Farmville murders

Farmville murders
Location of Farmville in the U.S. state of Virginia.
Location	505 First Avenue Farmville, Virginia, United States
Coordinates	37°17.7971 N 78°24.0735 W
Attack type	Quadruple homicide
Weapons	Ball-peen hammer and wood-splitting maul
Deaths	Mark Niederbrock (age 50) Dr. Debra S. Kelley (age 53) Emma Niederbrock (age 16) Melanie Wells (age 18)
Perpetrator	Richard Samuel McCroskey (age 20)

Coordinates: 37°17.7971′N 78°24.0735′W / 37.2966183°N 78.4012250°W / 37.2966183; -78.4012250

The Farmville murders occurred in Farmville, Virginia in September, 2009 – the quadruple bludgeoning homicide of Mark Niederbrock, Debra S. Kelley, their daughter Emma Niederbrock and friend Melanie Wells.

Emma Niederbrock shared a relationship with Richard Samuel McCroskey, a troubled aspiring rapper. Together, Emma Niederbrock, McCroskey, her mother and father, along with friend Wells, attended a horrorcore concert the week before. When Wells' mother could not locate her daughter, she alerted police, who discovered the murders.

McCroskey, 20 years old, was subsequently arrested, convicted of the murders and sentenced to life in prison. He is serving his sentence at Red Onion State Prison in Pound, Virginia.

The murders took place at Dr. Debra Kelley's home, where Kelley lived with her daughter Emma Niederbrock. The bodies were found just after 3:00 p.m. on September 17, 2009, the victims having been bludgeoned to death with a hammer and maul. Three bodies were found in a downstairs bedroom and one in a room upstairs.

Days before the killings Emma Niederbrock and Melanie Wells joined McCroskey in Michigan for a horrorcore concert, the Strictly for the Wicked Festival. According to police, Emma's parents, Debra Kelley and Mark Niederbrock had taken Emma Niederbrock, Melanie Wells and McCroskey to the concert.

Prince Edward County Commonwealth's Attorney James Ennis said McCroskey's anger over his failing relationship with Emma Niederbrock led to the killings. Ennis says McCroskey was angered by some text messages Emma sent while they were in Michigan. They returned to Virginia, and McCroskey became increasingly distraught about the relationship, Ennis said. He had an expectation that he and Emma were seeing each other exclusively and was unhappy with how things were going.