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An 82-year-old COVID-19 patient was beaten to death with an oxygen tank by a fellow COVID-19 patient allegedly because the former, a Catholic, was praying.
The 37-year-old suspect, named Jesse Martinez, was being treated for the disease alongside his elderly roommate, whose name was withheld, at a hospital in California, USA, as per Los Angeles Times yesterday, Dec. 23.
Martinez reportedly became flustered when the 82-year-old began to pray in the morning of Dec. 17. He picked up an oxygen tank and hit the old man in the head around before 10 a.m.
The suspect was then detained by hospital staff before police arrived, according to the report. The two COVID-19 patients did not know each other.
Martinez has since been arrested and was charged with murder, with an enhancement for elder abuse and religion-motivated hate crime, the report said.
“These families were already experiencing a hardship and now this — it’s senseless,” Lancaster City Mayor R. Rex Parris was quoted as saying. Ian Biong /ra
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