In the quiet town of Wayne, New Jersey, a tragic story unfolded on the night of October 9, 1991, culminating in the death of 36-year-old Cornelius 'Corky' Kasten III. Kasten was at his home with his fiancée, Carol A. Ott, when their lives were violently cut short by a former postal worker, Joseph M. Harris. Harris, a 35-year-old Navy veteran, had been fired from his job at the Ridgewood post office, a dismissal in which Ott, his former supervisor, had been involved.
This termination fueled a grudge that would have devastating consequences.
Dressed in black fatigues and a bullet-proof vest, Harris armed himself with a formidable arsenal that included two machine guns, grenades, and a samurai sword. He first went to the home of Ott and Kasten. There, he attacked Ott with the samurai sword and then shot Kasten as he was watching television in the basement recreation room. The violence did not end there. After leaving the couple's home, Harris drove to the Ridgewood post office, his former place of employment.
At the post office, Harris continued his rampage, killing two mail handlers, Joseph M. VanderPaauw and Donald McNaught, as they arrived for work. He then barricaded himself inside the building for a tense four-and-a-half-hour standoff with police, during which he threw explosives at the officers. Eventually, Harris surrendered to the authorities at dawn.
Joseph M. Harris was arrested and charged with four counts of murder, as well as attempted murder, attempted kidnapping, and various weapons charges. He was held on a $1 million bail. It was later discovered that Harris was also responsible for a 1988 home invasion in Montville, New Jersey, where he had murdered another man, Roy Edwards, and assaulted his family. In 1992, Harris was convicted for the string of killings and sentenced to death. However, he died of natural causes in prison in September 1996, before his sentence could be carried out.
