Robin and Margaret Bain and three of their children were killed on June 20, 1994, in their New Zealand home. This was familicide; a mass murder where one member of the family killed the others. Ever since the oldest son David returned home from his paper delivery route and called the police that morning, there has been debate over who was responsible.

David Bain was 22-years-old, a music student and aspiring opera singer living with his family. When he got home early that morning, he found all five of his family members dead: his father Robin, his mother Margaret, his two sisters Arawa and Laniet, and his brother Stephen.  At first glance, it appeared that the father, Robin, was responsible, and that this was a murder-suicide.  But that would change.

Join us at the quiet end for The Only One Who Deserved to Stay: David Bain. Familicide is rare. But when it happens, the father is nearly always responsible. Research has shown that these “family annihilators” are either angry or in a state of prolonged despair.  Robin Bain, a troubled man with untreated depression, fit the profile. But the lives and relationships of the Bain family were complicated and maladjusted. David Bain had plenty of his own issues; and evidence, including his own behavior, pointed to David as the killer.

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The Bain Family

Sources

Black Hands by Martin Van Beynen

Black Hands, The Podcast, by Martin Van Beynen, July 2017

The Court of Appeal of New Zealand, David Cullen Bain v. The Queen, May, 2007

The Mask of Sanity by Joseph Karem