(CNS) – A convicted felon was sentenced Friday to 107 years to life in state prison for fatally stabbing a senior citizen after the man kicked the defendant out of his Palm Springs home, then leading police on a high-speed chase in the victim’s car.
Jonathan Alan Flora, 33, killed 75-year-old Henry Marshall at his home at 2290 Park Drive on May 16, 2017. He pleaded guilty in August to first- degree murder and nine other felony counts, including kidnapping, false imprisonment and evading arrest.
Flora was arrested hours after police discovered Marshall floating face-down in his swimming pool, with multiple stab wounds to his head, face and body. Officers followed a blood trail leading from the living room through the patio to the pool.
The defendant was found in possession of Marshall’s car, cellphone, driver’s license and credit cards when he was arrested after leading Palm Springs police on a pursuit the same day the victim’s body was found.
Flora was wearing bloodied clothes, had a “significant cut on one finger” and was in possession of a black glove, which matched a glove found inside Marshall’s home, according to court documents, which say he also used the victim’s cell phone to make a call and his credit card to buy vodka at a liquor store.
Flora told a passenger in the car that he had cut himself “because he had killed someone,” according to an arrest warrant declaration, which said that Marshall’s neighbors told police they saw Flora crawling out of a window of the victim’s home on the night before the discovery of his body.
Court documents don’t specify why Flora was kicked out of Marshall’s home or how long he had stayed there.
Prior to being arrested, he led police on a chase that reached speeds of 90 mph on Palm Canyon Drive before he drove onto the Agua Caliente Indian Reservation, where the vehicle came to a rest near the trading post.
All four occupants of the vehicle were detained on the reservation, police said. The passengers were released after being interviewed, and Flora was initially booked on suspicion of violating parole.
Flora was previously convicted of burglarizing the Park Drive home in 2009, though police and prosecutors have not disclosed whether Marshall was the homeowner at that time.
Along with the burglary conviction, Flora was convicted in 2012 of making criminal threats.
