Ohio father executes three children- The case of Chad Doerman
June 27, 2023
Devastating news this week from the small township of Monroe in Ohio, wherein less than 8,000 residents reside.
On the afternoon of June 15, 2023, 32-year-old Chad Doerman lined up his three young sons and executed them with a rifle.
The children's mother, who has not yet been identified in the media, was injured while attempting to save her children. She was shot in the hand but managed to make a 911 call at approximately 4:15p.m pleading for police and medical assistance, while screaming down the receiver that her children had been shot. Reports state that the children’s mother had been injured while trying to grab the firearm from Chad Doerman to save her children.
A few minutes later, a witness who had found a girl running down the street, claiming her father was trying to shoot her, also made a 911 call.
Doerman murdered his three sons, shooting them point-blank with a firearm as his wife watched in horror. He reportedly ripped the children from her arms as she attempted to shield and save them, and chased one of the boys down after he attempted to run away, and dragged him back to the home where he then shot him.
The victims have been identified as Clayton Doerman, 7 years old, Hunter Doerman, 4 years old, and Chase Doerman, 3 years old. Their bodies were later found in the back yard of the home. When officers eventually arrived, they attempted to revive the boys using CPR, to no avail.
They found Doerman sitting on the steps outside of the home, the rifle he had used to kill his children set down beside him on one of the steps. Doerman, who was clad in a brown short-sleeved T-shirt and jeans, is shown lifting his hands as officers approach him. He was arrested and later charged with three counts of aggravated murder. It would later be revealed that he had premeditated the slaughter of his own children leading up to the event.
After being interviewed by detectives, Doerman was taken to the Clermont Count Jail. Initially Doerman was being held on a bond of $20 million, the highest bond in the county’s history, however, the judge, Judge Victor Haddad, ordered the suspect to be held without bail- a decision that was not resisted by Doerman's lawyers.
He was reportedly apprehended without a struggle and was compliant with the officers.
The children’s mother was transported to the University of Cincinnati Medical Center where she was treated for her injuries.
On June 22, 2023, the Clemont County Grand Jury returned an indictment for 9 counts of aggravated murder, 8 counts of kidnapping in the first degree and 4 counts of Felonious Assault in the 2nd degree.
The preliminary hearing took place on June 26, 2023.
Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty in Doerman's case, and Clermont County Prosecutor Mark Tekulve was quoted as saying: "My goal is to have this man executed for slaughtering these three boys,” at the hearing this month. According to Tekulve, the Doerman case will be the first to be death-penalty-eligible that Clermont County has seen in three decades.
According to the prosecutors, Doerman confessed to shooting his three boys, and admitted that he had been planning the murders for months. The disturbing details of the murders were shared by Tekulve, who stated that Doerman's middle child, Hunter, 4, was killed first after being shot in the head twice at the family home on Lourel Lindale Road.
After Hunter was murdered, Clayton, 7, attempted to run away and was shot from behind as he ran as fast as he could through a field near the residence and accidentally tripped and fell to the ground.
The youngest of the boys, Chase, 3, was torn from his mother’s arms and shot in the head.
Tekulve said of the sickening execution: “This is by far the most sickening, horrifying crime I have seen. I can only imagine the terror these little boys felt and experienced as their father, their protector, was murdering them.”
Chief prosecutor, David Gast, said of the case: “The trauma that this man has inflicted on his family, community, law enforcement, first responders, and all the rest of us is unspeakable. There has been a full admission in this case, the case is still new, we’re still discovering facts- but the evil horror of what we know is impossible to process. In an act of incomprehensible cruelty, the father that stands before you lined up his three young boys and executed them in his own home with a rifle. In an act of desperation, the mother at some point grabbed the gun the father was wielding to attempt to protect them.”
Chief Prosecutor David Gast, of the Clermont County Prosecutor's Office, said of Doerman's crimes: "This is the man that, every day, they woke up looking to for protection, love, guidance, a man they trust more than any other person on earth, a person they rely upon to keep them safe from harm. He was their world, he was their guardian, and he executed them in cold blood.”
Currently there has been no report of a motivation for the premeditated murder of the children.
According to Doerman’s father, Keith Doerman, who resides in Florida and visited the suspect just a week before the murders, Chad has no history of mental illness, nor a criminal record. Media outlets report that Chad Doerman did have a domestic violence charge circa 2010, however, the case is said to have been dismissed.
When asked about his son’s motivations for executing his own boys, Keith Doerman told the Independent: “I don’t know if it was financial, I don’t know if it was mental, I don’t know if it was work-related. I don’t know, I can’t talk to him.”
Despite the dropped domestic abuse charge, Keith Doerman described his son as "fun loving" and said "he wasn't that type of guy," going as far to call the family annihilator a "super father."
The boys enjoyed fishing, giggling, playing baseball together and playing with their pet dog.
Their funeral took place at First Baptist Church of Glen Este on Old State Road, Batavia, Ohio on Monday, Jun 26, 2023, at 8:00 PM, where the attendees wore bright colors in the children’s memory.
