Press Release
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Date: 04/07/2009

Contact person(s):

Media Coordinator, Terry Menshek - (707) 565-3099 Media Spokesperson, Chief Deputy District Attorney Spencer Brady

Santa Rosa, Sonoma County, California

CONVICTION FOR SECOND DEGREE MURDER, ELDER ABUSE & ARSON UPHELD ON APPEAL IN KILLING OF MOTHERE

District Attorney Stephan Passalacqua announced today that the California Court of Appeals upheld convictions after a trial by jury in the second degree murder case of People vs. Steven Krukow. Krukow was convicted of murdering Ms. Doris Krukow, his mother.

District Attorney Passalacqua stated, “We are pleased that the Court of Appeal found that defendant was afforded a fair trial and upheld the jury’s guilty verdicts. This defendant deserves a lengthy prison sentence for the gruesome and violent killing of his seventy-two-year-old mother.”

Krukow, 45, had been living with Mrs. Krukow, who was 72 years old, in her home on Young Drive in Santa Rosa. Mrs. Krukow had asked her son to move out because of numerous problems he had caused in the neighborhood. On the date of her murder, he was supposed to move out. Mr. Krukow, however, took a heavy blunt object and bludgeoned Mrs Krukow to death while she sat on a loveseat in her housecoat. He then poured gasoline in several areas of the house and ignited several fires. Over fifty percent of Mrs. Krukow’s body was burned in the fire. Mr. Krukow then fled Sonoma County and lived under an assumed name for almost four weeks until Mendocino Sheriff’s deputies spotted him in Fort Bragg on August 17, 2006. When they asked for identification, Mr. Krukow gave a false name. The jury also found Mr. Krukow guilty of elder abuse and arson of an inhabited dwelling.

The Court of Appeals found that statements involving Mr. Krukow’s problems with his neighbors and defendant’s video-taped statements were properly admitted into evidence. The court also found that Mr. Krukow received a fair trial, noting the “powerful evidence of guilt.”

On June 28, 2007, Mr. Krukow was sentenced to five years, plus an additional fifteen-years-to-life in the California Department of Corrections.