MOUNT CLEMENS (AP) - A Detroit-area man who will spend the rest of his life in prison with no chance of parole for strangling his wife and two children with a cable told a judge Tuesday that he failed as a husband and a father.
Timothy Fradeneck, 38, was sentenced in Macomb County Circuit Court. His wife, Christie, 8-year-old son, Timothy, and 2-year-old daughter, Celeste, were found dead last April in their Eastpointe home.
Fradeneck pleaded guilty in January, saying he was mentally ill. The plea qualifies him for mental health care in prison.
"I failed myself when I failed to protect my family from myself," he told Judge Diane Druzinski. "I let the despair that I felt in my head eclipse the love I felt in my heart."
Fradeneck told police he tried to take his own life by ingesting pills and starting a fire, but that he fell asleep before the fire.
In Druzinski's courtroom Tuesday, family members held aloft photos of Christie Fradeneck and the two children.
Christie's sister, Courtney Zanni, told the court Tuesday that her sister was ready to leave Fradeneck after "he told her he wasn't going to go to work."
Killing her "was the single most ambitious thing this man has ever accomplished," Zanni said. "We don't believe his stories. He's a master storyteller. She was married to a monster."
Published: Thu, Mar 03, 2016
