New Jersey Town: Why Us?

More details are emerging about what may have sparked a deadly shooting rampage by a Seaside Heights, N.J., police officer Wednesday.

Court records show one of the neighbors killed Tuesday by Edward L. Lutes Jr. was acquitted last year of sexually assaulting a member of Lutes' family.

It was another shock for the star-crossed New Jersey shore community of Dover Township, some 60 miles south of New York City and known most recently for its high childhood cancer rates.

The first shooting spree was bad enough: A retired police officer allegedly guns down his granddaughter and three neighbors.

The second one was frighteningly similar: A SWAT team officer fatally shot five neighbors before wounding his boss and then killing himself.

"We keep making the news, but it's always bad news," said Linda Maddalena, 60, a Town Hall secretary.

Police say the first round of mayhem in Dover Township occurred at the hands of John W. Mabie, 70, a former Newark police officer who moved here after retiring on disability. Acquaintances say he was tortured by the memory of a 1970 traffic accident in which his station wagon struck a go-cart, killing an 11-year-old boy.

On Feb. 21, he apparently snapped, locking his wife in the basement and walking out the door with a .38-caliber revolver, police said. He walked to his mother-in-law's house, allegedly shot and killed granddaughter Natalie Gingerelli, 22, and then went to each of his next-door neighbors' homes, fatally shooting three others, police say.

On Tuesday — six weeks later and one mile away — it happened again.

Lutes, 42, a veteran police officer in nearby Seaside Heights whose fiancée was killed last year in a traffic accident, walked out of his house and into the homes of two neighbors with whom he had feuded.

Armed with a police-issue automatic pistol, police said he fatally shot Dominick Galliano, 51, wife Gail Galliano, 49, and their son, Christopher Galliano, 25.

Authorities would not elaborate Wednesday on the nature of Lutes' feud with his neighbors.

According to court records cited by The Star-Ledger of Newark, Dominick Galliano was acquitted last year of sexually assaulting a girl in Lutes' family. She claimed that Galliano exposed himself and began fondling himself while Gail and Dominick Galliano baby-sat her in March 1999.

After shooting the Gallianos, Lutes then allegedly walked across the street to the home of Gary Williams, who had testified on behalf of Dominick Galliano at his trial, the Ledger reported. Police said Lutes killed Williams, 48, and his wife, Tina Williams, 46. All five victims were shot several times.

The Williams' 23-year-old son, who jumped out a back window to safety, flagged down police.

Next, Lutes drove 15 miles south to Barnegat, where police said he shot his boss — Seaside Heights Police Chief James Costello — as Costello headed to his car to drive to the scene of the latest killings.

Costello, who was shot in the wrist and the leg, was hospitalized in stable condition Wednesday night.

Neither Dover Township Police Chief Michael Mastronardy nor Executive Assistant Ocean County Prosecutor Gregory Sakowicz would say what prompted the shooting spree.

"He was a patrol officer, a fine officer who did his job well," said Capt. James Chaney, a co-worker. "I'm numb at this point, for the families and anybody who's suffering through this."

Seaside Heights Fire Chief Reece Fisher, who met Lutes when he was a firefighter in the 1980s, said Lutes was devastated by his fiancée's death a year ago.

"He was able to come back to the job, but who is to say what was going on inside of him?" Fisher said.

The blood bath ended when Lutes pulled his 1995 Buick Regal into the driveway of a stranger's home in a 55-and-over residential community and shot himself.

The owner of the home, who had no connection to Lutes, found the car's engine running when she came out about 10 a.m. Lutes was slumped behind the wheel.

"They're out of the blue, these things," said Pam Meagher, 40, a mother of two. "Now, you have to worry not only about crazies running around, but also police officers. It's upsetting."

The township was already coming to grips with the fact that leukemia, brain cancers and central nervous system cancer all occurred at higher-than-normal rates among the township's population of about 80,000.

From 1979 to 1995, 90 children in Dover Township were diagnosed with cancer — 23 cases more than researchers would normally expect to find. A study concluded that there was no single environmental cause for the high cancer rates, however, contaminated well water and chemical plant emissions were linked with some leukemia cases.

The cancer and shootings have given residents pause.

On Wednesday, instead of leaving her 10-year-old twins at the school bus stop on her way to work, Meagher asked a neighbor to take them. She may make a regular practice of it now, she said.

"It's a tragedy of the highest order," said William Polhemus, a former Seaside Heights police chief.