A man from upstate New York was taken into custody this week after he left a television studio, where he openly stated in an interview that he had killed his parents.
Lorenz Klaus, 53, made a shocking revelation to CBS6 in Albany on Thursday, confessing to the murders of his parents eight years ago. His visit to the station came the day after police discovered two bodies on his property.
The station also shared the entire interview on YouTube.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lmz0Empdtiy
Klaus pleaded not guilty to the charges on Friday at Albany Crown Court, facing two counts of murder and concealment of human bodies.
During a 30-minute conversation with news anchor Greg Floyd, Klaus was initially hesitant to discuss the specifics of his parents’ deaths in 2017.
“When your parents died, did they know what was going on with them?” Floyd asked.
“Yeah,” Klaus replied.
“And did they know it was in your hands?”
“Well, yes, there’s no one there.”
The interview aired during the station’s 6 PM news broadcast. By the end of the segment, police were waiting for Klaus in the train station parking lot.
Klaus referred to the murder as an act of mercy, claiming he wanted to spare his parents from the decline that comes with aging.
He noted that his parents were likely in their 70s and 80s at the time.
Klaus confessed to strangling his father, Franz, with his bare hands, and did the same to his mother, Theresia. He buried them in the backyard of his home in Whitehall, Albany.
While he said his parents didn’t explicitly ask to be killed, he insisted they “knew they were going downhill.” He expressed that he was fulfilling a duty as their son.
The police discovered the bodies during an investigation related to Klaus allegedly collecting Social Security benefits from his deceased parents for personal use. The Social Security Administration had requested welfare checks at Klaus’s home.
Additionally, conspiracy theories seemed to play a role in Klaus’s narrative. Reports indicate that he shared a manifesto filled with anti-Semitic beliefs, describing Zionists, Governor Kathy Hochul, and a Rhodes Scholarship winner as “enemies of the state,” and suggested charges under German law.
Klaus also ran as a Democrat in New Hampshire in 2020, campaigning to abolish the presidency and promoting various anti-Semitic conspiracy theories.
Local reports indicated that Klaus’s online activities in recent years displayed animosity toward Britain, diplomatic relations, Freemasonry, and Jewish individuals.
At his court appearance on Friday, Klaus was ordered to remain in Albany County Jail without bail.
