Neo-Nazi ex-Marine kills four, including toddler, in murder-suicide, police say

A former Marine with ties to neo-Nazi and Minutemen groups shot four people, including a toddler, and then killed himself in a suburban Phoenix home, police reportedly said Thursday.

The Associated Press quoted Gilbert police spokesman Sgt. Bill Balafas as saying that police believed Ready, 39, was the gunman in Wednesday's shootings in a home in Gilbert.

Ready reportedly lived in the home with a woman who was among the dead and those killed included his girlfriend, her daughter and granddaughter and the daughter's boyfriend, according to media reports.

Reuters cited police as saying Ready, known as "J.T.," was a prominent border militia leader who founded the US Border Guard, a private-citizen militia that hunts for drug traffickers near the Mexican border and illegal immigrants in the desert south of Phoenix.

The Border Guard dress in military fatigues and body armor and carry assault rifles during patrols. 

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The Tucson Citizen named the girlfriend as Lisa Mederos, 47, and the others as her daughter Amber, 23, and her 15-month-old granddaughter, Lilly, and Amber’s fiance, Jim Hiott, 24, was also slain 

The paper also reported that there were signs of domestic abuse occurring in the home they had shared for a year.

It cited Gilbert police as saying she had called police twice about domestic violence, including moments before she and moments before she her family members were slain Wednesday.

Of the earlier report, when Mederos phones to say Ready had tried to choke her, police said they had no probable cause for an arrest. 

The pair met at an AutoZone near Mederos' home.

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