TEWKSBURY — Maureen Mahoney has not lived in Tewksbury for a while, however she tries to come back again to her house city a few occasions a 12 months.
She moved to Florida in 1978, at first intending to stay there for less than a couple of 12 months, however then constructed her life there, bought married and had youngsters. Regardless of residing in Florida, her household’s identify stays without end tied to the city of Tewksbury.
Throughout her most up-to-date go to to Tewksbury Wednesday, Maureen met The Solar at The Place of Peace at Mahoney Park, a small sliver of land on the sting of Lengthy Pond as soon as owned by the Mahoney household, who gave it to the city. With a number of picnic tables, bushes, and a crowd of assorted waterfowl, the small park sits as a memorial to Maureen’s dad and mom, Hugh and Ruth, and her youthful brother, John, who have been all killed by three males in a house invasion on New 12 months’s Eve in 1975.
The city, with a inhabitants of about 25,000 on the time, was roiled by the murders of the Mahoney household, who have been all nicely revered on the town. Maureen, 21 then, was the one who found the killings when she returned house along with her two sisters that evening earlier than racing to the police station to report it.
Six months later, after an in depth investigation, Robert Smith, then 26, Robert Wilson, 27 and Terrance Milan, 29, have been arrested, charged, and later convicted within the murders.
Dropping her dad and mom and youthful brother undoubtedly formed the remainder of the lives of Maureen and her surviving siblings, and it took them a very long time to come back to phrases with the tragedy.
“First, it completely destroyed my life. It was a long time to actually be able to get to the point where I could do the 40th anniversary in 2015,” mentioned Maureen. “It was a long, difficult process to be able to grapple with what happened, and not sort of run away from it, or not think about it.”
It was across the similar time Maureen determined she lastly needed to have a correct memorial ceremony for her dad and mom and brother, which drew 300 individuals to the Tewksbury Nation Membership. In that very same 12 months, the city started sustaining Mahoney Park, marking the Place of Peace as a memorial to the slain members of the family.
“I was really moved by how much emotion came up for people, and I can’t count the number of folks who told me it was a healing experience for them to come together as a community,” mentioned Maureen. “Because when this murder happened, the whole town was just shaken to the core, and I don’t think it has ever been the same.”
With the fiftieth anniversary now approaching, Maureen plans to do one thing related, this time with a ceremony on Oct. 9 on the Indian Ridge Nation Membership. The ceremony can even mark 10 years of labor Maureen and the Mahoney Household Fund Committee have achieved to analysis the core causes and causes individuals like Smith, Wilson and Milan come to commit the type of violence they did to the Mahoneys 50 years in the past.
“We started looking at the core of violence. How does a person become like this? It often starts when they are very young and exposed to violence,” mentioned Maureen. “I have a saying: violence begets violence, peace begets peace. If kids grow up in violent homes, they are much more likely to continue that cycle.”
The committee has achieved this work with assist from nonprofits in Higher Lowell, Boston and Lawrence.
“We’ve been doing that month-in and month-out over the past decade, doing all sorts of workshops and events, and webinars during COVID, and I think it has been impactful,” mentioned Maureen.
After a few years, and various kinds of remedy, Maureen mentioned she has come to phrases with what Smith, Wilson and Milan did to her household.
“I was finally able to come to a place where I understood, not with compassion or forgiveness but with understanding, these men,” mentioned Maureen. “They were very evil people that did this.”
At one level within the interceding years between the murders and now, Maureen mentioned somebody instructed she go into the jail to take a seat down with one of many three males.
“No, I can’t do that. I don’t know what purpose that would serve,” mentioned Maureen. “From police records and detective records, they showed no sign of remorse.”
Maureen nonetheless works as a medical nutritionist, however mentioned when she does finally retire she desires to proceed doing the work along with her committee, discovering the foundation causes and methods to stop the cycle of home violence. That work, Maureen mentioned, is motivated by the type of generosity her dad and mom and brother have been identified for.
“My father, financially I know he helped a lot of people, and never expected and sometimes never did get it back. My friends and people say ‘your mother was always ready to drive us where we wanted to go, and was baking cookies,’ and kids loved to come to my house after school,” mentioned Maureen.
After they have been killed, Maureen mentioned one of many nurses who labored underneath her father informed her he would inform individuals to not fear if they might not pay on the hospital.
“He was always there when someone needed him, and the same thing for my mother. From the friends of my brother, John, he just had a heart of gold,” mentioned Maureen. “He would have his group of friends, but the younger brothers of the friends would want to tag along to play hockey, go skate on the pond, play football, and John was always helping out the ones who were left behind.”
The Oct. 9 commemoration will function a fundraiser for the committee, with any cash raised going again to the group via the Higher Lawrence Group Motion Council. It can characteristic visitor audio system Middlesex District Legal professional Marian Ryan and former Boston Police Division Commissioner Ed Davis, who had beforehand served because the Lowell Police Division superintendent. Earlier than that, Davis was working as a safety guard at St. John’s Hospital on New Years Eve, 1975, as Dr. Hugh, Ruth and John Mahoney have been introduced into the ER.
“[Davis] was there, he saw. Afterwards, when he was interviewed, he would say ‘Dr. Mahoney would come into the hospital, and he would always say hello, and be very gracious.’ He spoke to everyone in the same manner and with the same respect, whether it was a fellow surgeon, a security guard or a janitor,” mentioned Maureen, referring to her father. “And that is the type of person he was.”
The foundation causes that carry individuals to violence and crime are very doubtless the identical as they have been in 1975, however within the web and social media period, Maureen mentioned she thinks there may be “a lot more isolation” amongst youth.
“I think fewer kids are outside, playing hockey, playing basketball, doing all that stuff, so I think the general lifestyle is probably more conducive to getting crazy ideas and acting on them,” mentioned Maureen. “There really hasn’t been a drastic change in domestic violence and child abuse. They continue to plague families across the country.”
Since 2022, the committee has been working with consultants from Boston Faculty and Tulane College, exploring a hyperlink between children being uncovered to corporal punishment and harsh self-discipline with post-traumatic stress dysfunction.
“So we have begun to really hone in on that, and getting parents, guardians, grandparents, whoever is taking care of the kids, to rethink discipline, and we have done many workshops on rethinking discipline,” mentioned Maureen. “Because there is a statistic that 70% of all child abuse begins with the adult aiming to discipline the child. It doesn’t work, it teaches the kids not to get caught, because they are not truly understanding, the brain shuts down and they are in their fight or flight response, learning can’t really take place.”
The precise goal for any funds raised via the fiftieth anniversary occasion, Maureen mentioned, might be for a marketing campaign geared toward selling “positive parenting.”
Whereas she acknowledges it’s a lofty aim, Maureen mentioned she and the committee idealize a world with out the type of violence that befell her household 50 years in the past.
“It’s a tall order, but we are staying on the path, and I think that my parents and my brother would be very proud of what we’re doing, and that gives me a knowingness and a perception that I am doing the right thing,” mentioned Maureen.
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