Michael Stephen Stolz, 76, was arrested by the police after a five-hour standoff in the Dallas suburb of Lewisville on Tuesday. Stolz was charged in the shooting and murder of his wife, Bernice Stolz, 49, and put in the Denton County Jail on Wednesday upon a $250,000 bond.
The police were tipped off when the employer of Bernice Stolz informed the police that she had been missing from work for several days. When the police went to check on Bernice, her husband rebuffed the officers and denied them entry into the home. Officers on duty smelled putrid odor from the home and called in SWAT for help.
The SWAT team sent in a robot with a camera that spotted Stolz inside the home lying unarmed on the floor. The SWAT moved in and apprehended Stolz who surrendered peacefully.
The dead body of Bernice Stolz was found on the kitchen floor with a bullet would on the head. Stolz apparently told the police that he would have killed himself, if his bullets did not run out after killing the two dogs of his wife and the woman.
It never occurred to him that in a state where he could buy guns freely, he could also walk out and buy a couple of bullets for himself, if such was his intention. He had four days between the murders on Saturday and his arrest late Tuesday.
Stolz told the police that the couple’s mixed German Sheperd defecating on the floor on Saturday made him angry and he shot the dog, and then the other dog, a Rotweiller, and then shot his wife to stop her screaming and erratic behavior, after seeing her dogs shot and killed.
Lewisville Police Captain Kevin Deaver told the media that Stolz had no history of mental illness though the police had on previous occasions responded to calls for medical assistance at the home. “Sometimes it’s just a trivial little thing that sets people off,” said he.
Or maybe sometimes a 76-year old man waits for something trivial to happen before shooting his 49-year old wife.