Remembering Mike Mohn: Father, husband and quiet neighbor who's death shocked the world
Mike Mohn was a quiet man in a quiet neighborhood in Levittown.
At 68, the son of a horse-riding farm boy who helped build U.S. Steel’s Fairless Works, he was semi-retired civil engineer. He played guitar. He was a gentle and genial presence on Upper Orchard Drive.
“Just a real good guy, low key,” said Carol Carnley who, with her husband, Jim, have lived next door to the Mohn family for 28 years.
“Whenever Mike pulls up into his driveway, and then you pull up into yours, he waits until you get out of the car so he can say, ‘Hi, Carol!’ before he goes into his house.”
Mohn and his wife, Denice, are the kind of neighbors you hope to live next to. Friendly. Kind. Need a favor? They’ll help.
“They are very private people, who lived quietly,” she said.
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That ended Tuesday when Denice Mohn returned home to find Mike dead in a first-floor bathroom. He had been beheaded by their youngest son, Justin, 32, who lived with them. Denice Mohn rushed to the Carnley’s seeking help.
“Mike fell,’” Carol Carnley recalled her saying. “I called 911.”
Then Carol and her husband, Jim, went over.
“I am in shock, like everyone else here. They are a great family. I’ve known Justin since he was 4. I am just shocked by the events. I’ve never seen violence up close, and I don’t think Denice has, either,” she said.
The nightmarish events that unfolded that cold winter evening, and became an international story with the most shocking and distrubing headlines, overshadowed Mike Mohn’s life, which by all accounts was decent and honorable.
He raised three children, two boys and girl, in a neat, green-shuttered Levitt Jubilee, which was their home for almost 40 years.
In the 72 hours after his death, reporters representing big outlets, from the AP to the networks to TV affiliates in Philadelphia, to the UK, lined the drive in idling vehicles, seeking interviews with the Carnleys and others.
“Not one of them asked about Mike,” Carol Carnley said.
When one did, she broke her silence, so people know more about the Mike Mohn than how he died.
Original story Levittown man charged with beheading father. He posted grisly YouTube video after
When the Carnley’s moved into their home, the Mohns were the first to welcome them. Their kids played together.
“We weren’t go over and have dinner friends, but Mike and Denice would help anybody in the community,” she said.
You didn’t have to ask Mike Mohn for help.
“I broke my arm, and my husband has a bad back. In the past couple of snow storms, Mike shoveled our driveway. Hand shoveled. The whole thing. He shoveled his, and then ours,” she said.
But if you needed help, he was your go-to guy. When the Carnley’s dog died —– it was a big, heavy dog — Mike was the one who helped Jim Carnley lift it and carry it to his truck.
He walked with his wife almost every day.
“She came home for lunch every day, and after she ate, she’d go for a walk and he’d go with her,” she said.
Mike was always there when you needed help, and now she and her husband are doing the same for Denice Mohn. They’re collecting the mail, they’re feeding the Mohn’s cats. And they’re bracing for something else.
After Justin killed his father, he made a nearly 15-minute long video and, clearly disturbed, displayed his father’s head, and ranted against President Biden, federal employees and more. In a politically divided country, it’s already been used by partisans with media platforms, one calling Justin Mohn a “MAGA maniac.”
Mike Mohn spent years as a federal employee as civil engineer for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in Philadelphia.
“We are deeply saddened about the tragic death of our teammate Michael Mohn. He served with our Geo-Environmental Section and primarily worked on environmental remediation projects in the region," said spokesman Steve Rochette. "Our thoughts and prayers are with the Mohn family and we are focused on supporting our grieving employees at this time. We would refer any other questions to local law enforcement authorities.”
The irony, said Carnley, is that Mike Mohn and his wife kept their political opinions to themselves.
“They weren’t political people,” she said. “I warned Denice about that. I warned her that this is an election year and it’s going to be dragged in. And I hate that Mike’s going to be used as fodder for that, because that wasn’t him.
"None of this was Mike.”
JD Mullane can be reached at 215-949-5745 or at jmullane@couriertimes.com.
Get help
From Middletown Police: KCIT is the Keystone Crisis Intervention Team that supports crime victims and communities in their recovery from traumatic events. Members of KCIT will make themselves available to neighbors, those involved in the actual reporting of the incident and were in the close proximity of the scene of the Mohn murder on Jan. 30, 2024. If you would like to take advantage of this resource please use one of the following numbers to make contact with a KCIT member : 1-855-SOS-KCIT or 1-855-767-5248
This article originally appeared on Bucks County Courier Times: Mike Mohn remembered for life, not shocking death, YouTube video
