Claudia Abby Bristol

On 5 February 1994, Alan Bristol and his three children, Tiffany (7), Holly (3) and Claudia (18 months), were found dead in Alan Bristol's car parked in the garage of their Wanganui home. It was established that death had been caused by Alan Bristol connecting the exhaust system to the interior of the car. This was the final act of a sustained campaign of violence and intimidation by Alan Bristol against his estranged wife, Christine. Source: 4theKidz

Tiffany Bristol, 7, and her sisters Holly, 3, and Claudia, 18 months, were killed by their father in Whanganui on the night of February 4, 1994. Their mother, Christine, had endured violence for years, but never thought her husband would harm their daughters. Source: https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/faces-of-innocents/81543472/faces-...

The Bristols' three daughters - Tiffany Anne, 7, Holly Alyse, 3, and Claudia Abby, 18 months - were all killed by their father when he took his own life. Almost 20 years have passed since Alan did the unthinkable and gathered up his peacefully sleeping daughters from their beds, laid them in the back of his car parked in the garage of their Wanganui home, and started the engine. "He'd taken them out of their beds and put them in the back with their cuddly blankets and bits and pieces," says Christine. Alan Bristol was found slumped between them. His last act, committed amidst a tumultuous separation from Christine, prompted a law change in 1995 aimed at boosting protection of children in custody disputes where violence is alleged. Alan Bristol moulded and bullied her into the person he wanted her to be, Christine says. "He was an absolute perfectionist, extremely intelligent, strongwilled, a very focused young man. He was the blond-haired, blue-eyed golden boy. He's a very handsome striking man but deeply manipulative, too. He doesn't have 'domestic violence' tattooed on his forehead, I mean how would you know?" Alan and Christine met when they were both aged 21 and married at 25, when Tiffany was a baby. "I absolutely adored him. I was besotted with him and I deeply loved the guy. I don't hate him now. I'm deeply disappointed. But I was always brought up that no matter what people do, they deserve respect and dignity when they pass away." Christine's photo albums are filled with "happy family" shots of three girls who should have grown up and looked back on a perfect childhood. Like good parents, Alan and Christine tried to give their children everything they could want or need. They had a trampoline, swimming pool, barbecue, and a sprawling lawn. Christine has photos of Tiffany riding a pony, family trips to Rainbow's End and the zoo, the girls sliding down the dinosaur at Wanganui's Kowhai Park, splashing in a paddling pool on the lawn the summer they died and playing dress-ups. She has certificates praising Tiffany for her efforts and helpfulness during her final term at school, and pictures from that last Christmas, just over a month before they died. On the surface it looks idyllic, but Christine says Alan wasn't going to let her see the girls on Christmas Day if they didn't spend it all together. Her lovely, cheeky, friendly, hard-case girls "loved their dad". But from early on in their relationship there were problems. She took out non-violence and non-molestation orders against him, but they'd patch things up and try again. There were rapes and violent assaults. In mid-1993 he forced her to leave and the girls stayed behind. "I couldn't live with him any more and I felt like I wasn't being a proper mum, he'd taken all that away because I was too busy trying to keep one step ahead of him." They made an informal agreement over care of the girls but they ended up going to court. She and Alan tried mediation, but she'd turn up and he wouldn't. Then, when it came time to go to court, she and Alan would end up alone in the same room. "I was being assaulted waiting to go into court - in the face, physically and emotionally. I would be in tears and they never asked questions. "They were just wanting to speed the process through court. Get in. Get out." She was constantly on edge, looking over her shoulder, yet she was portrayed as a trouble-maker. Alan filed for and was granted interim custody after she took the two youngest out of town for a couple of days to a friend's place. "It was classic," she says, of the assault he inflicted early in February. She was returning Holly and Claudia to the former matrimonial home where Alan continued to live. Tiffany was already there with a friend. He pinned her against the garage wall and assaulted her with her own car keys, asking about a man she'd had a one-off dinner with. "He was tormenting me with my keys. Bubby - Claudia - was at the door, Holly was next to me hitting him on the leg, and Tiffany was there with her friend watching. She had a glazed look. Poor little thing, he messed with her head badly." She fought back but he wouldn't relinquish the keys until she begged. Her flatmate, a policeman, encouraged her to report the incident. Alan was arrested the next day, and charged, and released on bail. He went home and killed himself and the girls. Christine's girls were each buried with a photo of their mum. "This is going to be hard for you, darling," she says, "But this is what I have to live with everyday." She places them down on the table: Three little girls lying in three little white satin-lined coffins. Like perfect dolls except their perfect porcelain features are rosy with carbon-monoxide poisoning. On February 8, 1994 - the day of their funeral - Alan Bristol's lawyer Garry Spooner was reported in the Herald defending his client. "He was devoted to his kids," Spooner said. "Certainly the kiddies thought Dad was just the best." In the same article, the officer in charge of the investigation said police had been involved in the Bristols' "domestic situation" for several years but had not been able to substantiate any charges of violence until the indecent assault. Incensed by the story, Christine responded with a press release that she'd been the victim of domestic violence for a long time, and called for an inquiry. Within weeks Sir Ronald Davison started an inquiry and, says Christine, "it felt like something really productive was on the brink of happening". Davison's inquiry found that at the time of the girls' deaths, the court knew Alan was violent but failed to act on that knowledge in decisions on custody of the three children. As a result, new laws were enacted to protect children of violent relationships. Source: https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/tragedy-in-a-picture-perfect-kiwi-fam...