Arapahoe County – Phillip Effland and his wife and 24-year-old daughter decided it was time to die – and they should die together.
They each wrote a suicide note, then took a large amount of prescription pills sometime Saturday, according to authorities. Early Sunday morning, they said, Phillip Effland awoke from his drug-induced sleep to find his daughter, Brenna, already dead, and his wife, Denise Effland still alive.
Phillip Effland shot and killed his wife with a small-caliber pistol and took a second dose of potentially lethal drugs in an effort to seal the couple’s suicide pact, investigators said.
When police arrived at the family’s home in Centennial the next day, Phillip Effland was barricaded in a bedroom. He was conscious but unresponsive.
On Thursday, authorities announced that Effland, 57, will be held in the county jail without bail on manslaughter charges for allegedly assisting in suicide.
“It’s shocking, but the thing about it is that they had such a close-tied family, such a loving family,” said James Reeves, the county’s elected assessor from 1991 to 1995 who hired Effland as his deputy assessor. “And I think they all shared in the problems he couldn’t overcome.”
The suicide notes were not released, nor would investigators describe what had been written.
The family had spent several days packing their belongings, expecting to be evicted Wednesday from the home they had rented for almost a decade. Arapahoe County Sheriff Grayson Robinson said it appears the family had a variety of problems that led them down a darker path.
The deaths were only the third homicide case in Centennial since the city incorporated in 2001. But Robinson said this investigation is all the more baffling because the family had planned their deaths.
“This is a sadness for our community,” he said.
Neighbors and friends said the couple were reclusive and had a hard time with Brenna, who suffered from a mental illness. Eff land’s relatives could not be reached for comment.
Phillip Effland graduated from Cherry Creek High School and went to college in Iowa, where he got involved in political movements, friends said. In high school, he formed a jazz band with friends, calling it the Jazz Blues Men.
“He was a great drummer, and he played the French horn,” said longtime friend Dr. Steve Gordon of Sioux City, Iowa.
As Gordon describes it, Phillip Effland had always exhibited quirky behavior, but he also was a gregarious and popular fellow.
“Phil always had bizarre ideas, and he always had to tell the best stories and would talk of himself as the best of everything,” Gordon said. “It’s always a shock when something like this happens to someone you know, but I think that as he got his family more isolated I can see how this would happen. I think he lost touch with reality.”
He hasn’t held down a stable job in years, friends said.
“I let him work on my campaign, and he was out every day going door-to-door with me,” Reeves said. “He was a hard worker and very intelligent.”
Even when a steady paycheck was coming in, Phillip Effland never seemed able to pull himself out of debt, Reeves said. Despite pulling a salary of more than $50,000, Effland griped about owning only one suit, which was plain and dark blue.
“He always said once he got back on his feet, he’d get himself another suit,” Reeves said. “Money-wise, he always was behind the curve.”
On two occasions, his behavior resulted in his being fired from the county assessor’s office, Reeves said. His most recent three-year stint with the county ended in 1994, after he was released for refusing to follow orders and lying to associates, Reeves said.
As Phillip Effland cleaned out his desk, Reeves remembers loaning him a few thousand dollars. The next time Reeves heard from him, it was in a letter Eff land wrote to the county, demanding to be stricken from the voter rolls and claiming that the government would no longer watch over him.
“I just thought he was bullheaded to some extent,” Reeves said. “But in retrospect, he was showing symptoms even then of severe psychological disorder.”
Staff writer Manny Gonzales can be reached at 303-820-1173 or mgonzales@denverpost.com.
