
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, July 18, 1990                   TAG: 9007180275
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-8   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE: PHILADELPHIA                                LENGTH: Short

PHYSICIAN KILLS SELF, FAMILY WITH IV SOLUTION

A physician used an intravenous solution to kill his ailing wife, two children and himself in a bedroom of their mansion, police said Tuesday.

Dr. Anthony Paul, 49, left a suicide note at his office and at his three-story house in the affluent Chestnut Hill section, police said.

The notes referred to financial difficulty and to the medical problems of his wife, Melanie, 47, and daughter, Medhina, 17, said Detective Lt. Thomas Quinn.

"He decided to take the family with him," Quinn said. "He indicated he didn't want to leave his son as a ward of the state."

The son, Rajiva, was 12.

The bodies were found Tuesday in a bedroom, intravenous solution bags on the wall and individual IV tubes in the arms of each victim, police said.

A copy of the suicide note was discovered Tuesday morning at the Fox Chase Cancer Center, where Paul had worked for 15 years, said spokesman Eric Rosenthal. He said Melanie Paul suffered from arthritis, and their daughter had a learning disability.

- Associated Press

by CNB