A 20-year-old man was arrested Sunday in the slayings of his parents, younger brother and elderly grandmother, whose bodies were found bludgeoned to death in the family home, authorities said.
Richard Edgar Henderson Jr. told detectives late Sunday that he had beaten his family to death with a pipe on Thanksgiving evening, Manatee County Sheriff Charlie Wells told the Sarasota Herald-Tribune.
He was being charged with four counts of murder and was jailed Sunday night without bond, authorities said. It was not immediately clear if he had an attorney.
The bodies of his parents, Richard Henderson Sr., 48, and Jeaneane Henderson, 42, grandmother June Henderson, 82, and 11-year-old brother Jake were discovered in the home earlier Sunday, the sheriff’s office said.
The medical examiner was examining the bodies and had not released an official cause of death.
Henderson was arrested shortly before 7 p.m. Sunday walking along a highway in Palmetto, the sheriff’s office said in a news release. He had been seen at the family home earlier that morning and later abandoned a van in nearby Wauchula, officials said.
Myakka City is about 45 miles southeast of Tampa.