A Florida mother discovered her two young children and their father dead inside his Cocoa home on Wednesday afternoon when she arrived to collect them for her scheduled custody time, in a suspected murder-suicide that has left the family and community devastated.
Olivia Piccolo, 29, went to the home of her ex-husband, Joseph Dingwall, 37, to pick up their seven-year-old son, Remy, and five-year-old daughter, Aria. Instead, she found all three dead inside the residence.
Cocoa Police Chief Evander Collier IV said Piccolo had been scheduled to have custody of the children that day. When she arrived, she tried to contact Dingwall before going inside the house.
“The door was partially ajar and she went inside and found all three deceased,” Collier said during a press conference.
Investigators believe Dingwall was responsible for the deaths of the two children before taking his own life. Police have not publicly established a motive, and the investigation remains ongoing.
Records show that law enforcement officers had been called to Dingwall’s residence 11 times before the incident. The calls involved various medical matters and suspicious activities, according to police records.
A neighbour also reported hearing two gunshots at approximately 12:20 a.m. on Wednesday, around 12 hours before Piccolo arrived to collect her children.
The neighbour, Marcos Garcia, said his doorbell camera recorded Dingwall pacing outside the residence with a flashlight shortly after the gunshots were heard.
“Two gunshots. Two clear gunshots, and it was 12.20 a.m., midnight,” Garcia said.
The circumstances surrounding the gunshots and the events inside the home remain part of the investigation. Police have not publicly provided further details about what led to the deaths.
In the aftermath, a community fundraising campaign was established to help cover funeral expenses and support Piccolo. The organisers described Remy and Aria as the centre of their mother’s life, saying that anyone who knew her understood the importance of her children to her.
“Anyone who knew Olivia, even for a short amount of time, knew about her children. You couldn’t know Olivia without knowing how much Remy and Aria meant to her,” the organisers wrote on the fundraising page.
“They were her entire world. Her life revolved around them, and every part of her heart belonged to being their mother.”
The Cocoa Police Department has not announced a motive. Authorities continue to investigate the deaths of Dingwall and the two children.
