Tragedy in the San Fernando Valley

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Last week Nina Shen Rastogi at Slate asked the question, “If we’re in the midst of a financial collapse, why aren’t executives jumping out of office buildings?”

Because the current situation hasn’t had nearly as devastating an effect on people’s personal finances. The Great Crash of 1929–and, to a lesser extent, the crash of 1987–did lead some people to commit suicide. But in nearly all of those cases, the deceased had suffered a major loss when the market collapsed. Now, due in large part to those earlier experiences, investors tend to keep their portfolios far more diversified, so as to avoid having their entire fortunes wiped out when stocks take a downturn. In addition, some of the worst declines in the past week have been limited to a smaller number of companies (such as Lehman Bros., Morgan Stanley, and Goldman Sachs), further limiting the potential damage to individual investors. [Link]

Sadly, we may be about to see people’s personal finances affected if things keep going bad. This afternoon there was tragic news out of the San Fernando Valley. An out-of-work Indian American financial advisor killed his wife, mother-in-law and three young sons before turning the gun on himself:

“We believe this to be a murder-suicide,” Moore said. “It appears [the gunman] killed his family and then took his own life.”

The bodies of the man’s 39-year-old wife, 70-year-old mother-in-law, and three sons — ages 19, 12 and 7 — were found inside the home’s various bedrooms. Authorities had earlier said that one of the victims was the gunman’s mother but now say it was his mother-in-law.

Friends and neighbors identified the couple as Karthik and Subasri Rajaram, who had lived in the neighborhood for a few years.

Moore said police believe that the gunman shot the victims sometime after 6 p.m. Saturday, and that he had left behind three letters indicating that he had carried out the killings. One letter, addressed to law enforcement, confessed to the shootings. He wrote a second letter to friends. The third letter, police said, appeared to be a will.

Moore said Rajaram had previously worked for Price Waterhouse and Sony Pictures and “had attested to some financial difficulties,” Moore said. “He had become despondent over his financial” situation…

One of the young victims, Ganesha Rajaram, 12, was a 7th grade honors student at Alfred B. Nobel in Northridge, which he had attended for the last two years, said Principal Robert Coburn. His parents were very involved in his education, frequently interacting with teachers and never showing any signs that anything was amiss, he said. [Link]

Of course it is pure speculation at this point to assume that Mr. Rajaram’s financial woes are directly related to the current bear market, but the San Fernando Valley was one of the hardest hit in the sub-prime debacle. Hopefully this remains an isolated incident and not a national trend.

67 thoughts on “Tragedy in the San Fernando Valley”

  2. 50 · Branch Dravidian said

    To the “how did he do it” posters… I’m guessing he started killing when there were only one or two family members in the house and then ambushed each of the others as they returned home…

    Each one was killed in their own room. The father must have used either a silencer or gone abt murdering at the dead of the night when everybody in the family were fast asleep so that nobody could hear the gun-shot as the other members were being killed ? Don’t 19yrs olds and mother-in-law lock their bedroom while sleeping ? I hope the post-mortem revelas the time each one was killed. Or is that the house is so huge that nobody in the house can hear a gun-shot in the other rooms ?

  3. I think the “how he did it” is less important than WHY he did it. The whole issue of mental illness and the south asian community is getting lost here-it’s such a large issue that we as a community often don’t spend any time looking at. It doesn’t happen to us and we don’t have any problems in our community with mental health is often what we hear and there are so little resources for people out there that often find themselves in such desperate situations. Did he have anybody that he could have talked to about this? Anybody that would have listend to the the pressure that he must have felt inside? Such a sad story.

  4. I don’t think mental illness played as large a role as a distorted sense of cultural duty, and I feel Amrita’s comment (2) is right on. I am almost certain that this man, once having made the decision that he would commit suicide (different topic altogether), had a vision about the future of his family. His wife, perhaps married at a young age and unable to properly support herself, would struggle. His sons, two of which are children and the eldest he might still see as a child, would be helpless. Mother-in-law would have to return to India…

    So I think this is less of a case of mental illness as it is conservative man under pressure

  5. It is a tragedy. He had no right to take the lives of others. It is obvious he waited too long until he completely lost his mind and took such a drastic measure. It is a lesson for all. Being responsible means being able to put aside all our egos and false pride and be prepared and do anything to make a living.

  6. I think the “how he did it” is less important than WHY he did it….

    I think how he did it is also important because who knows it maybe just pure homicide by some third person and not murder-suicide. None of the information supplied by police/media seems to clearly explain how could he pull this off with nobody hearing the gun-shots within the house.

  7. @ Chetna,

    Our family knows this family personally. Shubha and Karthik were not certainly not lacking support from the community and there was never an indication to anyone that Karthik had any mental illness. None of us can get our head around this. Shuba was so vivacious through all her troubles even though she had a fair few. Her mother, poor lady, did not speak too much since she was hard of hearing. It just makes no sense to anyone of us.

  8. This was not a spur of the moment decision. It is a result of a mentally weak guy with an overdose of a warped versoin “one for all and all for one” complex when it comes to his family.

    “His narrative is one of talking about this tragedy befalling him and his contemplation of an available exit or solution,” Moore said. “One is taking his own life and the other is taking the lives of his family and himself. … He talked himself into the second strategy, believing that was, in effect, the honorable thing to do.” Moore said the several-page narrative appeared to have been written over a period of time. “This was something that was not a spur-of-the-moment type of event,” he said. Moore said it was clear to police that the family members were close and “had an affection for each other.” He said the parents had given up their master bedroom to their eldest — who was spending the weekend home from college — “out of respect.”

    The guy had to know his eldest son was going to be a big shot in whatever pursuit he chose. It looks like he weighed all the options and still found this to be the best option. Having your sense of pride wrapped up in your career and financial health is fucked up.

  9. At risk of being labelled the resident conspiracy theorist, I refuse to believe that it was a murder(s)-suicide. It’s next to impossible to kill five people in different rooms in the house with a gun, without a silencer (and the gun did not have it). At the first shot, someone almost everyone in their rooms will freeze. At the second, at least one or two people will have a flight-or-fight response. Each one was killed in their own room. The father must have used either a silencer or gone abt murdering at the dead of the night when everybody in the family were fast asleep so that nobody could hear the gun-shot as the other members were being killed ? Don’t 19yrs olds and mother-in-law lock their bedroom while sleeping ? I hope the post-mortem revelas the time each one was killed. Or is that the house is so huge that nobody in the house can hear a gun-shot in the other rooms ? Just making a wild-guess though the police may have verified it…I suppose the note that he left is his own handwriting (and not forged) or else it could have been just murder by some third person. Moor Nam, do you think there’s a way he might have killed them all one room, laid everyone out separately and then killed himself? It’s pretty weird to leave a bunch of mysteries like that behind,

    Guys, don’t lose your sleep over this issue, its pointless. He could have easily drugged the family and killed them in their sleep.

  10. 54 · Casey Lucchese said

    I don’t think mental illness played as large a role as a distorted sense of cultural duty,

    I disagree– I believe mental illness can often play a HUGE role when it comes to murder suicides–regardless of ones cultural identity.

    One of my biggest soapbox issues is South Asian Mental Health Issues– or namely, the lack of information and open discussion of it.

  11. 59 · brawn said

    Guys, don’t lose your sleep over this issue, its pointless. He could have easily drugged the family and killed them in their sleep

    This may very well be a murder-suicide but I hope the media keeps a tab on such logical questions and not pass it off as one-time sensational story. I am not questioning the competency of the police but tomorrow a homicide may very well be passed off as murder-suicide. For e.g. just reading the recent news I haven’t able to figure how an Indian student in Missouri who commits a murder-suicide can fall into a lake with a gun-shot wound ? Is it so easy for a student to get a gun. If so then it is scary.

  12. 59 · brawn said

    He could have easily drugged the family

    Hope the media covers that story from the police after the post-mortem.

  13. Dude, murder suicides happen every day back in the Desh. BFD. Just the other day some idiot took out his whole family AND both his in-lays in TN by mixing pesticide into the “juice”. It’s gotta be a cultural thing. The desi reponse to massive stress, I guess.

  14. Venkat, you mean he poisoned them first, rather than drugged them the way brawn figured it out, so the gunshot to the head was just to make sure? If he thought that hard about it, there had to be something about himself that he didn’t want them to know.

  15. I am truly amazed by all the desi Angela Lansburies on this thread that this tragedy seems to have unearthed. Although their methodology seems closer in spirit to Bill Frist. At least, that guy had a videofeed and conversations with the family, to work with.

  16. conspiracy theory? maybe maybe not.

    forget financial troubles. It being LAPD, ow about they came across a homicide case, decided that it is simply easir to just close it off as a’financial’ suicide etc, and close the file? What proof that he himself did they killing? yeah yeah letters wills whatnot – come on, ‘They’ are no better than a third world country when it comes to financial trickery, we know now, why not in this too?

    Looks lke ‘ oh some eeendian guy seems killed, close the file somehow already’ attitude. No one is giong to hold candle light vigils for him neighbour might not even know their names..

  17. i knew this family closely.did not suspect this drastic measure by kartik.he was unemployed.but that does not mean he had any financial problems.he was extremely brillant,where he read the markets very well. insecurity must be the cause to this drastic act!