Inset: Nicholas Steven Kirchner (Sumter County Sheriff’s Office). Background: The Largo, Florida home where Kirchner is accused of murdering his parents (WTSP).
A Florida man is accused of murdering his parents and then traveling to another state where he threatened to kill other people.
Nicholas Steven Kirchner, aged 37, is charged with two counts of first-degree murder for allegedly killing his parents in Largo, as reported by the Pinellas County Sheriff’s Office in a press release.
The investigation commenced shortly after 12:30 p.m. on Friday during a welfare check at a Saunders Avenue home for an employee who failed to appear at work. Officers discovered the bodies of 53-year-old Elizabeth Lee Kirchner and 64-year-old Steven Eric Kirchner in the living room, both victims of gunshot wounds.
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Roughly three hours later and some 460 miles away, deputies with the Taliaferro County Sheriff’s Office in Georgia received a 911 call from a motorist about a suspicious man in the shoulder of the highway. He was wearing all white and a red baseball hat and kneeling with one hand raised, the agency said in a press release.
A deputy approached the man who identified himself as Nicholas Kirchner and said he was armed. Investigators learned that he was not only a homicide suspect but also had pointed a gun at a person earlier Friday in Sumter, South Carolina. During that incident he allegedly told someone “I’ve already killed two people — I’ll kill some more.”
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WACH, a Columbia, South Carolina, Fox affiliate, reported the suspect threatened several people at gunpoint and ordered of them to enter a home to retrieve an item. He said he would should the person if his demands were not met, per the TV station.
After he was taken into custody in Georgia, he admitted multiple times to killing his parents, authorities say. According to Pinellas deputies, he described the slayings as a “righteous kill.” He also said he had abandoned a stolen Nissan Pathfinder not far from where he was arrested, cops said.
The suspect was subsequently transported to the McDuffie County Sheriff’s Office jail where he awaits extradition back to Florida.
A probable cause arrest affidavit which would possibly lay out a motive for slaying his parents along with a timeframe as to when he may have killed them was not immediately available.
