A Florida father accused of murdering his entire family inside his luxury home near Walt Disney World broke down during his testimony and blamed the deaths on his wife.
Anthony Todt, 46, the "Disney Dad" accused of multiple murders, faces four counts of homicide in the 2019 killings of his wife, Megan Todt, and their three children, Alex, 3, Tyler, 11, and Zoe, 4.
Police also claim the man killed the family dog, Breezy.
According to the New York Daily News, Mr Todt is a therapist from Connecticut, and had been living with the bodies for weeks before police found them inside his gated-community home.
Police visited the house in 2020 intending to arrest Mr Todt on fraud charges, but instead found the bodies of his slain family. A medical examiner found that the victims were killed by "unspecified violence" as well as Benadryl overdoses.
During his testimony, Mr Todt told jurors that his wife had been suffering from depression and other health complications including Lyme disease. He claimed she also had several miscarriages, according to WESH.
Mr Todt claimed that his wife's struggles led him to adopt a religion based on Hinduism with a focus on the afterlife.
“My wife — she was a yoga teacher in addition to physical therapist — she went from a very strong vibrant woman to barely holding on at 90 pounds,” he said crying. “She went from a mom who provided for everything…to a person who could barely walk stairs on certain days.”
He then claimed that his wife killed their children and herself. He said he came home one day and found her covered in blood, and that he did not report the deaths because he was trying to cover for his wife.
That testimony conflicts with a recorded confession he made to investigators. Jurors heard the recording days before his testimony. Mr Todt reportedly confesses to suffocating his daughter Zoe, stabbing and suffocating his sons Aleks and Tyler, and suffocating his wife after he said she stabbed herself.
Mr Todt claimed that he and his wife planned the murders after watching videos about the afterlife. He said they had "salvation in mind," and that they "love our kids."
He also said he tried to take his own life on 10 different occasions but "chickened out."
