Original article no longer available
Utica Observer-Dispatch
Thu, Jan 30, 2003
By TOM LAMBERT, Observer-Dispatch
Canastota Police Chief Guy Blasier was taking medication for stress and anger related to his job, which family members believe played a role in threats to his family and, later, his death.
As authorities await toxicology tests that might determine how Blasier died, statements to police made by Blasier’s wife, Ann, 35, and their two young daughters shed some light on what took place at their home this past weekend.
In a police report, the three said Guy Blasier made repeated threats against their lives during the weekend. Those threats led to Blasier’s daylong standoff with state police.
“I fear for my life and fear for my kids and I want an order of protection to keep my husband from me,” Ann Blasier said in a statement given to Oneida state police 9:30 p.m. Sunday night. She gave that statement just hours before Blasier barricaded himself in his home.
State police found Blasier dead at his Lakeshore Road South home at 5:20 a.m. Tuesday, after more than 24 hours of police surrounding his home trying to get him to come out.
Police were originally there to serve him an arrest warrant for a misdemeanor assault charge against his wife.
Meanwhile, an autopsy report released Wednesday concluded that Blasier didn’t die from trauma or injuries, Oneida County Coroner Kevin Berry said.
The time, manner and cause of death are pending awaiting the results of toxicology tests, Berry said. Those test results are expected in two to three weeks.
Carl Totera, Blasier’s father-in-law and retired Canastota police officer, said he wasn’t surprised at the preliminary results of the autopsy.
“I really don’t think he committed suicide,” Totera said Wednesday. “It’s just something he wouldn’t do.”
Totera said he thought Blasier may have died because of an accidental overdose or due to anti-depressant drugs he was taking because of work-related stress.
Since becoming chief, Blasier had filed three lawsuits against the village for what he viewed as attempts by village officials to humiliate him.
Blasier said her husband became abusive toward her during the past year. She also said that was due to medication he was taking for anger and stress.
The police report stated that Ann Blasier said she was repeatedly kicked in the shins on Saturday and punched three to four times in the face Sunday, causing a lump on her head for which she had to seek medical attention at Oneida Health Care.
She said during the weekend she was chased by her husband around the home and twice locked outside in below-freezing temperatures before her 8-year-old daughter let her back in.
Ann Blasier had signs of physical injuries to her left cheek and numerous bruises to her right shin that she stated came from a domestic incident on Saturday, the report said.
Ann Blasier said her husband was tape-recording a phone conversation she was having with her sister on Sunday night.
She said he confronted her about the call after she was done and went to sit on the couch.
“That is when my husband walked up to me and started to say ‘you’re going to leave me and ruin me, I’m not going to pay child support,'” Ann Blasier said in the police report. “He said, ‘the kids wouldn’t have parents because I will kill you, then kill myself,'” according to the report.
The report also stated that Blasier ordered his 15-year-old daughter to give him her cell phone so she couldn’t call police, then pushed her into a chair.
“My dad said that if we use any of the phones in the house to call the cops he was going to kill us three,” the 15-year-old said in the report.
Ann Blasier and her daughters were only able to leave their home just after 9 p.m. Sunday after they said they were going for a ride and wouldn’t call police.
Ann Blasier then called her sister who called state police. State police contacted Blasier on her cell phone, and she and her daughters went to Troop D barracks before troopers took Blasier to the hospital for treatment, the police report said.
The Canastota community and neighbors of the Blasiers have expressed surprise and sorrow at Blasier’s death.
“My family is going through a tough time right now,” Totera said. “I really don’t have much more to say than that.”