Around one in the morning on Thursday, Jay Albery Stevens, 52, flagged down Cochise County Sheriff’s deputies from a crossroads outside the town of McNeal, roughly 30 minutes from the Mexican border in southeast Arizona.
Stevens told the police who stopped to see if he was alright that he had just killed his stepfather and that he wanted to show them the corpse.
Stevens directed the police to his stepfather’s corpse, who had been shot in the chest with a.40 caliber revolver, lying outside of a neighboring house in the town of Pearce. Stevens was taken into custody there.
Stevens claimed to have been inspired to kill after his stepfather accused him of not reading the Bible, but in reality, his motivation came from “a lot of years of putting up with this [crap],” he told the investigators.
He also said he weighed several options of disposing of the body, including chaining it to his truck to ‘drag him out into the desert,’ or burying him, but decided that was too difficult.
‘I was gonna bury him, but I’m too lazy to dig a hole that big,’ Stevens told cops.
Stevens was charged with first degree murder and is being held on $1 million bond, according to the Herald Review.
Deputies from the Cochise County Sheriff’s office said they arrested Jay Albert Stevens, 52, after he waived them down at about 1am on September 8 at a crossroads outside the town of McNeal, about 30 minutes from the Mexican border in southeastern Arizona
When police stopped to ask if he was okay, Stevens informed them that he’d just shot his stepfather to death and that he wanted to show them the body
Stevens told police that his whole family disliked his stepfather, and characterized him as an alcoholic who ‘brainwashed’ his mother into becoming one too.
‘This has been building in me for a long time,’ Stevens said, ‘What I did today was just probably 20 years of [crap].’
Stevens said his stepfather had spent all of Wednesday drinking beer, and that at one point accused him Stevens of not understanding the Bible and never reading it.
The two began to argue about the accusation, and Steven’s stepfather told him ‘If you don’t like it, you can get out.’
Stevens then spent several hours in his bedroom where he ‘stewed’ over the fight, then decided to kill his stepfather.
‘It took me a while to get the gumption to go out there with a gun,’ he told police.
Grabbing the gun, Stevens walked into the living room and pointed it at his stepfather.
‘I put the gun right up to his face,’ he told cops. When the stepfather then said ‘[F***] off,’ Stevens shot him in the chest.
‘I was attempting to kill him,’ Stevens said, describing how his stepfather stood there looking at him before he fired another shot into him.
Stevens said he then punched his fallen stepfather in the face numerous times out of ‘anger and rage.’
Deciding he was going to get caught no matter what he did, Stevens said he walked his dogs over to his sister’s house so they’d be taken care of.
Once there he confessed to the murder and told her to call the cops, then started walking down the highway till he saw a deputy to flag down.