Son charged with murders of parents

THE bodies of a college professor and her husband have been recovered from a river in central Illinois and their 21-year-old son, who said he was “sick of his parents” and had stabbed them to death, has been charged with first-degree murder.

The bodies of Susan Brill de Ramirez and Antonio Ramirez Barron, both 63, were found Tuesday in the Spoon River near Annawan, Peoria County Coroner Jamie Harwood said.

Jose Ramirez was arrested and charged on Monday after confessing to killing his parents, Peoria County Sheriff Brian Asbell said. Ramirez has been appointed a public defender and is being held on a $3 million (R44m) bond.

Peoria County Assistant State’s attorney Dave Kenny said during a bond hearing on Tuesday that Ramirez told friends he was “sick of his parents” and that he had killed them on Friday.

Ramirez waited until his parents were sleeping then went into their bedroom at their home near Peoria, Kenny said.

He used pepper spray as a distraction and stabbed his father in the stomach and neck, then stabbed his mother when she woke up, he said.

Ramirez then wrapped the bodies in a tarpaulin and a tent, put them in his father’s Sports Utility Vehicle and drove them about 80km to the Henry County community of Annawan, where he dumped them off a bridge into a waterway.

The couple last reported to work on Thursday at Bradley University in Peoria. |