MUSCATINE, Iowa – 19-year-old Darian Lensgraf is in jail after being accused of stabbing his grandmother, Diana Lensgraf, on her 66th birthday.
Lensgraf is charged with first-degree murder after Muscatine Police found the victim dead in her home in the early morning hours of Dec. 12.
Muscatine Police spent several hours at the home on the 2100 block of Breese Avenue that same morning.
“Because we are on a dead-end road, there’s nowhere to run,” says neighbor, Jesus Ocampo.
Officers ended up in Ocampo’s neighborhood after a strange 911 call made from a convenience store just blocks away from Diana’s house. There, a clerk made the call reporting a man with a bloody knife was in the store.
“There was a person there, had blood on him, had a knife and was making statements about having killed somebody,” reports Alan Ostergen, Muscatine County Attorney.
That’s where police found Darian who confessed he stabbed his grandmother to death.
“It’s not every day that we arrest 19-year-olds for killing their grandmothers,” Ostergen comments.
Police aren’t saying what led up to the stabbing and that the grandson, Darian, doesn’t live in the victim’s house.
“I wish there was a little more community support here or maybe this wouldn’t have happened,” Ocampo emphasizes. “We are neighbors, but we really aren’t.”
Police are still trying to identify a motive for the murder. Darian is scheduled for a preliminary hearing on Dec. 21.