Alex and Derek King were only 12 and 13 when they were accused of killing their father with a baseball bat.It was the Sunday after Thanksgiving in 2001, the boy’s father was found in his house that was on fire with his head smashed in. The boys were at the house at the time, but two days after the murder, family friend, Rick Chavis, turned the boys in to the police, and they admitted to the murder.Derek said that he had been the one who actually hit his father with the bat, but his younger brother Alex had given him the idea. They also said that they had started the fire to cover up the murder. A lot of people were wondering what could possibly be the motive behind these two killing their father. They openly admitted that their father had never physically abused them or anything.For six months they awaited trial. Before they went to court the boys suddenly changed their story. They now said that family friend Rick Chavis had been the murderer.The trial for this was very unusual because right after Rick Chavis’s trial the boys were tried as adults for the same exact charges. While Derek was at a foster home, his younger brother often went to Chavis’s house when his dad was gone, and when Alex King took the stand during Rick Chavis’s trial he admitted to having a sexual relationship with Chavis and that he was in fact in love with the family friend. Chavis had been charged with sexual abusing two thirteen year olds in 1994. Prosecutor David Rimmer said that Chavis probably killed the boys’ father so he could have Alex all to himself.Alex said that they were sleeping the night his father was murdered and Chavis came into the boys’ room woke them up and told them to go out to his car. He came outside later and drove the boys to his house where he told them that he had killed their dad.Alex’s answer to Chavis’s attorney asking him to describe his father’s death changed everything. Alex said that his dad was still trying to breath and was making a sound like someone who had a slightly stopped up nose. The jury said that there was no way the boys were in the car when their dad had been murdered since they could describe that to them and Alex was sentenced 8 years in prison and Derek 9 in separate juvenile detention centers.Chavis was acquitted for the charge of killing the boys’ dad because there wasn’t enough evidence that he actually swung the bat. He was later charged with accessory after the fact to first degree murder and tampering with evidence since he took the boys home and washed their clothes. He is now serving 35 years in prison.This whole story is just crazy. If you ask me I think that Chavis actually murdered the dad and the boys were in the room with him. I’m guessing he threatened the boys until they took the blame for him and then when it was almost time for their trial, the boys realized how much of a big deal this all was so they told everyone that Chavis really did it. I just don’t think that young boys like that could smash their father’s head in with a baseball bat, but I guess you never know.
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