Young mother allegedly killed her mother and two daughters following a reported argument with her husband, according to police.

Police in Plant City, Florida, have completed a months-long investigation into a devastating family shooting that left four people dead and one young child physically unharmed. Investigators concluded that 27-year-old Hailey Dempsey fatally shot her mother and two of her three young daughters before dying from a self-inflicted gunshot wound on May 3, 2026. Authorities said the surviving child, who was two years old at the time, was also fired at but was not struck.

The findings were announced after investigators spent more than three months examining multiple crime scenes, digital records, firearms evidence, surveillance footage and other material connected to the case. Police also concluded that Dempsey’s husband was not responsible for the deaths and eliminated him as a suspect. The investigation established that the violence began during the early morning hours of May 3 at the family’s home on North Burton Street.

Police said Dempsey shot and killed her 55-year-old mother, Valerie DeBoe, who normally lived in Clearwater and had been staying with the family during a period of domestic tension. Dempsey then gathered her three daughters and left the residence on foot at around 5 a.m., according to investigators. Doorbell and neighborhood surveillance footage later helped detectives reconstruct portions of their movements through the area. At one point, Dempsey and the children were recorded approaching another residence and knocking on the door before leaving when no one immediately answered.

Investigators said Dempsey eventually concealed herself and the children behind trees and vegetation in the front yard of another property on West Tever Street. Shortly before 7 a.m., police believe she fatally shot her four-year-old daughter and her four-month-old daughter at that location. Authorities said she also fired toward her two-year-old daughter but missed, leaving the child physically unharmed. Dempsey then shot herself, according to the police department’s final investigative findings. Officers were called to the area shortly before 8 a.m. after receiving a report concerning screams, and they encountered an extraordinarily difficult scene when they arrived.

The events of May 3 followed several contacts between the family and Plant City police during the preceding two days. Police Chief Richard Mills Jr. said officers responded on May 1 to a verbal dispute between Dempsey and her husband, Jay Dempsey. Investigators said the disagreement involved adult material that Dempsey had discovered on one of her husband’s phones, as well as concerns surrounding their relationship. Mills emphasized that responding officers found no evidence of physical violence or other criminal activity during that encounter. Police therefore did not have grounds at that time to make an arrest based on what they observed.

Later on May 1, Dempsey contacted officers again because she believed that someone may have placed a tracking device on her vehicle. Officers examined the vehicle but did not locate a tracker, according to the police account presented after the investigation. Dempsey subsequently left the family residence with her children and her mother and stayed at a hotel. The following day, May 2, police were contacted again when Dempsey wanted to return to the house to collect additional belongings while her husband was away. Officers remained present while she retrieved her possessions, and police later said she and her husband also spoke at a local library that day.

Those earlier police contacts became an important part of the investigation because detectives needed to determine whether anyone else had participated in the later shootings. Jay Dempsey was initially detained while authorities investigated the deaths and executed a search warrant at the family residence. Police subsequently reconstructed his movements and determined that he was traveling on Interstate 4 from a friend’s home in Lakeland toward Plant City when the shootings occurred. Investigators said the evidence established an alibi and ruled him out as a suspect. He was not arrested or charged in connection with the deaths.

The investigation also required authorities to examine firearms and other physical evidence recovered from the family’s home and the shooting locations. Earlier search-warrant records showed that investigators collected firearms, ammunition, electronic devices, blood swabs and other potential evidence. Police later said a firearm recovered during the investigation was forensically connected to bullets associated with the crime scenes. Investigators also reviewed extensive digital information and surveillance material while reconstructing what happened during the hours before the bodies were discovered. Chief Mills described the case as extremely complex and said reaching a conclusion required careful and methodical investigative work.

One issue authorities addressed carefully was Dempsey’s state of mind before the killings. Mills said investigators found indications suggesting that mental-health difficulties may have been relevant, while local reporting on the completed investigation said police considered the possibility that she had been experiencing postpartum psychosis.

However, authorities did not publicly announce a confirmed medical diagnosis, and the precise psychological circumstances surrounding her actions remain uncertain. Police also cited messages indicating that Dempsey had expressed difficulty coping while caring for the children and had referred to experiencing a serious emotional breakdown. Those details provide investigative context but do not establish a definitive medical explanation or a single proven motive for the killings.

For the same reason, investigators have not reduced the tragedy to the marital disagreement that occurred two days earlier. Police confirmed that officers had responded after Dempsey and her husband argued over adult material found on a phone, and Mills said investigators believed those family tensions were part of the events preceding the deaths. However, police also said the exact reason Dempsey ultimately killed her mother and two children remained unclear.

The argument is therefore part of the documented timeline rather than a conclusively established cause of the later violence. Presenting that distinction is important because the investigation uncovered several circumstances surrounding the family in the days before May 3 but did not identify one simple explanation for what followed.

The only child to survive the shooting was the two-year-old daughter. Investigators determined that a shot had been directed toward her but failed to strike her, and she was found physically unharmed at the scene. Subsequent reports said she was placed with family and remained in good physical health after the tragedy. Authorities have appropriately released limited information about the child because of her young age and the deeply sensitive circumstances surrounding the case. The focus of official reporting has instead remained on establishing what happened and explaining how investigators reached their conclusions.

Chief Mills became visibly emotional while discussing what responding officers encountered on May 3. He said that in 34 years of working in law enforcement, the scene was among the most difficult he had experienced personally. His comments reflected the impact the deaths of two very young children, their grandmother and their mother had on the officers and investigators assigned to the case.

Police said the investigation involved multiple scenes and hundreds of pieces of evidence, making it necessary to avoid drawing conclusions before forensic and digital examinations were complete. After more than three months of work, the department ultimately classified the deaths as a murder-suicide and said there was no remaining suspect or continuing threat connected to the case.

Valerie DeBoe’s relatives have also spoken about the profound loss experienced by the surviving family. A fundraising page established after the deaths described DeBoe as a devoted wife, mother, grandmother, mentor and friend who was affectionately known as “Gigi” by her grandchildren. The fundraiser was created to help surviving relatives cope with the consequences of the tragedy and honor her memory. Such family tributes provide a reminder that behind the investigative evidence are people whose lives were permanently affected by what happened.

The Plant City Police Department’s final findings provide substantially more clarity than was available immediately after the shootings. During the early stages of the case, investigators had publicly avoided identifying a perpetrator while examining evidence and determining whether another person might have been responsible. Search warrants and surveillance records gradually provided additional information, but authorities continued investigating before announcing a final determination. The completed investigation now places Dempsey as the person responsible for the deaths of her mother and two daughters and for the attempt to shoot her surviving child before her own death. Her husband was formally eliminated as a suspect based on the evidence reviewed by investigators.

The case remains an exceptionally painful family tragedy, and several questions about why the violence occurred may never receive a definitive answer. What authorities have established is the sequence of events, the forensic evidence connecting the shootings, the earlier police contacts and the absence of evidence implicating Dempsey’s husband. Police have also acknowledged possible mental-health factors without publicly claiming a confirmed diagnosis or suggesting that one issue alone explains the killings. Reporting the case accurately therefore requires separating documented investigative findings from theories about motive or mental state.

Four members of the same family died on May 3, while one very young child survived physically unharmed. Months of investigative work transformed what initially appeared to be an unexplained multiple shooting into a case police have formally classified as a murder-suicide. For surviving relatives, however, the conclusion of the police investigation does not end the consequences of the tragedy. Their loss extends far beyond the evidence, timelines and official reports that investigators used to determine what happened. The surviving child’s privacy and well-being remain especially important as relatives continue dealing with the aftermath of an event that permanently changed their family.