Trigger Warning: This article mentions details about a murder and suicide.
A man from Georgia has been found guilty of the murder of a firefighter and his wife while their 2-year-old son slept upstairs in the home. He was sentenced for murdering Timothy Justin and Amber Hicks, who were found dead in their Acworth, Georgia, home on November 19, 2021. According to court records, he was found guilty on all counts in a bench trial last week.
Investigators said that their neighbor, Matthew Scott Lanz, was responsible for the killings after entering their home and shooting the couple. He was unaware that their child was asleep upstairs. The child was thus left physically unharmed.
During the investigation, Justin’s father testified that he entered the couple’s home after Amber didn’t show up to work and neither of them responded to messages, according to 11 Alive.
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According to PEOPLE Magazine, officers entered their home and encountered the 2-year-old kid beside them, soaked in blood as he desperately tried to wake them up. He was still in the same diaper. While a clear motive wasn’t clearly stated, prosecutors said Lanz previously claimed he had seen “demonic lights” inside Amber Hicks’ home.
In addition, his late brother Austin Lanz had broken into the same property when different residents lived there before the murders back on April 21, 2021. He later died by suicide after stabbing a police officer in Washington, D.C.
The then homeowner, named Phillip Brent, spoke to The Associated Press and said that the break-in was the result of a long pattern of harassment directed at him and his then-fiancée.
According to Brent, Austin Lanz had been caught on surveillance video placing sexually explicit and “vaguely threatening” notes in their mailbox. Brent said that during the April break-in, the disturbed individual smashed through the back door with a sledgehammer, opened the blinds, and entered through Brent’s bedroom.
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Lanz was ultimately convicted of two counts of malice murder, four counts of felony murder, two counts of aggravated assault, one count of child cruelty, and one count of tampering with evidence.
As per CBS News, one day after the murders, authorities say he stabbed a Sandy Springs police officer who was responding to a burglary call.
He attacked the officer multiple times as others intervened and opened fire, striking and wounding him.
The trial after the murders was delayed as attorneys were contemplating whether Matthew Scott Lanz was in a stable mindset and “appeared to have the capacity to make rational decisions,” as he was working with his attorneys to manage outbursts, which might disrupt the flow of the proceedings.
Therefore, there has been a visible history of instability and crime in the family, even before the murders of Justin and Amber Hicks. Perhaps a consistent rage is building over time within both the brothers, Matthew and Austin, followed by the latter’s death, which has led to the couple’s murders that have ruined the Lanzz family forever.
