PARKER, Colo. — A 73-year-old Parker man was arrested last week after allegedly admitting to killing his wife with a sledgehammer, according to court documents released Wednesday.
“I think I killed her. I hit her in the head with a hammer,” the suspect James Beeker allegedly told officers, according to an arrest affidavit obtained by Denver7.
Those Parker police officers were attempting to perform a welfare check on the couple when they encountered the suspect sitting inside his vehicle parked at an intersection near his home the afternoon of April 4, according to the affidavit.
Moments later, police forced their way into the couple’s home, located in the 8400 block of Wheatgrass Circle, and found the body of his wife, 79-year-old Angel Beeker. Her body was cold to the touch and lying face down in the kitchen in the home, the affidavit reads.
Police found a bloodied sledgehammer in the garage during a subsequent sweep of the home, according to the affidavit. Blood stains were also observed along a walkway on the side of the home that went from the garage to the driveway, police wrote in the affidavit.
Just a day before the grim discovery in the couple’s home, police responded to the same address on a report that James Beeker was having “psychological issues,” according to the affidavit. A 911 call was made after the suspect was attempting to take medications that were not prescribed to him.
After arriving at the home, officers were told that James Beeker was incapable of taking care of himself and was refusing to be checked into the Pine Grove Assisted Living facility, where a room in the facility’s memory care unit had been reserved for him.
A family friend told officers that James Beeker had been in a mental decline, and he had been “getting worse and worse over the past few months,” according to the affidavit.
Police left without detaining James Beeker during the April 3 call because it was determined that “he did not have any immediate health concerns,” police wrote in the affidavit. A family friend grew concerned for Angel Beeker’s welfare after she failed to answer the friend’s phone calls later that evening. Her body was found the next day.
During questioning of the suspect the next day, James Beeker claimed to have no memory of the incident despite him successfully answering basic questions about who he was and where he was, police reported in the affidavit.
James Beeker was booked into the Douglas County Detention Center on suspicion of first-degree murder.
