LOWELL, MASS. (WHDH) - A Maine man was sentenced to life in prison Wednesday after pleading guilty to beating his grandparents, mother and a home health care worker to death with a baseball bat.
Groton police officers responding to a report of a person in need of assistance on Common Street shortly before 6 p.m. on Sept. 8 2017 were led to a second home on the street where they found the bodies of 26-year-old Orior Krause’s victims.
The victim were later identified as Krause’s grandparents, Elizabeth Lackey, 85, and Frank Lackey, 89, who owned the Groton home; his mother Elizabeth Krause, 60, of Rockport, Maine; and Bertha Mae Parker, 68, of Tewksbury, a home health care worker who was caring for his grandparents, according to a release issued by the Middlesex District Attorney’s Office.
The subsequent investigation revealed that Orion Krause traveled from Rockport, Maine to the Boston area on Thursday, September 7. On Friday, September 8, his mother met him and they traveled together to visit his grandparents at their home.
At some point following his arrival at the home, then he fatally attacked the four victims with the bat then fled to a neighbor’s home where he was arrested.
“The resolution of this case today in no way can erase the incalculable loss felt by the family and friends of these victims. Following the 2017 murder, the entire Groton community mourned the loss of Elizabeth and Frank Lackey, Elizabeth Krause and Bertha Mae Parker. We continue to have them in our thoughts today as this case comes to a close.” District Attorney Marian Ryan wrote in a statement.
Krause will be eligible for parole in 25 years.
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