Gruesome photos from Long Island murder-suicide home show bloodstained sheets where man slaughtered four members of his family

New photos show the gruesome scene inside a Long Island haunted house where a murder-suicide left five members of the same family dead — while a neighbor said one of the victims was celebrating his birthday on the day he was killed.

Pictures taken Tuesday morning show the back room where police say madman Joseph DeLucia killed his three siblings and a niece with a shotgun in a fit of rage because they wanted to sell his late mother's house on Wyoming Court in Syosset.

The wood-paneled room is furnished with old-fashioned furniture and items such as wooden captain's chairs, stacks of newspapers and magazines, a wooden table with a vinyl tablecloth, crocheted throws and a worn sofa.

A cup of iced coffee still sat on a side table in the living room – police said the family had stopped at Starbucks to get a drink before meeting with a local real estate agent to discuss the sale of 95-year-old matriarch Theresa DeLucia's small North Shore home.

The only sign of the tragedy were two bloodstained white sheets lying crumpled next to each other on the floor directly beneath the table.

It's unclear how they got there or whether they were used to mop up the blood that streamed from the eyes of DeLucia's four victims before he ran outside and turned the shotgun on himself. Police found him dead on the lawn just before noon on Sunday.

A balloon could be seen floating in the corner of the room. A neighbor who gave her name as Randi said the family was planning to celebrate victim Tina Hammond's birthday on Sunday.

The neighbor said she was very good friends with 64-year-old Tina, who showed up at her mother's house with her daughter, 30-year-old Victoria Hammond.

“I met her because I was helping her mother. She was old and could no longer take care of herself. We became best friends,” Randi said, describing Tina, who lived with her daughter in East Patchogue, as “a good person and always in a good mood.”

The neighbor also wanted to come to the house to celebrate, but something told her to wait a little longer – so she went to get food for the party instead.

This decision may have saved her life.

“I went to pick up the food first, came back and saw the police here. If I hadn't picked up the food, I would have been in the house. And possibly dead,” said the shocked woman. “There is a God.”

The gathering degenerated into a dizzying bloodbath around noon Sunday when DeLucia, a 59-year-old mechanic, shot and killed his niece Victoria and her mother, as well as two other siblings – Joanne Kearns, 69, of Tampa, Florida, and Frank DeLucia, 63, of Durham, North Carolina.

Authorities said DeLucia, a former emergency medical technician, had a history of mental illness and was unable to comprehend having to leave the home he had lived in his entire life because his siblings wanted to sell it after their mother died on August 19.

On Tuesday, Tina Hammond's boss said she was simply an “extraordinary person.”

“She had a vibrant personality and was kind and friendly to everyone,” said Steve Huey, the 64-year-old manager of Giunta's Meat Farms Supermarket in Bohemia. “Everyone here is still in shock. The whole situation is surreal.”

Huey said her mother recently became very ill and the East Patchogue woman often has to interrupt her work shifts to talk on the phone with doctors or nurses.

She started working as a cashier about a year and a half ago, he said, and he was immediately impressed by her work ethic.

“She was second to none,” he said. “She came early and did everything she could to help people.”

“She always had a smile on her face and always had something nice to say,” he continued. “She never complained about anything – and when you make your living in the public eye, that's a miracle! That's very, very rare! That alone tells you what kind of person she was.”

He also said that she loved her daughter Victoria, with whom she lived. Victoria would often visit the store, he said, smiling.

“They were like heart and soul, inseparable,” Huey said. “They were always together and they were just always really nice people.”

“She was a good all-rounder who was taken from us far too early,” added the manager.

“You never thought something like this would happen. It's surreal. How can this be true? Everyone here is in shock. You just can't get over it.”