Prosecutors say a Massachusetts man shot his mother dead after clashing over 84 foster cats in their home, then fled to Vermont while boasting in Snapchat texts.
Daily Mail reported that Ryan Hanafin, 22, is accused of firing a bullet into his mother Andria Hanafin’s head inside their Reading house, about 14 miles north of Boston.
Andria, 49 and a mother of three, was found lying in a pool of blood when her husband returned shortly after midnight on October 8. Middlesex District Attorney Marian Ryan said she was pronounced dead at the scene.
Prosecutors say the son and mother had been fighting often because he disliked the number of foster cats in the home. Eighty-four cats were later taken from the house to the Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.
On the morning before the shooting, Matthew Hanafin told his son to get a job and do something with his life. That same evening, Andria called her husband and stressed that she wanted their son to move out.
Matthew came home after a 12-hour shift and discovered her body. A 13-year-old child was at home when the 911 call went out. Another daughter was away at college.
CBS News reported that Andria had told a friend she was scared of her son, feared retaliation, and that he had ruined her life.
"he had ruined her life"
Police said the family had no history of visits from authorities before the shooting.
Investigators said Ryan sent Snapchat messages to a cousin after the alleged shooting.
"blew madre to pieces"
He also wrote that he “blew her s*** smooth off,” according to the same account from investigators. He then fled in a 2010 black Dodge Charger.
Authorities urged residents to use extreme caution if they encountered him and said he was potentially armed and dangerous. They later located him in Vermont, returned him to Reading, and found thousands of rounds of ammunition and a firearm in the car.
Earlier coverage of the Reading manhunt tracked the search as it crossed state lines.
A house search found 19 firearms in Ryan’s room, including a ghost gun and a 3D printer. He was charged with first-degree murder and assault and battery with a dangerous weapon.
A judge held him without bail on the murder charge and set $5,000 bail on an untraceable firearm charge. He pleaded not guilty to all counts at his first appearance in Woburn District Court and is due back November 10.
His attorney, Carolyn McGowan, did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Saturday.
The Boston Globe reported he most recently worked at a gun shop six months earlier and had previously attended a local university.
Crime stories out of Massachusetts keep returning to the same hard facts: weapons, warnings, and a body on the floor.
An adult son with an arsenal, a house packed with 84 cats, a mother who said she feared him, and no prior police file still ended with a first-degree murder charge. Courts exist to deliver the accountability the home never could.
