Hochman murder-suicide: Mom says 'coward' husband took her daughters

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HARRISON - Anamarie DiPietro knows the worst day of her life will remain with her forever.

Last Feb. 21, her husband, recently retired White Plains Police Officer Glen Hochman, killed two of their daughters - Alissa Marie, 18, and Deanna Nicole, 14 - before turning the same gun on himself inside the family's Adelphi Avenue home.

"I didn’t lose my children," DiPietro recently told The Journal News/lohud.com. "They were taken from me by a coward. Not a day goes by that I don't think about two of my girls. They were sleeping in their beds where they were supposed to be safe. They are not here because someone who was supposed to protect them didn’t."

The Harrison Ambulance Corps will soon honor the memories of her two daughters with a bench outside the organization's headquarters on Pleasant Ridge Road. The bench will be illuminated with a spotlight, and surrounded by flowers and trees. The dedication ceremony is planned for Dec. 20, on what would have been Alissa's 19th birthday.

Alissa volunteered for the ambulance company, along with two local fire departments, and had been a member of its junior explorers. A scholarship has been created there for potential members, and one of two new ambulances carries the names of her and her sister.

Their mother is grateful.

"It's time for me to start focusing on how they lived their lives rather than how they died," their mother said. "The bench dedication and scholarship are positive things."

"This is something that will be with me for the rest of my life," she said.

DiPietro and her eldest daughter Samantha, 22, were away on an overnight trip when Hochman killed the girls and the family's three dogs before killing himself. He had retired Jan. 30 after 22 years with the White Plains Police Department.

The Harrison police investigation's forensic tests confirmed he fired the .40 caliber Glock handgun, according to police reports obtained by The Journal News/lohud.com. He was found dead inside the garage on bloodied car mats.

He smashed his computers and hid the hard drives. Police found the devices but they did not contain any information explaining his actions. He left a suicide note of five to six pages inside the house indicating he had planned the killings and setting out specific financial information for his wife, police said.

Harrison Police Chief Chief Anthony Marraccini said toxicology reports did not show Hochman had been drunk or under the influence of drugs at the time.

The carnage came a day after DiPietro filed a police report stating that she and her husband had a nonviolent argument over an $80 phone bill. Police said the couple had discussed separating.

Police never could pin down exactly why Hochman killed his daughters, with Harrison Police Chief Anthony Marraccini saying: "It's not justice, that's for sure. It's not fair."

"The family has suffered so much tragedy," he said.

Marraccini said the officers who responded to the tragic scene and the community are also still living with the aftermath.

"We offered a lot of support for the officers," he said. "The healing process takes time."

Harrison Mayor Ron Belmont said the tragedy galvanized the community, which rallied behind the family with prayer services and emotional support.

"We helped them get through their ordeal and they helped us get through our ordeal," Belmont said.

Harrison EMT Chief Joe Bilotto said the memorial bench will be unveiled at a candlelight ceremony.

"We're never going to forget or get over this," he said.

"Alissa touched our lives," he said. "We will always have a place we can reflect."

DiPietro,a teacher, said she saw Alissa, a Harrison High School senior, growing into a strong young woman, dedicated to helping others.

Her youngest daughter remained "a work in progress" who enjoyed working during the summer at a nursery school, DiPietro said.

"They paid her and she was so proud," DiPietro recalled. As far as her future, "She didn't know what she wanted. She had a lifetime of choices."

DiPietro has since sold the Adelphi Road house and moved away, but said the support the family received from the Harrison community has been overwhelming. Her mother, Barbara, works at the ambulance corps.

She mentioned that she went back into the house just days after the murders.

"I needed to go in and make peace," DiPietro said. "I needed to see where my girls were. We had family dinners in that house. We were happy. Now, it stopped being our home and became just a house."

Now she writes down her thoughts for the outside world on her Facebook page. She said she and Samantha are "making our way."

"It's day by day, minute by minute and second by second," DiPietro said. "Both of us are trying to find our way."

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