Bitter Indiana Divorce Believed to Prompt Plane Crash Killing Father and Young Daughter
Indiana police believe that a plane crash killing a father and his young daughter earlier this week was caused by the man’s bitterness about his divorce last year. 47-year-old Eric Johnson crashed the single-engine Cessna plane that he was piloting on Monday into his former mother-in-law’s house, killing himself and his 8-year-old daughter Emily. An Associated Press story detailed that Johnson had obtained his pilot license last November, the same month in which his divorce with his wife of 12 years, Beth, was finalized. The couple had gone through a bitter divorce in which Beth obtained a restraining order last July.
Both Eric and Beth Johnson shared custody of Emily, alternating weekends. When Eric did not bring Emily to school on Monday, Beth filed a missing persons report before learning of the crash. Vivian Pace, the mother of Beth and owner of the house in which the plane crashed, said in the story that her daughter reached Eric Johnson on his cell phone shortly before the crash. Pace said that Eric told Beth that he had their daughter, and that she was not going to get her. Pace also detailed a claim that Beth could hear Emily in the background asking for her mother to come get her.
Indiana State Police 1st Sgt. Dave Bursten said that accounts of the plane’s movements before the crash and the fact that it crashed into Pace’s house raised some serious questions. While police are investigating the case as a suicide and homicide, investigators are going to also examine whether mechanical failure was a factor in the crash.
Pace alleged that Eric Johnson did not want the divorce and even tried to convince Beth to not go through with it last summer by threatening her with a gun while Emily was with relatives in Iowa. While Beth obtained a restraining order on July 14, 2006, police did not disclose the reasons for it. One neighbor of the couple said that police cars were parked outside of their home for several weeks last summer. We’ll keep you updated on the latest developments surrounding this disturbing story.
