Angela Meeks insists her brother wasn’t a “scary monster” who suddenly snapped.
“That wasn’t the truth,” she told me Monday night. “He had been battling mental illness for most of his life. This tragedy may have been as little as a misunderstanding between himself and his brain.”
This misunderstood tragedy involved her younger brother, Eric Meeks, 34, shooting and killing their parents, John and Olga Meeks, before taking his own life, police say. The murder-suicide domestic incident, as police described it, took place in the couple’s Merrillville home sometime between Friday night and Saturday morning.
“I have no idea how or where he got a gun,” said Angela Meeks, who lives in Novato, Calif., near San Francisco. “As a result of my brother’s mental health issues, he should not have had access to a gun. There was not a gun in the house.”
Police are still investigating who had ownership of the gun, and how Eric Meeks got in possession of it. A much tougher task is determining a motive for the shootings.
We may never know what prompted Eric Meeks to kill his parents and then himself. It all hinges on his mental illness, his sister told me.
“Due to this, I want to convey how important it is that we, as a community, understand mental illness, and that we stop stigmatizing it,” she said. “We (need to) learn to embrace mental health care like we embrace physical health care. We should be conscious and aware of our community members with mental issues and not be afraid of them or hide them.”
Mental illness is not painted in the broad brushstrokes of black and white, she noted. It is best understood in the complex hues of gray, a sometimes murky world Eric Meeks had to deal with on a daily basis.
“He may not have been able to cope with what was going on in his mind, (or) body, and he knew how devastating that would be,” his sister said. “And how (our parents) would blame themselves if he was gone and they were not.”
On Friday, Eric Meeks abruptly left his job at Gary Sportsman’s Club in Crown Point, the club’s manager said. Meeks apparently learned of something going on at his parents’ home and left in a rush.
Only God may know what he learned that moment or what compelled him to later shoot and kill his parents, the biggest supporters in his life. Parents are too often blamed or punished for their unconditional love for a child. It’s a double-edged sword that comes with being a loving, caring parent.
“He loved our parents and they adored him back,” Angela Meeks said. “Eric was my mother’s last child, the baby. She held him close and he was happy to stay close.”
Eric Meeks lived in a residential facility in Hobart, operated by Regional Mental Health Center.
“He had his own apartment … and within those four years he thrived … as part of a great program,” Angela Meeks said.
“Unfortunately, he had a sickness in his brain at a time and place where his environment didn’t understand enough knowledge to get him the help he needed early on,” she said. “He achieved so much when he finally got the help he needed. He spent the last few years independent and proud of himself.”
She remembered her brother as a sweet, humble and considerate boy who grew into the same sort of man.
“His true self was very loving, very caring,” she said. “He had friends and neighbors that he checked on and gave rides to.”
Eric Meeks was proud to be associated with the Knights of Columbus, his sister said, and his Facebook page often noted it. His last social media post, however, cited the death of a fellow knight.
“Today is the wake for a friend, a brother knight was the loyal recording secretary for our council,” Meeks wrote Feb. 4. “Bob died Saturday, too soon. He will be missed.”
Otherwise, his Facebook page offered no clues of anything going wrong in his life leading up to his actions at his parents’ home.
“My brother did not snap,” Angela Meeks insisted. “I’m not sure if it was any one moment. In terms of mental illness, snapped is just not an appropriate way to express his behavior. There’s so much more to him than he just snapped.”
Audrey Finnearty of Merrillville, an old friend of Eric Meeks, told me, “None of us who knew him ever saw this coming.”
Isn’t this what we typically hear regarding such fatal outbursts? No red flags hoisted beforehand by family or friends. No clues or hints by the person struggling with mental illness.
According to the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, people with mental health issues are more likely to be victims of violence than perpetrators of violence.
But, as we learned again, there is no easily understandable rhyme or reason with mental illness. Suicide survivors such as Eric Meeks’ two sisters, including Cynthia Meeks who lives in the state of Washington, are left piecing together a puzzle that may forever remain unfinished.
“My heart is shattered in a million pieces,” Angela Meeks wrote Monday night on her Facebook page.
Her parents were loving, hard-working people, even into their mid 60s.
Jeff Mayer, who worked with John Meeks at NIPSCO’s Bailly Generating Station in Chesterton, said Meeks was a soft-spoken man who always had a good word to say about others.
“He was willing to help his co-workers with their jobs or training new employees,” Mayer said. “John was a hard worker, showed up on time, and never left early. He was proud of his family… a hard-working guy who wanted to provide the best for them.”
Angela Meeks agreed.
“My dad lived and worked to make his family happy. He worked very hard for us always striving to give all of us a better life. My brother knew this.”
“My brother died accomplished and independent,” she said. “Had he been the person he truly wanted to be, you may have never known his name.”
Twitter @jdavich
