Had agreed or agreed

The murder last week of one of Switzerland's most famous skiers has forced the Swiss to look long and hard at a crime that is worryingly common in their society.
Corinne Rey-Bellet was shot by her husband Gerold Stadler just days after the couple had agreed to separate.

Stadler also shot and killed Rey-Bellet's brother Alain, and seriously wounded her mother, before finally killing himself.

The Swiss media tend to call cases like this "family dramas", in which a man kills his wife, often his own children, and himself.

Family slaughter might be a more accurate term - there have been 14 such cases in Switzerland in the last 11 months.


"There is a profile for a man who commits a crime like this," says Philip Jaffe, professor of psychology at Geneva University.

"He tends to be very ambitious, but isolated, very contained, and he can't cope with loss. So if his wife threatens to leave him his response is violence. "


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My question is on the second sentence of the above. It is a past perfect sentence. Is it necessary to write the past perfect here?


Instead of 'after the couple had agreed to separate' I would write 'the couple agreed to separate'.


I would like to hear your comments.