An 11-year-old Pennsylvania boy faces homicide charges after he shot his father to death after getting mad at him for taking away his Nintendo Switch and telling him to go to bed.
Pennsylvania State Police said they were called to the Duncannon Borough home just beore 3:30 a.m. on Tuesday and found 42-year-old Douglas Dietz dead from a gunshot wound to the head, WGAL reports.
Dietz’s son, Clayton Dietz, was arrested and charged with murder.
The boy’s mother told investigators she was sleeping when she heard a loud noise and smelled something that smelled like fireworks. She was unable to awaken her husband and heard something that sounded like water dripping, only to find that it was blood when she turned on the lights.
Clayton then entered the bedroom and announced, “Daddy’s dead.” Troopers who responded to the scene also said they heard Clayton tell his mother, “I killed daddy.”
Court documents say that Clayton told investigators he had a good night with his parents, who sang happy birthday to him after midnight. But Clayton said he got angry “when his dad told him he needed to go to bed.”
Police asked the boy what happened, and he responded that he “shot somebody.” He told police that he found a key in his father’s drawer and used it to unlock a safe in the bedroom, where he hoped to find his Nintendo Switch. Instead, the found a gun and admitted “removing the gun from the safe, loading bullets into it and walking over to his father’s side of the bed,” the documents say.
Then, the docs say, “He pulled back the hammer and fired the gun at his father.”
Police asked the boy what he thought was going to happen when he shot his father and he told them, “he was mad, and he had not thought about that.”
Investigators found the gun used in the shooting in a closet that connects Clayton’s bedroom with his parents’, WHTM said.
The boy’s mother, Jillian Dietz, said that she saw Clayton in the closet before he ran downstairs yelling, “My dad’s dead.” She also said she hear him yelling, “I killed my dad, I hate myself.”
The 11-year-old boy is being held at Perry County Prison without bail and is due for a hearing on January 22, according to WGAL.
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