A Colorado ex-convict remarried on national TV was picked up for drunken driving in Utah - and stunned jailers by confessing to the murder of his parents at their home.
After getting a call from Richfield, Utah, police late Monday night, Jefferson County, Colo., deputy sheriffs went to the home of Richard and Helen Pelham and confirmed Ronald Pelham's confession.Rescue crews had been at the house the day before, trying to prevent Ronald Pelham's reported attempt at suicide.
"Oh my God. I can't believe this. He called me yesterday morning and asked me if I wanted to go to Las Vegas with him," said his soon-to-be ex-wife, Cindy Pelham, who remarried Pelham, 28, on Geraldo Rivera's TV talk show last December. The two remarried officially Jan. 8.
Police say that call probably came after the elder Pelhams had been bludgeoned to death in their sleep. Police believe the weapon was a golf club.
"He seemed real straight. After killing his parents, I don't know how he sounded so normal," said Cindy Pelham, 33, whose divorce from Pelham is scheduled to be final on Oct. 28.
Richard Pelham, 66, and Helen Pelham, 60, lived in the house for 11 years. Ronald Pelham lived with his parents occasionally since his release from prison in January.
In the past, "we'd heard them fighting inside . . . a lot of yelling and screaming back and forth," said neighbor Eric Mayes. However, nothing was heard overnight Sunday, he said, the night rescue crews were sent there on a report of a suicidal man.
On Sunday, "Ron called and left a suicidal message on my answering machine. I called three morgues and asked if he'd been brought there," Cindy Pelham said.
She called the fire department, but when an ambulance and fire crews arrived, Pelham and his parents said, "We don't know what you're talking about," said Jefferson County Sheriff's Sgt. Gary Granger.
The crews left - and sometime in the coming hours the Pelhams were bludgeoned as they slept.
The slayings came to light Monday night, when Ronald Pelham was arrested near Richfield. As he was being booked into the Sevier County Jail, Granger said, "he said he'd killed his parents back here." When jailers realized he wasn't joking, they called police.
During a court hearing Wednesday, a tearful Pelham waived his right Tuesday to extradition hearings. Colorado police were in Richfield Tuesday to transport him back to Golden to face possible murder charges.
(Mark Brown is a reporter for the Rocky Mountain News in Denver. News staff writer Marlys Duran contributed to this report.)