Tyler Roenz and Michelle Roenz (Harris County Sheriff’s Office)
A 19-year-old Texas man will spend several decades behind bars for killing his mother, strangling and beating the 49-year-old woman to death before throwing her corpse in the trunk of her own car and fleeing.
Harris County District Court Judge Hillary Unger on Thursday ordered Tyler Roenz to serve a sentence of 40 years in a state correctional facility for the 2022 murder of Michelle Roenz, authorities announced.
In addition to pleading guilty to his mother’s murder, Tyler Roenz also pleaded guilty to one count of felony tampering with evidence. Unger sentenced him to 20 years on the latter charge, with the two sentences running concurrently, meaning at the same time.
In exchange for pleading to the two felonies, prosecutors dismissed one count of unauthorized use of a vehicle and one count of attempted sexual assault. The alleged sexual assault took place in February 2022 and involved Tyler Roenz allegedly attacking an 18-year-old girl inside of his car while they were in their high school parking lot.
“This is an awful tragedy for this family,” Harris County District Attorney Kim Ogg said in a statement following the sentencing hearing. “It was important that this defendant took responsibility for what he did, and now he will spend decades in prison for his actions.”
The investigation into Roenz began on Oct. 13, 2022, when then-17-year-old Tyler Roenz and his 49-year-old mother were both reported missing by the teen’s father. That report was filed after the father came home and found someone’s tooth in the family’s garage, as well as a trail of blood leading to the master bedroom. Inside the master bedroom was a large pool of blood, along with an additional four teeth.
The husband also reported that his wife’s black Mazda was missing. Based on license-plate readers and a series of credit card purchases at gas stations in Michelle Roenz’s name, authorities tracked Tyler Roenz as he drove through Oklahoma and Kansas until the black Mazda was eventually spotted in Nebraska.
Authorities in Texas gave word to the Nebraska State Police that the car was believed to be traveling within the Cornhusker State and linked to a recent homicide. Some 15 minutes after that alert, state troopers said they caught sight of the car and attempted a traffic stop, leading to a brief high-speed chase.
After traveling for roughly 9 miles at speeds over 110 mph, the Mazda rear-ended a semi-truck and careened off the road, slamming into a tree near Aurora, Nebraska.
Tyler Roenz was seriously injured in the crash and taken to a hospital. His mother’s body was found in the trunk of the car he was driving.
Tyler Roenz was detained in Nebraska and later extradited to Texas.
A medical examiner in Nebraska determined Michelle Roenz’s manner of death to be homicide and the cause of death to be strangulation and blunt force trauma, according to authorities.
Tyler Roenz must serve at least 20 years of his 40-year sentence before he is eligible for parole, the DA’s office said.
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