Dad ‘stabs dead his wife, their two kids and himself hours before son’s graduation’

Jeremy Koch (second from left), his wife and their two sons were found stabbed to death inside their Nebraska home on Saturday (Picture: Facebook)

A father stabbed his wife and their two children to death, and then turned the knife on himself, hours before the graduation ceremony of one of his sons.

Jeremy Koch, 42, killed his wife Bailey, 41, and their sons Hudson, 18, and Asher, 16, ‘before taking his own life’, according to the Nebraska State Patrol.

The family-of-four were found dead at their home in Lexington, around 9.45am on Saturday, and a knife recovered at the horrifying scene.

Hudson was set to walk in his high school graduation ceremony hours later.

Bailey’s mother, Lane Peg Kugler, said that seeing her daughter, son-in-law, and two grandsons lying in their beds dead ‘will haunt me the rest of my life’.

‘Jeremy had been fighting mental illness for many, many years. His depression had turned into psychosis,’ Kugler wrote on Facebook on Sunday afternoon.

‘It was not Jeremy that committed this horrific act. It was a sick mind.’

Kugler said her last conversation with her daughter was a few days ago and that the family was ‘preparing for Hudson’s graduation and reception’ and ‘it was going to be a wonderful day’.

Jeremy had been released from a mental hospital three days before his son’s graduation at Cozad High School.

Bailey was a special education teacher at Holdrege Middle School, and the school district remembered her as ‘a passionate educator, a caring colleague, and a bright presence in the school community’.

Cozad Public Schools stated that the ‘tragic situation that will deeply affect our Cozad community’ and that the high school graduation would continue as scheduled at 4pm.

During the ceremony, Superintendent Dr Dan Endorf acknowledged ‘bittersweet emotions’.

The state patrol is leading an investigation into the incident.

Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at [email protected].

For more stories like this, check our news page.