Ponzi Dad Horror

Murder and a Ponzi scheme in a single story? The New York Post reports that Long Island lawyer William Parente was under investigation for running a $20 million Ponzi scheme, and that, hours before he killed his wife, two daughters, and himself, his scheme began to unravel. Parente, his wife Betty, and 11-year-old daughter Catherine were visiting his eldest daughter, the 19-year-old Stephanie, at college in Baltimore when Parente snapped. During the day on Monday he bludgeoned and smothered his wife, then Catherine, and, when Stephanie visited the hotel room at 4 pm, he did the same to her. He covered the bodies with a sheet, and early on Tuesday morning, he slit his own wrists. Hours after the bodies were discovered, $450,000 in checks that Parente had given an investor began to bounce.