A 44 year old man has been handed a death sentence in Tarrant County, Texas, after being found guilty by a jury of the horrific murders of three individuals.
In addition to executing the savage killings, he also dismembered his victims and set their bodies alight.
Over a seven-day period in September 2021, Jason Thornburg took the lives of David Lueras, 42, Maricruz Mathis, 33, and Lauren Phillips, 34, later claiming the trio needed to be sacrificed for religious purposes.
During the lengthy trial, chilling details emerged about what transpired at the Mid City Inn in Euless. The three victims were separately lured into the room Thornburg was renting and subsequently murdered.
The killer slit the throats of two of the victims and strangled Phillips before sexually assaulting her lifeless body. He also consumed part of David’s heart and severed his penis, reports the Mirror US.
Once the victims were dead, Thornburg dismembered their bodies in the motel bathtub and stored their remains in rubbish bags under the bed.
In the early hours of September 22, the murderer transported their body parts, which he had kept in plastic storage tubs, to a dumpster on Bonnie Drive in Fort Worth.
He deposited the remains inside the dumpster, ignited them and then fled the scene. Firefighters were summoned to the blaze and extinguished the fire, where they discovered the victims’ burnt bodies.
Law enforcement officials zeroed in on Thornburg as the perpetrator who dumped and incinerated bodies in a dumpster, thanks to CCTV footage showing his Jeep Grand Cherokee near the crime scene. He callously cleaned and returned the containers he used to the shop where they were originally purchased, showcasing an eerie degree of detachment.
In court, substantial evidence, revealing chilling details of the motel slayings, convinced the jury of Thornburg’s ongoing threat to society, resulting in his death sentence after a swift five-hour deliberation. As the verdict was declared, Thornburg remained mute.
Post-verdict, the presiding judge announced: “Therefore, Jason Allen Thornburg, you have been adjudged by a jury to be guilty of capital murder. And the juror has answered the special issues making it mandatory that your punishment be death. Therefore, this court sentences you, Jason Allen Thornburgh, to death.”
His conviction and death penalty are automatically reviewed by the Court of Criminal Appeals. If the sentence is affirmed, Thornburg will stay under state custody until his execution is effectuated, a process that can stretch on for years.
What’s more, upon his arrest for these gruesome murders at the motel, Thornburg shockingly admitted to police his involvement in two additional killings.
Thornburg is alleged to have confessed to law enforcement that he murdered his 61 year old room mate, Mark Jewell, who died in a suspicious home explosion in May 2021, and his former girlfriend Tanya Begay in Arizona back in 2017.
Firefighters discovered Jewell’s body following a gas explosion at the Fort Worth residence. Begay vanished in March 2017 after last being seen with Thornburg.
According to Fox 4 reports, the FBI still considers the case open as her body has never been found.