Pasadena dad gets life for killing kids on Father's Day

[MuffyBee]

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/metropolitan/6988970.html
Pasadena dad gets life for killing kids on Father's Day
May 4, 2010

Chronicle file
Randy Sylvester appears in court in 2008.


A Pasadena man pleaded guilty today to a capital murder charge and was sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole for killing his young son and daughter and burning their remains on Father's Day in 2008.

Randy Terrell Sylvester could have faced the death penalty if convicted at trial for murdering Randy Sylvester Jr., 7, and 3-year-old Denim Sylvester. Sylvester led police to the children's bodies stuffed inside a suitcase and a wooden box near Texas 3 and Allendale in southeast Houston about a week after their mother had reported them missing from their apartment complex on June 15, 2008.

Sylvester initially blamed their deaths on kidnappers who took them because he owed them money. But he also reportedly admitted to local activist Quanell X, who was assisting police, that he had killed them accidentally.

A judge declared Sylvester mentally incompetent to stand trial in February 2009 and he was sent for treatment at the Vernon State Mental Hospital. His competency now restored, Sylvester's case was set for trial.

Visiting state District Judge Don Stricklin asked Sylvester several simple questions this morning, such as his date of birth and hometown, before sentencing him.

[Nut44x4]

We have the story here:

http://missingexploited.com/2008/06/21/bodies-of-missing-7-year-old-randy-sylvester-jr-3-year-old-sister-denim-sylvester-found-deceased/

[MuffyBee]

Thanks Nut.  I just knew I had read of this case at Scared Monkeys. 

[MuffyBee]

http://www.myfoxhouston.com/dpp/news/100504-randy-sylvester-verdict?obref=obinsite
(video)
Man Pleads Guilty to Murdering Own Children
Accused of Killing, Charring Children's Bodies
Tuesday, May 4, 2010


Randy Sylvester
Randy Sylvester

PASADENA, Texas - A man has pleaded guilty in the deaths of his son and daughter whose bodies were found charred and abandoned in storage containers by Pasadena police in June 2008.

Randy Sylvester, 29, pleaded guilty on Tuesday to capital murder and was sentenced to life in prison without parole.

In March 2009, a judge determined that Sylvester was not competent to stand trial.

Sylvester was charged with capital murder and assault (bodily injury to a family member) for killing his children, Randy Jr., 7, and Denim, 3. He was serving a 2-year probation for a November 2006 drug conviction when the killings took place.

The bodies of the children were found by police packed in a wooden chest and a suitcase in a wooded area approximately 5 miles from their Pasadena home after Sylvester led officers to it. Sylvester originally told authorities that the children were in a pond almost 6 miles away from the railroad overpass on Galveston Road where they were actually left.