Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, July 22, 1995 TAG: 9507240034
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: RICHARD FOSTER STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
In the early afternoon of July 11, Marlon DeTuncq was sitting at a typewriter, trying to make sense of the financial problems from his failed marriage.
As he worked on the document, he talked on the telephone with his 38-year-old son, Jordan, who lives in Annapolis, Md.
"My dad was a terrible, miserable wreck," Jordan DeTuncq said.
Twelve hours later, Marlon DeTuncq was dead.
Around 2 a.m. July 12, dressed in camouflage, he entered the house of Richard Farkas, a retired psychologist who had been dating DeTuncq's estranged wife, Maralene. Farkas, still wearing his pajamas, met DeTuncq in a hallway. The two men shot it out. DeTuncq was killed, and Farkas was mortally wounded. He died three days ago at Roanoke Memorial Hospital.
Marlon DeTuncq's next-door neighbors at the lake describe him as a kind, gentle man who complained about violence on TV. He helped with chores and did small repair jobs for people.
His old friends say they never saw him exhibit any kind of violent behavior.
That's what has his children so confused.
"He went overboard. He must've lost it. That's all I can think," Brad DeTuncq said.
Born in 1929, Marlon DeTuncq grew up in northern Michigan. He graduated from the University of Michigan and later earned a law degree from George Washington University in Washington, D.C., though he never practiced law.
He and his wife, Phyllis, had two sons, Bradley and Jordan, and a daughter, Pam. The family lived in Maryland, and Marlon commuted to Washington, where he worked as a personnel director for the General Services Administration.
In the early 1970s, he was transferred to the GSA's Office of Federal Supply and Services after he stood up to supervisors who pressured him to hire people based on political affiliation instead of their qualifications, his former manager said.
"I thought it took a fair amount of judgment and backbone," said Bill Foote, who also was DeTuncq's close friend for 25 years.
In 1981, DeTuncq and his wife divorced. About three years later, he retired as a senior executive from the GSA. In 1991, he met Maralene McEwen.
DeTuncq's children say he and McEwen met through a personal ad. McEwen had just left her second husband, and had four children -three sons and a daughter -from a previous marriage.
Robert McEwen, her second husband, was an accountant who owned properties including a popular Tex-Mex restaurant and bar on Chesapeake Bay called Armadillo's. In the early 1980s, Maralene and Robert McEwen retired to Montserrat, a Caribbean island in the British West Indies.
The couple bought a beer and wine store called the Empire Shop, which Maralene managed until she divorced McEwen and moved back to the United States in 1990. When she met DeTuncq, - who was 12 years older - she was working as a legal secretary in Baltimore.
Less than a month after they met, Marlon and Maralene got married.
After a brief honeymoon in Atlantic City, they returned to Maryland, where they bought two adjoining row houses. Marlon, a skilled woodworker and craftsman, fixed up both houses and sold one. In 1992, the couple bought a house at Smith Mountain Lake.
They settled into a quiet life. Marlon found time to read and work in his wood shop. He put in a hi-fi system so could listen to his collection of classical records while he worked. Maralene took a job with a lawyer and later turned to selling real estate.
Maralene DeTuncq did not return phone calls and told a friend that she did not want to be interviewed. Her children also refused to be interviewed.
At first, the problem was the grandchildren, according to Marlon DeTuncq's daughter, Pam.
Marlon DeTuncq made a deal with Maralene that none of his grandchildren under the age of 2 would be allowed to visit at the lake, his children said.
Marlon DeTuncq loved his grandchildren and made toys and knickknacks for them in his wood shop at the lake, his daughter said. "At our house, Dad would throw the ball with the kids. [But] Maralene was very jealous."
Old friends noticed other changes in Marlon.
"He was completely swept away with her from Second One," said Charles Brown, a fishing and hunting buddy who worked with Marlon DeTuncq at the GSA. "My relationship with Marlon distanced itself because of his being married to Maralene."
Foote, the friend and former supervisor from the GSA, visited the lake last December so he and Marlon DeTuncq could fish for striped bass. The DeTuncqs bickered often during the visit, Foote said.
In February, Marlon and Maralene DeTuncq visited Marlon's daughter, Pam, who lived in California at that time.
They had visited before, Pam said, but this time was different.
Her father and his wife argued a lot and were spending more money than Pam thought they could afford.
Two weeks before the visit to California, Pam said, Marlon and Maralene DeTuncq had vacationed in Mexico. Then they were buying jewels.
"My father was on a fixed income. They were on a pension. They were living well beyond their means," Pam said.
Marlon bought Maralene an expensive-looking ring early in their visit. He said it was for her birthday, which was in May. He told Maralene she could wear it only one day, but she wouldn't take it off, Pam said.
"Dad said, 'That's so I have to get her another present on her birthday,''' she said.
At Smith Mountain Lake, Marlon and Maralene DeTuncq had set aside money to buy a boat and a new dock from a $15,000 check Marlon received from the government for a real estate transaction, Brad DeTuncq said. But when they got back from California, Marlon realized all the money was gone.
In April, Marlon's mother died. While he was in Michigan for the funeral, his children say, Maralene sent him a letter saying she was leaving.
"My dad was emotionally distressed," Brad DeTuncq said. His father drafted letters asking Maralene to come back, he said, and read them to his children, looking for advice.
"He was so broken up," Pam said. "He loved her dearly."
The separation lasted a short while.
During the reconciliation, Marlon was more than generous, Brad said. The couple stayed at the Hotel Roanoke, and he bought her jewels. They purchased a boat.
A month later, his children said, she left again.
"We were calming him down," Brad DeTuncq said. "He came to my house for a few days. He realized he was broke. ... We tried to talk him into getting a lawyer."
Just days before the shooting, Brad DeTuncq talked to his father on the phone. His father was depressed and thought Maralene was seeing another man, he said. Brad and Jordan promised to come over soon and help their father straighten out his finances.
"He said he still loved her. He still wanted her back," Brad DeTuncq said.
"He was in outer space," said Jordan DeTuncq.
"I think the light bulb went off," Pam said. "He sounded very sad. The realization had hit."
Keywords:
FATALITY
by CNB