A high-profile Miami actual property agent, her two younger daughters and their father have been discovered stabbed to demise in a grotesque scene inside their house in what police consider was a murder-suicide.
Melanie Hyer, 46, her daughters — Savannah, 11, and Sienna, 8 — and their father, Ryan Charles Whiten, 42, have been discovered inside Hyer’s house in Doral, Fla., throughout a welfare verify on Tuesday evening, in accordance with the Miami-Dade Sheriff’s Workplace.
All 4 relations had sustained stab wounds, police mentioned.
“The Miami-Dade Sheriff’s Workplace Murder Bureau investigation is at the moment main detectives to consider this incident was a murder-suicide,” officers mentioned. “Investigators are persevering with to work carefully with the Miami-Dade County Medical Examiner’s Workplace because the investigation stays lively.”
Authorities are awaiting post-mortem outcomes from the Miami-Dade County Medical Examiner’s Workplace.
Hyer, initially from Manhasset, NY, labored as a probate actual property agent in South Florida, specializing in luxurious waterfront and industrial properties, and appeared as an trade skilled on a number of information retailers all through her profession, in accordance with her LinkedIn profile.
Hyer and Whiten had separated years earlier and have been co-parenting their daughters on the time of their deaths. Each had been married to different individuals however had since divorced, NBC6 reported.
Whiten’s ex-wife informed 7 Information Miami that the connection between Hyer and Whiten had been “poisonous” for years, and the 2 had been locked in a bitter battle over their daughters.
Nonetheless, Whiten’s ex-wife — who divorced him in 2024 and requested to not be recognized — mentioned she was “shocked” by the information, remembering him as somebody who was “all the time so candy together with his ladies and liked them deeply.”
She mentioned she had not noticed any indicators of violence between the 2, however mentioned Whiten feared Hyer would in the future take his daughters away from him.
“I don’t know what occurred,” she mentioned.
Whiten’s ex-wife mentioned he contacted her three weeks earlier than the deaths to say how grateful he was to have her in his life — a message she now believes was his method of claiming goodbye.
After information broke of the deaths, distinguished members of the group spoke out concerning the tragedy that rocked South Florida.
Doral Mayor Christi Fraga — who mentioned she knew Hyer and her daughters personally — known as their deaths an “unimaginable tragedy.”
“As a mom, and as somebody who personally knew and admired the loving and devoted mom on the heart of this tragedy, this loss feels particularly near house,” Fraga wrote in an Instagram submit.
Fraga additionally informed CBS Information that Hyer was “a light-weight of sunshine” who was “all the time keen to assist at college and to be concerned as a mother.”
Jeannette Acevedo-Isenberg, head of Downtown Doral Elementary the place each ladies have been college students, informed dad and mom Wednesday that grief counseling and emotional help animals can be accessible for anybody affected by their deaths.
“Each college students have been deeply liked by their faculty, their lecturers, and their friends,” Acevedo-Isenberg wrote in an electronic mail obtained by NBC6.
If you’re fighting suicidal ideas or are experiencing a psychological well being disaster and stay in New York Metropolis, you possibly can name 1-888-NYC-WELL totally free and confidential disaster counseling.
If you happen to stay outdoors the 5 boroughs, you possibly can dial the 24/7 Nationwide Suicide Prevention hotline at 988 or go to SuicidePreventionLifeline.org.
