Brother of Transgender Woman Who Committed Suicide Charged With Murder of Their Father
I heard about this story on Utah Public Radio driving through Utah this afternoon.
A 25-year-old Smithfield man — charged with fatally stabbing his father in the street outside the defendant’s home last week — hugged the older man, then jumped on his back and stabbed him in the neck with a paring knife, according one of several witness accounts of the vicious attack.
Shane Alan Hallstrom has been charged in 1st District Court with first-degree felony murder in the Thursday death of 58-year-old Calvin Leon Hallstrom. The crime is punishable by up to life in prison.
Shane Hallstrom’s mother, LaDean Hallstrom, who is Calvin Hallstrom’s ex-wife, said she was able to pull her son’s hand off the knife and remove it from Calvin Hallstrom’s neck following the attack, according to a probable cause statement filed by police with the Cache County jail.
The woman then tried to put pressure on the man’s wound, but her son tried to stop her. She then took the knife into the house and called 911, the jail statement says.
As she was on the phone, she saw her son “slamming Calvin’s head on the concrete, the jail statement says.
LaDean Hallstrom later told police that “Calvin and Shane had a strained relationship.”
More: Utah man charged with murder in stabbing of father | The Salt Lake Tribune
Why was this father/son relationship so strained that this young man resorted to an absolutely horrible brutal bloody murder of his own father? There are clues.
This young man’s sister posted this to Facebook in October, and followed through on her promise.
The young man will undergo a mental competency evaluation.
Shane Hallstrom’s pretrial appearance was on Monday at the 1st District Court in Logan. He was charged with murder after police allege he stabbed his father, Calvin Hallstrom, to death on April 28.
Geoff Fattah, with the 1st District Court, said the prosecution ordered an evaluation of Shane’s mental competency, which could take up to 60 days. A court hearing was set for June 20 to discuss the status of the evaluation before the prosecution.