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Edward Offord II, 39, shot his girlfriend, 32-year-old Krista Winger, set both of their houses on fire and killed himself in the predawn hours of Aug. 10, 2009, according to police and news accounts from the time.

Offord, a Columbus, Ohio, man, called 911 at 3:54 a.m. and calmly told a dispatcher, "Hey Columbus, I set two houses on fire tonight and shot my girlfriend in the back of the head." Neighbors on Offord's street had reported a fire at his home around 2:41 a.m. A second fire was reported roughly a half hour later at the Upper Arlington-area house where Winger lived.

During the roughly four-and-a-half-minute call, the dispatcher asked Offord whether he still had weapons on him. He said he had two handguns with him and a shotgun in the trunk of his car. When the dispatcher asked what had made him do it, Offord hung up.

Firefighters found a body inside Offord's burning house around the time of the call. Authorities later said it was Winger's. Police traced the cellphone signal from Offord's 911 call and found his body about an hour later in a parking area near O'Shaughnessy Reservoir in southern Delaware County; investigators said he had killed himself.

Winger worked in the Arts and Sciences academic services department at Ohio State University. A co-worker called her "a wonderful, very talented, very funny charming person to work with" and said, "we will miss her."

Offord had volunteered for eight years with Greyhound Adoption of Ohio. The night before the killing, he drove to the group's shelter near Cleveland and returned his two rescue dogs, sobbing, according to the shelter's director. He also served as a volunteer reptile docent at the Columbus Zoo and competed as a precision shooter at a range in Powell, whose co-owner said Offord had never shown any signs of violence.

Offord and Winger had been dating about a year. On his MySpace page, he had written that he "can't comprehend meeting a more perfect girl."