ROANOKE TIMES
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, May 8, 1990                   TAG: 9005080705
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: B-3   EDITION: EVENING 
SOURCE: associated press
DATELINE: HAMPTON                                LENGTH: Short


FATHER GETS 50 YEARS FOR KILLING SON, 8

A man who fatally stabbed his 8-year-old son but never fully explained why has been sentenced to 50 years in prison.

When asked for a final comment Monday, Arthur Donovan Jarrell, a 37-year-old former mail carrier at Newport News Shipbuilding, quoted the Bible and told Circuit Judge Walter J. Ford he was sorry for his son's murder.

Assistant Commonwealth's Attorney James P. Bohnaker, who had asked for a life sentence for first-degree murder, said he was satisfied that Jarrell will be locked up.

Defense attorneys Thomas L. Hunter and Robert W. Lawrence tried unsuccessfully at Jarrell's March 14 trial to prove that the crime was not premeditated and that their client had "snapped" when his son, Samuel, struck him in the groin with a hammer. The boy was stabbed 38 times with a fillet knife.



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