On March 30, 1975, Easter Sunday, James Ruppert murdered 11 family members in his mother’s house at 635 Minor Ave, Hamilton, Ohio, in what has come to be called the Easter Sunday Massacre. He is now serving two life sentences at the Allen Correctional Institution.

Ruppert’s early life was pretty crappy. His mother Charity would tell him that she would have rather had a daughter, and his father Leonard had a violent temper and didn’t care much about James or his brother Leonard Jr. Leonard Sr. died in 1947 when James was 12.

Leonard Jr became the father figure in the house,  And pretty much made life Hell for James while growing up. Things got so bad, that when he was 16, James tried to commit suicide by hanging himself with a sheet.

As an adult, Ruppert was described as a quiet and helpful man who was unremarkable, with no police record. James was jealous of his older brother’s good job and family life. He had flunked out of college after two years while his brother earned a degree in electrical engineering and did well in athletics. Leonard II also married his brothers ex-girlfriend, had eight children, and had a good job with General Electric, while James was unemployed at the age of 41 and had moved back in with his 65-year old mother Charity. Charity was fed up with her son not holding a job and his constant drinking; she threatened to evict him. James also owed his mother and brother money.

A month before the massacre, James asked about silencers for his weapons while he purchasing ammunition. His behavior was becoming more unstable…

The night before the murders, like most other nights,  James was out at the bar. At the 19th Hole Cocktail Lounge he talked with employee Wanda Bishop. She would later say that James told her he was frustrated with his mother’s nagging and his upcoming eviction, and that he needed to solve the problem. He left the bar at 11:00 PM that night and came back later. When Bishop asked him if he had solved the problem, he told her “No, not yet.” He stayed at the bar until it closed at 2:30 AM.

On Easter Sunday, March 30, 1975, Charity Ruppert’s older son Leonard II was visiting her house on Minor Avenue. He and his wife Alma brought their 8 children (ranging in age from 4 to 17) to see their grandmother.

Leonard Ruppert II’s younger brother James was upstairs in the 2-story house sleeping off his previous night of drinking while the other family members enjoyed an Easter egg hunt in the front yard. Upon entering the house, Charity Ruppert began fixing sloppy dinner  while Leonard and Alma sat at the kitchen table. Most of the children were in the living room at this time.

Around 4:00 PM, James woke up, loaded a .357 Magnum, two .22 caliber handguns and a rifle and went downstairs. He entered the kitchen and shot and killed his brother Leonard. James then killed his sister-in-law Alma and his mother Charity as she tried to stop him. Next, he killed of his nephew David and his nieces Teresa and Carol.

He then went into the living room where he killed his niece Ann and his 4 other nephews Leonard, Michael, Thomas, and John.

After waiting 3 hours in the house, James finally called police to report the shooting.

Eventually, the house was cleaned up and new owners moved in. They supposedly left after hearing voices and other unexplained noises. But the house has had other owners since, and is occupied now, so don’t harass the current owners.

This info is all over the web, but I got this off of Wikipedia, since they seemed to have the most concise version of the story, so I used theirs .