Left: Jeremy Koch (GoFundMe). Right: Front: Bailey and Hudson Koch. Back: Jeremy and Asher Koch (Bailey Koch Facebook).
Bailey Koch, expressing that she had “no pride left,” openly shared her husband’s mental health struggles and her own feelings of desperation in searching for solutions on a GoFundMe page.
Days later, she and her entire family was dead.
The Nebraska State Police reported in a press release that they responded to a suspected murder-suicide case in rural Dawson County, located in the Panhandle of Nebraska. Deputies from the Dawson County Sheriff’s Office reached a residence at Johnson Lake in Plum Creek Canyon #1 around 9:45 a.m. on Saturday. Upon entering, they discovered four deceased individuals: Bailey Koch, 41, her husband Jeremy, 42, and their sons Hudson, 18, and Asher, 16.
More from Law&Crime: ‘We dropped one’: A 14-year-old boy reportedly boasted in his journal about having ‘hella fun’ while stabbing a man 22 times with his friend, following an insult to his girlfriend’s child, according to police reports.
Authorities believe Jeremy Koch stabbed his wife and sons to death before turning the knife on himself. Cops recovered the murder weapon.
Titled “Jeremy’s Battle: Mental Health Support Needed,” Bailey Koch described her husband’s years-long with depression. She wrote how her family was “as vanilla as it gets” with two teenage sons, one of whom was set to graduate high school and move to California for a three-year bonsai apprenticeship. She was a teacher and Jeremy Koch ran the family landscaping business.
“But my husband tries to kill himself…a lot,” she wrote.
Back in 2009, Jeremy Koch was diagnosed with “severe depression” and over the next few years survived at least four attempts on his life, the worst of which occurred when he took a semi-truck on the highway, his wife said.
Love true crime? Sign up for our newsletter, The Law&Crime Docket, to get the latest real-life crime stories delivered right to your inbox.
“He was left with a leg broken in four places, punctured lung, fractured pancreas, complete colon reconstruction, brain bleed, and…still depression,” she wrote. “When he awoke, I was in awe and relieved. He was destroyed his attempt hadn’t worked.”
Then her husband went some seven years “without experiencing dark thoughts.” However, his mental health struggles exacerbated in July and he was unable to work which meant the landscaping business floundered and they were living on her teaching salary, she wrote.
“In March, just a couple months ago, I woke to Jeremy shaking me awake saying, ‘Something is wrong,”” Bailey Koch wrote. “He was standing over my bed with a knife ready to end his life. I was able to talk him down and into accepting help.”
He spent several days in a hospital’s mental health wing. They were declined ketamine treatments and tried Electroconvulsive Therapy Treatments, the fundraiser page said. But it didn’t work. Back at home, Jeremy Koch wouldn’t get out of bed and refused to eat, his wife said. He ended up back in the hospital, she said, for dehydration.
“By not eating or drinking, Jeremy is slowly completing suicide,” she wrote. “So here I am…asking for help. I have taken out every penny we have to pay bills. My retirement is gone. Jeremy’s retirement is gone. I have begun the process of looking into selling our family business because the stress is too much on my husband, and nothing is worth losing him.”
Bailey Koch posted an update on Thursday — two days before her death — saying while her husband was home, he was not reacting well to his new medications. But she said she had “hope” after a hospital about an hour away from their home was offering a different treatment. She wrote how they were going to the hospital on Friday to see if they would qualify.
The fundraiser had raised more than $20,000 but was taken down on Sunday afternoon. It’s unclear why.
Officials have ordered autopsies on all four people in the home. The investigation remains ongoing.
If you are experiencing suicidal thoughts, call or text 988 to reach the national Suicide & Crisis Lifeline.
