Wash. pair pleads not guilty in slayings

A woman and her boyfriend pleaded not guilty Thursday to murdering six of her family members on Christmas Eve.

Prosecutors are deciding whether to seek the death penalty if the suspects, Michele K. Anderson and Joseph Thomas McEnroe, both 29, are convicted.

Investigators have said Anderson and McEnroe confessed to shooting her parents, her brother and his wife and that couple's two young children at her parents' home near Carnation, east of Seattle.

Prosecutors have given no motive, but said Anderson told detectives her brother owed her money and that she was upset because her parents did not take her side. She also said her parents were pressuring her to start paying rent for staying on their rural property.

According to charging papers, when the pair arrived at the home of Anderson's parents, McEnroe shot her father, Wayne, 60, in the head. Her mother, Judy, 61, rushed out from where she had been wrapping presents, and McEnroe killed her, too, the papers said.

The pair hid the bodies, and when Anderson's brother Scott arrived with his wife, Erica, both 32, and their two children, 5-year-old Olivia and 3-year-old Nathan, Michele and McEnroe shot them, the charging documents say. McEnroe apologized to the two children as he shot them in the head, according to prosecutors.

The two were arrested when they returned to the home in rural Carnation, east of Seattle, the day after Christmas, as detectives were processing the crime scene.

Each suspect is charged with six counts of aggravated first-degree murder.

Deputy Prosecuting Attorney James Konat asked Michele Anderson and McEnroe whether they understood each charge against them. The defendants answered yes in barely audible voices. At one point Konat said to Anderson, whose long brown hair hung down in front of her face, "I'm sorry, you'll have to answer out loud."

Their lawyers entered the pleas of not guilty on their behalf.

Family members of the victims, including Anderson's one surviving family member — her sister — and friends sat in the courtroom separated from the defendants by a pane of glass. They held each other and wept.

After the hearing, the family rushed out of the courtroom, down the hall and into an elevator without speaking to news media.

The next hearing was set for Jan. 29.