An Australian expat allegedly killed his 6-year-old son and 4-year-old daughter in their Kuta, Bali, bungalow on September 13 before taking his own life, while his wife, 600 miles away, listened to her daughter's final cries over the phone.
Damien John Shaw, 56, strangled both children and then hanged himself with a rope inside the residence, according to police statements reported by the New York Post. Kuta police reviewed CCTV footage from the area that captured part of the sequence: Shaw's son screaming from inside the bungalow, his 4-year-old daughter running outside, and Shaw dragging the girl back in.
Shaw's wife, whose name has not been released, was traveling in Jakarta at the time. During a phone call, she heard her daughter crying and saying "stop daddy," according to a report from The West Australian. She immediately called a neighbor in Kuta to check on the family. When residents arrived at the bungalow, they found Shaw hanging from a rope and the bodies of both children stacked on top of each other.
The wife told police that the couple's marriage had been troubled for years. She had left the family home and gone to her parents' house roughly two weeks before the killings.
Police disclosed another detail that deepens the tragedy: Shaw had attempted suicide approximately one month before September 13. His wife intervened and stopped him. But the family never sought psychiatric treatment afterward, according to police.
That missed intervention now stands as one of the most painful facts in the case. A man who tried to end his own life was left without professional help, and a month later, he did not stop at himself.
Denpasar city police official I Gede Adi Saputra Jaya told reporters that investigators had spoken with Shaw's wife but that progress was limited. He said:
"Kuta Police have spoken with the victim's wife, but progress was limited as she remains in deep shock and grief."
The case echoes other recent family tragedies that have shaken communities. In Michigan, a father killed his wife and six children before setting their home on fire, a case that raised similar questions about missed warning signs and mental health failures within families under strain.
Sources close to the family described Shaw's personal history as one shaped by repeated grief. He lost his father when he was 15 years old. A brother also died, though the timing is unclear. His mother died recently from an illness.
Shaw had previously lived in Perth, Australia, before relocating to Bali. A former Perth neighbor described him to The Australian as quiet and unremarkable. The neighbor said:
"He was very private but never caused any trouble, we always exchanged pleasantries."
None of that background explains, or excuses, what happened inside that bungalow. But it fills in a picture of a man who had endured significant personal losses, whose marriage was falling apart, who had already tried to kill himself once, and who was never connected to professional help.
Domestic violence cases involving children remain among the most difficult for law enforcement and communities to process. In one recent Manhattan case, a woman was beaten to death in her apartment while a five-year-old child waited alone with her body, a reminder that children are too often the silent witnesses, and sometimes the victims, of violence inside homes.
Police statements relayed by Bali Eyewitness News described what the security footage showed. The 6-year-old boy was heard screaming from inside the bungalow. The 4-year-old girl ran outside, an act that suggests she understood something was wrong and tried to escape. Shaw went after her, dragged her back inside, and the footage ends there.
The children were found dead. Police allege Shaw strangled both of them before hanging himself.
No formal motive has been established. Police have not said whether Shaw left any note or communication beyond the phone call his wife partially overheard. The investigation remains ongoing, with officers still working to piece together the full timeline of events on September 13.
High-profile cases involving family violence continue to draw public attention and scrutiny. The Lindsay Clancy murder trial, in which a mother was charged with killing her children, provoked intense national debate about parental violence and mental illness, questions that will likely surface again as details of the Shaw case emerge.
Several key facts remain unclear. Police have not released the names of the two children. The year of the September 13 incident is not specified in available reporting. It is also unknown how long the Shaw family had been living in Bali, or where exactly Shaw's wife had gone when she left for her parents' house two weeks before the killings.
Whether police will formally classify the deaths as a murder-suicide, or whether that characterization originated with media outlets rather than investigators, is also unresolved. No charges have been filed, and the primary suspect is dead.
Cases like this one force uncomfortable questions about what systems exist, or fail to exist, to intervene when a family member shows clear signs of danger. Shaw tried to kill himself a month before he killed his children. His wife stopped him. And then, by all available accounts, nothing else happened. No treatment. No follow-up. No separation enforced by anyone with authority.
The pattern is not unique to Bali or to expatriate families. In the Caleb Flynn murder trial, prosecutors argued that warning signs of domestic violence were present long before a fatal act, a dynamic that repeats itself across jurisdictions and cultures.
Two children are dead because every safeguard that should have existed between a man's first attempt to end his life and his decision to end theirs simply was not there.
