It was a Thursday afternoon in September 2014 when the small town of Bell, Florida, essentially stopped breathing. You’ve probably heard the name Don Spirit. If you haven't, his story is one of those dark, inexplicable stains on American true crime history that doesn't just shock you—it haunts you. People still ask how it was even possible. How does a man sit in a house and decide to end the lives of six children and his own daughter?
When Don Spirit killed family members in such a brutal, calculated fashion, it wasn't just a sudden "snap." It was the culmination of a life riddled with violence, bizarre legal leniency, and a local system that maybe, just maybe, didn't see the red flags waving right in its face.
The numbers are staggering. Six kids. All under the age of eleven. And their mother. All gone in an instant.
The Timeline of a Nightmare in Gilchrist County
The 911 call came in around 4:00 PM on September 18. Don Spirit was on the other end of the line. He wasn't screaming. He wasn't hysterical. He told the dispatcher exactly what he’d done and exactly what he planned to do next. He said he was waiting for the deputies to arrive so he could kill himself.
He stayed true to his word.
When the first deputy arrived at the home on NW 30th Street, Spirit was still alive. He spoke briefly to the officer before turning the gun on himself. Inside the house, the scene was something out of a horror film. Spirit had murdered his 28-year-old daughter, Sarah Spirit, and her six children: Kaleb Kuhlmann (11), Brandon Stewart (9), Destiny Stewart (5), Johnathon Kuhlmann (8), Alannah Stewart (2), and the youngest, Esmi Stewart, who was only 11 weeks old.
It's hard to process that kind of scale. You’re talking about an entire generation of a family wiped out by the person who was supposed to be their grandfather. People in Bell, a town of maybe 500 people, were paralyzed. It’s the kind of place where everybody knows your business, but apparently, nobody knew how bad things had truly gotten behind the Spirits' door.
A History of Violence: The 2001 Incident
Honestly, the most frustrating part of the story is that Don Spirit had done this before. Not a mass shooting, but he had killed before. In 2001, while on a hunting trip in Osceola County, Spirit shot and killed his 8-year-old son, Kyle.
He claimed it was an accident.
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According to the reports from back then, he was wiping some mud off his rifle when it discharged, hitting Kyle in the head. He didn't face manslaughter charges. He eventually pleaded guilty to a charge of possession of a firearm by a convicted felon. Because he was a felon, he shouldn't have even had that gun in the first place. He served about three years in prison and was released.
You’ve got to wonder how a man who already accidentally killed one of his children was allowed to remain the patriarch of a house full of young kids. It’s a massive failure of the safety net. Sarah Spirit, the mother of the six children, had actually been the one to call the police on her father multiple times over the years. There were reports of domestic strife, battery, and drug use.
The Gilchrist County Sheriff’s Office had been to that house many, many times.
The Systemic Failures and the DCF Paperwork
If you look at the records from the Florida Department of Children and Families (DCF), the paper trail is miles long. There was an open investigation into the family at the very moment the shootings occurred.
Sarah Spirit had reported that her father was physically abusive. In one instance, she told authorities that Don had hit the children with a belt so hard it left bruising. But the kids stayed. They were constantly moved back and forth between different living situations. Sometimes they were with Sarah, sometimes they were at Don’s place.
It was a chaotic, unstable environment.
The DCF eventually released a massive report—over 700 pages—detailing their involvement with the Spirit family. It showed a pattern of "low-level" concerns that never quite triggered the total removal of the children from the vicinity of Don Spirit. The investigators focused on Sarah's parenting and the kids' school attendance, but they seemingly underestimated the threat posed by Don himself.
He was a convicted felon with a history of "accidental" child killing. Why was he the primary support system for a vulnerable mother and six children? That's the question that still burns for the people of Bell.
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The Motive: Why Did Don Spirit Kill Family Members?
Psychologists and criminal profilers have spent years picking apart Spirit's psyche, but since he took his own life, we only have the fragments he left behind. Most experts point to a "family annihilator" profile. These are individuals—almost always men—who feel a loss of control.
Sarah had recently moved back in with him. They were struggling financially. There were rumors of a heated argument that afternoon regarding the children’s behavior or Sarah’s choices. For a man like Spirit, who likely suffered from undiagnosed mental health issues and a hair-trigger temper, the "if I can't control them, no one will have them" mentality might have taken over.
It wasn't a crime of passion in the traditional sense. He had the presence of mind to call 911. He waited for the police. He wanted an audience for his final act.
Some locals believe he was simply a "ticking time bomb" who had spent decades escaping the consequences of his actions. He’d survived the guilt of killing his son in 2001—or perhaps he hadn't. Maybe that first death broke something in him that never got fixed.
The Aftermath and Legislative Changes
In the wake of the Bell massacre, Florida's child welfare system underwent a reckoning. The "Spirit" case became a catalyst for Senate Bill 1666. This law was designed to shift the focus of DCF away from just "keeping families together" at all costs and toward "the best interest and safety of the child."
It increased the requirements for social workers and established a more rigorous vetting process for households where a known violent felon resides.
But for the six kids in Bell, the change came a decade too late.
The house where it happened was eventually torn down. It’s just an empty lot now. People don't like to drive by it. In a town that small, the absence of six children is a physical weight. They would have been in high school or starting college by now. Brandon would be 21. Kaleb would be 23. Instead, they are names on a memorial.
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Understanding the "Red Flags"
When we look back at the case where Don Spirit killed family members, we have to look at the specific red flags that were missed. It’s easy to judge in hindsight, but these points are crucial for identifying similar risks today:
- Prior Lethal Violence: If someone has killed a family member before—even "accidentally"—the risk of future lethality is astronomically higher.
- Access to Firearms as a Felon: Spirit was a convicted felon. He should not have had a gun. The fact that he did indicates a failure in local enforcement or a gap in how we track illegal weapon possession in rural areas.
- Frequent Police Contact: The "frequent flyer" phenomenon where police are called to a home dozens of times for domestic disputes without a permanent resolution.
- Threats of Suicide: Spirit’s final act was foreshadowed by a history of emotional instability. When domestic abusers talk about suicide, it’s often a precursor to homicide-suicide.
Actionable Insights for Community Safety
We can't change what happened in Bell, but we can change how we respond to similar dynamics in our own circles.
If you know a family dealing with a high-conflict domestic situation involving a person with a violent criminal history, "mind your business" isn't always the best policy. Documentation is everything. If you see something that looks like abuse, report it to the authorities—but also keep your own log of dates and times.
Support local domestic violence shelters. Often, mothers like Sarah Spirit stay in abusive households because they have nowhere else to go with six children. Financial dependence is a cage.
For those in Florida or other states, staying informed about your local DCF performance metrics is actually possible through public records. You can see how many "prior reports" exist for families in high-risk incidents in your county.
The story of Don Spirit is a dark reminder that some people are beyond rehabilitation and that the systems meant to protect the most vulnerable—children—need to be as aggressive as the predators they are watching.
If you or someone you know is experiencing domestic violence, help is available. You can call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 800-799-7233 or text "START" to 88788. There are people who can help you plan a safe exit before the situation escalates to a point of no return.
The tragedy in Bell wasn't just a "family matter." It was a community failure that we are still learning from today. By recognizing the patterns of family annihilators and demanding stricter oversight for violent offenders in homes with children, we can honor the memory of those six kids by ensuring it doesn't happen again.