Oklahoma teen charged with killing five family members to be tried as adult

By Heide Brandes

OKLAHOMA CITY (Reuters) - A 16-year-old Tulsa-area boy accused with his brother of murdering their parents and three siblings will be tried as an adult on first-degree murder charges, a judge ruled on Monday.

Lawyers for the teen, Michael Bever, had asked the court that he be tried under provisions of the juvenile code, which the judge rejected.

Bever and his brother Robert, 18, have been charged with killing five family members at their Broken Arrow home outside of Tulsa in July.

Oklahoma State law requires the state to treat anyone aged to 15 to 17 and charged with first-degree murder as an adult, though Bever's attorneys had argued that the provision was unconstitutional.

Being tried as an adult means the 16-year-old could be sentenced to life in prison. He is too young to be sentenced to death, if convicted.

The brothers are suspected of killing their parents, David and April Bever, two brothers and a sister with various weapons, including a hatchet, police said.

An autopsy released on Monday showed that all the victims had been stabbed repeatedly. The father, David Bever, sustained 28 sharp force wounds, including 17 in the torso. The suspects' mother, April, was stabbed 48 times.

The two older children, 12-year-old Daniel and 7-year-old Christopher, were also stabbed in the shoulder, while five-year-old Victoria received stab wounds in her neck and upper arm.

A 13-year-old sister survived the attack and a 2-year-old child was found unharmed.

Police have not commented on a motive for the attack.

A 911 call led Broken Arrow officers to a suburban home where they discovered the blood-splattered crime scene. Robert and Michael Bever were tracked down by dogs to a wooded area near the house.

(Writing by Jon Herskovitz; Additional reporting by Lenzy Krehbiel-Burton in Tulsa; Editing by Doina Chiacu and Sandra Maler)