A Pontotoc County man killed his fishing buddy after he allegedly attempted to feed him to Bigfoot.
Pontotoc County meth user thinks he saw Bigfoot
A jury found Larry Sanders, 55, guilty on Wednesday for the murder of his friend, Jimmy Knighten, in July 2022, who he believed was trying to use him as a sacrifice to the fictional creature.
Sanders told the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation that he had seen three sasquatches down stream from their fishing spot. He said that he spotted the largest one, dark-colored a hulking 12-feet tall, dipping it’s toe in the water.
Sanders was convinced that Knighten’s plan was to drown him so that his corpse would drift down to the Bigfoots as a ritual offering. “That’s the only thing that made sense,” he reportedly stated.
He apparently grew suspicious of Knighten for encouraging to attempt to catch a specific type of fish, which escalated into a physical fight when his friend suggested heading back to their truck to take a lunch break. During the altercation, Sanders choked his fishing mate to death.
Afterwards, he told his daughter that he had become the leader of the Sasquatches after slaying his friend, and needed to report back to “headquarters.”
Pontotoc County man’s claims murder last resort
Sanders’ attorneys cleverly argued that their client was attempting to take charge of the situation without the “element of malice aforethought” necessary for Knighten’s killing according to local outlet KXII.
“In a first-degree murder case in Oklahoma, as in most other states, you have an element of malice aforethought, meaning that you have to have specific intent to cause the death of another,” District Attorney Erik Johnson explained to reporters.
Sanders maintained during his testimony that he was not the initiator of the altercation. “He attacked me,” he told the court. “I acted out of survival mode.”
While in custody police, Sanders admitted that he raised his hands up triumph after slaying Knighten to display to the sasquatch he believed were watching that “evil is weak.”
A defense witness testified Sanders’ claim that “he and Jimmy had been fighting the Bigfoots” by the river. He said that the defendant believed that, “They were everywhere.”
The defense team argued that Sanders might have been experiencing a hallucinatory episode induced by methamphetamine, having recently abused the drug a few days before murdering Knighten.
“Jimmy truly enjoyed anything and everything outdoors,” Knighten’s obituary states. “He loved to fish, hunt game, ride four-wheelers, and most of all drink his beer around a big bonfire. Jimmy never met a stranger, and would give anyone the shirt off his back.”
“Yes, there was monsters in the wood that night, but it wasn’t Bigfoot, it was Larry Sanders,” Johnson told the outlet.
Sanders will be sentenced on June 18 and could face life in prison without parole.
