Homeless Man Gets Life Sentence for Killing 79-Year-Old with Tree Trimming Shears

A Texas homeless man will likely spend the rest of his life in prison after a jury sentenced him for the murder of a 79-year-old man in 2016. The homeless man killed the senior citizen with tree trimming shears.

Police found Conrado Sarate dead inside his Lubbock, Texas, home on September 6, 2016, KCBD NBC11 reported. Police determined the killer used tree trimming shears which were left behind. Police found the blood-stained shears in the living room of Sarate’s home.

Investigators arrested Lewis Ray Young for the murder in March 2017. Police say he was homeless at the time of the murder.

Police said Sarate had more than a dozen cuts on the front, back, and side of his head. Investigators found Young’s DNA on the murder weapon.

After learning of the DNA evidence, Young provided information about the circumstances leading to Sarate’s murder, the Lubbock NBC affiliate reported.

KCBD reported the following:

Court documents show Young told police he was highly intoxicated on September 4, 2016, and was smoking crack cocaine when he was approached by a woman. The woman asked Young to help her get the money owed to her. Young agreed and she drove him to a house, which was the house in the 2100 block of Ave. P.

The report goes on to say the woman stayed in the car and Young went to the door. An older Hispanic male opened the door and let Young in. The man said he did not owe the woman any money and for him to leave the house. The man picked up an unknown object and hit Young in the arm with it. Young said he and the 79-year-old man began to wrestle inside the house. Young told police he took the object and hit Sarate on the head with it twice. When Sarate fell, he hit him once again in the stomach.

The documents also say Young then walked back to the car, told the woman what happened, and the woman walked into the house. Later they both left in the car, according to the court documents. Young told police he had never been to the house before that night.

The court found Young guilty of the murder and handed down a sentence of life in prison with the possibility of parole. He has already been in jail for five and a half years, KCBD stated.