LAKE STATION, IN — A welfare check turned into a grim discovery Friday afternoon when cops found an entire family—mom, dad, and their three little girls—dead in their quiet Indiana home. The scene at Mansard Du Lac Manufactured Home Community has left neighbors reeling and police piecing together a tragedy that’s as heartbreaking as it is chilling.
It all started around 2:45 p.m. on February 21, 2025, when Lake Station police rolled up to a house on the 6700 block of Avenue 9 after a family friend begged for a check-in. No answer at the door prompted a search warrant—and what they found inside was devastating. Briana Payne, 27, and her daughters Aurorah, 7, Ava, 6, and Alayna, 4, were all shot dead, ruled homicides by the Lake County Coroner. Robert Payne, 31, the girls’ dad and Briana’s husband, was there too—dead from a self-inflicted gunshot, pegged as the killer who turned the gun on himself.
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Investigators from Lake Station PD and Indiana State Police are calling it a murder-suicide, an “isolated” horror with no threat left lurking. Autopsies on Saturday, February 22, at the Lake County Forensic Center confirmed the gunfire deaths, but why Robert snapped remains a mystery. Neighbors whispered to CBS Chicago about arguments echoing from the house days before—yet no one saw this coming. No prior domestic violence calls on record, just a family known for kindness. Briana, a caregiver at Sandra Lees In-Home Care, was the type to give you a ride or even her washing machine, locals say.
The community’s in shock. A GoFundMe’s up to cover funeral costs, painting the Paynes as a clan full of “endless love and laughter.” Now, that’s all gone, snuffed out in a trailer home where kids once played. As of February 23, 2025, cops are still digging for answers—what pushed Robert over the edge? For now, Lake Station mourns, and a tight-knit neighborhood wonders how it missed the signs.
