GREW ANGRIER.
San Diego, CA, Police Department
Etna kept the Massillon house in pristine order and, at least in the early years of the marriage, was generally considered a good woman raising two fine girls. James was another story. Neighbors often grumbled about the thumping they heard coming from the Huberty house at night. They didn’t know for a long time that James had built a shooting range in the basement.
James’s fascination with guns started in childhood. Neighbors said guns were displayed in almost every room of the little house, and James often sat just inside his front door with a shotgun on his lap. Just sat.
Local cops came to the house more than once, sometimes because the Hubertys were complaining about the neighbors, sometimes because the neighbors were complaining about the Hubertys. Twice, the Hubertys were hauled in on minor charges.
In 1980, police charged James with disorderly conduct in a dispute at a service station. The reporting officer said a belligerent James simply wouldn’t calm down, even after police intervened. He pleaded guilty and was fined only court costs.
A year later, Etna was charged with four counts of “aggravated menacing” for waving James’s Browning 9 mm semiautomatic pistol—the same gun he later used in the McDonald’s shooting—at neighbors during an argument. The charge was reduced to disorderly conduct.
NOTHING TO LIVE FOR
In 1982, James Huberty’s fragile world began to crumble.
He was laid off from his welding job of thirteen years when his employer, Babcock & Wilcox, closed the plant.
“I got no job or anything,” he told Etna. “I’ve got nothing to live for.”
A coworker recalled even more chilling words. An embittered James talked about “shooting somebody.”
“He said that if this was the end of his making a living for his family,” the coworker said later, “he was going to take everyone with him.”
Etna believed James had a nervous breakdown after the layoff. His politics became frighteningly radical as he blamed irrational enemies—capitalism, secret government initiatives, America’s rich, former President Jimmy Carter, minorities, or the shadowy darling of 1980s conspiracy theorists, the Trilateral Commission—for his ruin. Voices in his head urged him to kill himself. He told people he was a German, even though he wasn’t. He feared a nuclear war was only days away.
Then he had a brainstorm. They would sell their house for a big profit and move to Tijuana, where they had once vacationed. There, James said, they would “make a lot of money,” although he never truly had a plan.
“We’re going to show them who’s boss!”
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