BELMONT, N.Y. — William Larson Jr. has pleaded guilty to counts of Murder and Manslaughter in connection with the deaths of his parents in November 2019.
William Larson, 67, and his wife Lisa, 50, were shot with a rifle in the driveway of their home on Courtney Hollow Road in West Clarksville on November 5 of that year.
Their son, who was 17 at the time, became the subject of a manhunt involving several police agencies when he left the home after emergency responders arrived to investigate a reported fire.
He was eventually apprehended in some woods.
The case had been set for trial in January, however Larson Jr. plead guilty instead on Monday.
Hoping for leniency under domestic abuse statute
"My client and I, after reviewing the evidence and evaluating its strength, decided it would be better to accept the plea offer, and the focus our resources on prevailing at a hearing involving the Domestic Violence Survivors Justice Act," said Larson's attorney, Dominic Saraceno.
Saraceno explained that under that section of law, Larson's sentence could be capped at 15 years, instead of the potential 50-year to life sentence that he could have faced if he had been convicted of two counts of murder at trial.
However, in a move that shifts the burden of proof onto the defense, Saraceno will have to convince a judge that his client was the victim of domestic abuse inflicted by a family member or a member of the same household, that the abuse was a contributing factor to his client's conduct, and that otherwise statutory sentences would be unduly harsh in light of the circumstances.
"I'm reasonably certain we will be able to make a showing of all that at the hearing," said Saraceno. "And we don't need to offer proof beyond a reasonable doubt for us to prevail, but rather a preponderance of the evidence, which is a lower standard than is required at a trial for an extreme emotional stress event."
The sad and tragic case gripped the Southern Tier at the time of Larson's arrest several witnesses told police investigators that Larson had stopped attending Portville High School just before his parents were killed.
A neighbor described Larson as a normally polite and helpful teen who seemed to change in the weeks leading up to his parent's killings.
"He dropped out of school. He started staying up all night. He started sleeping in their vehicles instead of in the house,...and his mother was worried about him," neighbor Bruce Hitchcock said at the time.
There had also been whispers from several students, and others who had contacted our newsroom, that William Larson Jr. was an abused child.
According to Saraceno, his law firm's investigation of the case leaves him reasonably certain that they will be able to demonstrate that.
"You know, it's easy for the public to look at situation like this and condemn someone...but he didn't have an easy life, said Saraceno. "There were reports that my investigator has uncovered that his father had shot him when he was younger, that his father would make him go out in the woods and cut wood for 12 hours at a time in the winter, and that his mother would often take cigarettes and put him out on his hands and arms...just a horrific upbringing."
Larson's prosecution was delayed several times due to the COVID-19 pandemic and a change of lawyers on the part of the defendant.