“We fought all the time, but we loved each other”, Jacob Hearne told the investigator —minutes after confessing how he let his grandmother die.
Jacob Hearne was 19 years old and had lived with his grandmother since he was 9 in Mountain View, Missouri. He called her his mother figure, his hero, until she began, according to him, to be “a nuisance”.
Jacob was obsessed with the internet and wanted to make a living as a streamer; however, his 62-year-old grandmother Phyllis Schweinel was very concerned about his physical and mental health. She wanted to help him not only find a job and study, but, most importantly, have real-life friends.
One morning they argued because he had overslept and she lost an opportunity to make money. In his own words, they hated each other at that moment.
Hours later, a fire started in the house and got out of control until it was reduced to ashes… as was the elderly woman’s life. Jacob was found hours later sitting in the yard, completely barefoot. At first, he claimed that he had gone out for a walk and had no idea what had happened, but then he changed his story and said that his grandmother had asked him to end her life.
But it was completely false….
Jacob was tired of his grandmother meddling in his life, so he decided to get rid of her in cold blood. He waited for her to take several Xanax pills and fall asleep in her chair; then he lit a jacket with the gas stove and left it behind her. He then left the house before the fire trapped him.
The flames reduced the house to ashes… as was the elderly woman’s life.
Firefighters found her body inside the burned home that afternoon of April 19, 2022. Hearne was sentenced to 24 years for second-degree murder.