Inset: Deon Jennings (West Valley City Police Department). Background: Aspenwood Apartments in West Valley City, Utah (Google Maps).
A Utah man convicted of fatally stabbing his aunt’s boyfriend after an argument has been sentenced to prison.
Deon Jennings, 35, was found guilty by a jury in August of killing 59-year-old Willie Houston. Jurors told the court they believed Jennings had acted in “imperfect self-defense,” leading them to reduce the charge from murder to manslaughter, according to courtroom reporting by local NBC affiliate KSL.
West Valley City police responded to the Aspenwood Apartments on April 30, 2022, after receiving a report of a stabbing. Officers found Houston bleeding from wounds to his back and neck on the kitchen floor. Houston identified Jennings as the attacker before he was taken to a hospital, where he later died.
Houston’s niece told the court that Jennings showed no remorse and would not have contacted police without her urging. “I called him repeatedly, I reached out to him repeatedly and I connected the dots between that. It was never him,” she said.
Prosecutors argued that Jennings should receive a prison sentence consistent with the jury’s manslaughter verdict.
The judge sentenced Jennings to one to 15 years in prison, giving him credit for the 1,659 days he had already spent in the Salt Lake City Jail.
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