Troubled teen who shot his father in the head convicted of murder. Here’s his sentence
At the end of 2020, Adrian Kinchen Jr., 16, was sent to Lakewood from Florida to live with his father because his mother had trouble controlling her son’s behavior, court records say. After a week, Kinchen texted a friend about wanting to shoot his dad.
Ten days later, Kinchen Jr. took his 40-year-old father’s handgun from a backpack and shot the man in the head twice as he bent over to tie his shoes. Kinchen Jr. called his mother, waited 30 minutes, then called 911. Police responded for a report of a suicide.
Kinchen Jr. was sentenced Friday to 14 years in prison for second-degree murder. The sentence, imposed by Pierce County Superior Court Judge Clarence Henderson, was agreed upon by prosecutors and the defendant’s attorney as part of a plea agreement.
“To me if you can carry out adult crimes you should get adult time,” the victim’s brother, Caraun Vernon, wrote in a statement submitted to the court. “In my mind there is no gray area. I want to have faith in Washington judicial system that the appropriate time be handed down to the defendant, my nephew, who mercilessly took Adrian, Sr. my older brother from our family.”
Vernon wrote that his brother, Adrian Devaughn Kinchen Sr., was a role model to him and someone who gave back to Tacoma. Vernon said his brother coached youth basketball and donated necessities to single mothers. He said his brother loved to fish.
Kinchen Jr.’s sentence was below the standard sentencing range for defendants prosecuted in similar cases. According to court filings, the negotiated sentence took into account Kinchen Jr.’s age, mental health issues and upbringing.
That upbringing was difficult, the defendant’s mother told police. According to a forensic psychological evaluation conducted in April, the mother said Kinchen Jr.’s “immaturity, mental health issues and sudden bouts of acting out in fits of anger for no reason” made it hard. She said Kinchen Jr.’s father was never part of his life, and before the teen was sent to Washington, the last time he had seen his father was when he was 5 years old.
Records say Kinchen Jr. was diagnosed with unspecified depressive disorder, history of ADHD, history of disruptive mood dysregulation disorder, history of autism spectrum and borderline intellectual functioning in a recent competency evaluation at Western State Hospital.
Kinchen Jr. didn’t want to come to Washington. According to facts of the incident stipulated in the plea agreement, the defendant was “tricked” into moving. His mother initially told him he was coming to visit his grandmother, but it was his father who was waiting for him at Sea-Tac airport.
The teenager was in conflict with his father “from the moment he arrived,” evaluators wrote in his psychological evaluation. According to the report, the father left his son alone at home for days at a time and had a 24-hour surveillance system he used to listen in on his son’s phone calls with friends and his mother. The teen told evaluators that his father berated him over the language he used with friends.
When police interviewed Kinchen Jr. after the shooting, he told them he felt “trapped with no way out.” In the days before, Kinchen Jr. posted photos of himself on social media holding a gun, and he searched the internet for “would a bullet to the head hirt.” According to the psychological evaluation, materials taken from the teen’s electronic devices contained photos of him holding his father’s gun to his own head.
“Our family has been irreparably damaged,” Vernon, the victim’s brother, wrote to the court. “The pain we all experience and will continue to experience runs incredibly deep.”
