A 24-year-man accused of poisoning and dismembering his mother after she removed him from her will has been found guilty of first-degree murder. mailonline reports, Ari Liggett, 25, of Centennial, Colorado, was charged following the death of 56-year-old Beverly Liggett in October 2012. Police found Liggett driving around with his mother's remains in two plastic storage bins in the back of an SUV days after he killed her.
Liggett, who faces life in prison, is set to be sentenced on Friday. Police reports say Liggett told officers he found his mother dead on the floor of their home and that she'd committed suicide by taking potassium cyanide.He said he was trying to put her body in a storage shed when he was arrested.When later questioned by police, the former University of Colorado student mentioned his mother’s will and said his ‘definition of right and wrong may be different from what others think.’
Prosecutors claimed that Liggett had an obsessive, years-long plan to kill his mother, reports The Denver Post.
Liggett had pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity in July, but a state mental hospital found him competent to stand Prosecutors acknowledged Liggett's long history of mental health issues, but argued that he had maintained a ‘method to his madness’ as he spent years buying chemicals and practicing his mixtures in the Centennial home he shared with his mother. Prosecutors said Liggett poisoned his mother with a cyanide mixture on Oct. 14 or 15, 2012, and spent the next 24 hours getting rid of the evidence by dismembering her body in the bathtub.
He then placing her remains in plastic tubs full of olive oil, before scrubbing cleaning the house and running a handsaw through a cycle in the dishwasher. Liggett repeatedly told officers they could not prove he was sane. He said he believed people were demons and that he didn't know the difference between right and wrong. But prosecutors said Liggett's actions and comments were calculated and manipulative. A court-ordered mental health evaluation also found Liggett sane.'His mental illness is used by him. To his advantage. When he wants it,' said Chief Deputy District Attorney Brian Sugioka.Liggett had spent years harboring a deep hatred for his mother, blaming her for his mental health issues, said Sugioka. Public defender Natalie Girard repeatedly described Liggett's actions as 'completely psychotic' and argued Liggett's mental illness was too severe for him to plan his mother's murder.
He was first diagnosed with a developmental disorder at 5 years old and in the following years he was diagnosed with several mental health illnesses and hospitalized five times.
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