A 10-year-old Pennsylvania boy has been charged with murder as an adult for beating to death a 90-year-old woman who told him to get out of her room, officials said.
Tristen Kurilla spent Saturday visiting the Damascus Township home of his grandfather, who was caring for an elderly woman, Helen Novak.
But when Tristen went to Novak’s room around 10 a.m. to ask her a question, the woman yelled at him and told him to go away, cops said.
The boy did what he was told, but came back with a wooden cane, which he hooked around Novak’s neck and pushed into her throat for several seconds before punching her five times in the throat and five times in the stomach, according to the Scranton Times Tribune.
“I killed that lady,” Tristen told a trooper Saturday during an interview at the state police barracks.
An autopsy Monday determined Novak died from blunt force trauma to her neck.
The boy was charged — as an adult — with criminal homicide.
The boy went to his grandfather, Anthony Virbitsky, and told him Novak was bleeding from the mouth.
Virbitsky told police he did not find any blood when he first checked on Novak around 10:30 a.m., but the woman was “breathing heavy and looked scared.”
He found her unresponsive around 11 a.m. and called 911, officials said.
The boy was charged as an adult but can petition to have the case moved to juvenile court, the newspaper said.
He will appear in court on Oct. 22.