EUSTIS – Two women are believed to have ended their lives and set their home on fire late Monday, hours after police were there to investigate a suicide note one of them had written.
Police believe that it was Barbara Jean Purnell, 52, and Linda McMillan, 59, whose bodies were found sitting in recliners early Tuesday morning, Maine State Police spokesman Steve McCausland said Tuesday.
A dog also died in the fire that was reported by a neighbor at 11:30 p.m. Monday at 29 Peabody Road, Eustis Fire Chief Rusty Fearon said Tuesday. The home was engulfed in flames when firefighters from Eustis and Carrabassett Valley arrived, he said.
The cause of death and identities are still pending results from the state medical examiner’s office, he said. The bodies were taken there for autopsies.
“We are looking at these deaths as likely a double suicide,” McCausland said, pending further information.
State police Trooper Scott Dalton had been to the home early Monday evening and talked to the women after police got a call from Purnell’s aunt in New Jersey, who had received what was essentially a suicide note from Purnell, McCausland said. The aunt asked police to check on her well-being, he said.
Purnell admitted to Dalton that she had written the note, but she said it was a mistake, and both women declined counseling, McCausland said. Dalton left, and three or four hours later the house was on fire, he said.
Four state fire investigators and a state police detective worked to try to determine the cause of the fire, McCausland said, but because of extensive damage they were unable to pinpoint the cause.
The likely scenario police are working on is that the fire had been set by one of the women, he said.
Yellow tape prohibiting people from going near the fire site Tuesday was strung across the end of a long dirt driveway that led to the home, which is at the end of a dead-end road off Route 27 and about two miles north of the Eustis Town Office.
A red sport utility vehicle that belonged to the women was beside the gutted home as rain and snow fell onto the driveway midmorning Tuesday.
McCausland said it didn’t appear the women had jobs in the area.
When firefighters arrived, Fearon said, flames were coming out through the windows and the roof, and part of the roof had already caved in.
The page that alerted firefighters to the fire informed them of the possibility that there were occupants in the house, Fearon said.
Although firefighters arrived within minutes of the call, the fire was too far advanced for them to make an interior attack, Fearon said.
McCausland said the women had lived at the home since 1993, and he was not aware of their having relatives in Maine.
Comments are no longer available on this story