DA Seeking Death Penalty for Bucks Double Homicide

Prosecutors in Bucks County announced their intention to seek the death penalty for Lloyd Hill, who is accused of killing two people in Nockamixon Township in January.

Hill is charged with first degree murder in the death of

According to an April 1 article, Bucks County deputy district attorney Robert James gave notice during a March 30 preliminary hearing. James also requested and was granted a no-contact order after Hill reached out to his two teenage daughters following the killings.

The Hills met the Tarantinos while attending church in Quakertown. At the time of the murders, Lloyd Hill was living with Tara Tarantino, Fred Tarantino's ex-wife. The two couples did not, as several media outlets reported, "swap wives."

Hill and Tarantino were killed at the Schoolhouse Apartments at 8786 Easton Road (Route 611) in Nockamixon Township, where they had been residing. Court documents show that Stephanie Hill had an order of protection against Lloyd Hill, but it expired in 2005.

Police say that Hill sent threatening text messages to the couple in the weeks leading up to the attack. 

Police said Tarantino was attacked first--outside the apartments--where Lloyd Hill allegedly beat him to death with an aluminum baseball bat.

Hill then allegedly went inside his ex-wife's apartment and attacked her with a knife before telling a female teenage witness who was in the apartment at the time, "I killed Fred."

Stephanie Hill later died from her injuries at St. Luke's Hospital in Fountain Hill, while Tarantino was pronounced dead at the scene.

The trial is slated to begin this summer.