A Pizza Hut employee killed his manager over a measly $7,000 inheritance.
Kavonn Ingram confessed to shooting Alexander Stengel, 55, in the head at one of the fast food chain’s locations in South Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Stengel’s body was found in a trash can outside the restaurant on February 7.
Ingram is believed to have killed Stengel in the kitchen of the pizza restaurant and wrapped him in a trash bag and discarded it, according to investigators. Cops followed a trail of blood to the kitchen.
Stengel’s autopsy report stated that he was shot at close range and had gunshot wounds on his head and neck.
The victim cashed an inheritance check before going into work the day he was shot, and was believed to be carrying $7,000, according to a criminal complaint obtained by CBS 58.
Ingram said that he shot his boss in self-defense.
‘I take responsibility for my wrong actions taken after the altercation at Pizza Hut, however the events leading up to the altercation as well as the physical fight caused me to act in survival mode,’ he said said in court before his sentencing.
Ingram added that ‘the altercation did not have to become physical until it was initiated by the deceased – in a state of panic, anxiety, fear, grief’. He said that he felt he ‘would never recover proper justice’ and that was the reason he ‘committed inexcusable actions after the altercation’.
But Judge Michelle Havas told Ingraham: ‘Frankly, I don’t believe you.
‘I don’t believe for one second that this was anything but a cold-blooded execution of someone who worked for 33 years for crappy wages at a Pizza Hut, because it’s what he could do.’
Ingram was arrested four days after Stengel’s body was recovered. He pleaded guilty to first-degree reckless homicide in August, and on Friday was sentenced to 40 years in prison.
The victim’s sister, Pamela Stengel told the court: ‘I imagine his suffering. And his agony. His voice haunts me. I wonder what he was thinking in those last moments.’
Ingram’s restitution hearing will take place in November.
Pizza Hut had more than 6,700 locations in the US as of June, but one of its largest franchises, EYM Pizza L.P., last month announced it planned to sell all 127 of its remaining stores across five states on the heels of bankruptcy.
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