On June 10, a 68-year-old man in Renton, Washington named Wendell Wilson killed his 38-year-old daughter Lila Wilson over an argument on how to install a baby gate for her 13-month old son.
The argument started when it was unclear if the baby gate would fit in the kitchen, during which both Wendell and Lila got in each other’s faces.
Wendell then called his ex-wife and told her that he was going to kill his daughter. He then got his gun and shot Lila six times, two of which were in the head. The shooting occurred several feet away from his grandson. Afterward, Wendell called his ex-wife and told her that he killed Lila.
When the police arrived, Wendell confessed to the murder. He is being charged with first-degree murder and is being held for $2 million. He will be back in court on June 27.
Needless to say, it won’t be much of a Father’s Day for him.
I’m sure there are those people out there who would like to see this guy on death row for what he did (myself included). But unfortunately, the State Supreme Court of Washington ruled the death penalty statute to be unconstitutional last year, although it is possible the state legislature could pass a constitutional death penalty bill in the future.
So it is likely that Wendell Wilson will spend his remaining years behind bars, given his age. While this tragedy was the result of a petty dispute, there have been more horrific instances of fathers murdering their daughters in the form of honor killings, something which I have mentioned in a previous article.
Some of these honor killings have occurred here in the United States, including the case of Yaser Abdel Said, who murdered his daughters Amina and Sarah on January 1, 2008, in Irving, Texas and is still at large (and probably thumbing his nose at America). Another honor killing that took place in America involved Faleh Hassan Almaleki, who ran over his daughter Noor with his car in a Phoenix-area parking lot. The prosecution originally sought the death penalty for Almaleki, but the defense talked them out of it on the grounds that it would not look good if a Christian seeking the death penalty for a Muslim (never mind the fact that Muslims advocate the death penalty for Christians accused of various crimes, e.g. the Asia Bibi case). So Almaleki was eventually sentenced to 34.5 years in prison.
Meanwhile, Wendell Wilson’s fate is yet to be determined.
