Connecticut man kills suspected intruder, discovers it’s his son

A man shot and killed a masked intruder apparently trying to break into his sister’s home in suburban Connecticut, only to discover the suspected burglar was his own 15-year-old son, police said.

It was not clear why the teenager, Tyler Giuliano, was lurking outside his aunt’s home at about 1 a.m. Thursday dressed all in black and wearing a ski mask. Police say the aunt, who was home alone, called her brother -- Tyler’s father, Jeffrey Giuliano -- who lives next door.

The elder Giuliano rushed from his home with a loaded gun and opened fire on the masked individual, who confronted him with what appeared to be a weapon in his hand, according to police. Town Selectman John Hodge said Giuliano told police the masked person had lunged at him.

Only after the ski mask was removed did the elder Giuliano, a local schoolteacher, realize he had shot his own son.

“Everybody is just shaking their heads over it,” John Hodge said, according to the News-Times of Danbury. It quoted friends of the family as saying that both Jeffrey Giuliano and his son, a 10th-grader at New Fairfield High School, seemed happy and were popular.

A neighbor, Lydia Gibbs, said she heard nine shots fired and thought it was fireworks “because nobody would think it was a shooting in this town.” New Fairfield is a quiet, upscale suburb of about 13,800 people 50 miles north of New York City.

“The whole thing is just something out of a Hollywood script,” Hodge said.

No charges had been filed as of Friday.

ALSO:

Jerry Sandusky case: Victim No. 1 to reveal identity in book

Hammerfest 2012: Idaho braces for Neo-Nazi hate rock festival

Clemson clout? S.C. officer says he was fired for ticketing coach

tina.susman@latimes.com