A Sacramento County jury has convicted Mark Andre Tomas Navarrete of two counts of first-degree murder in the 2024 killings of his parents at their Elk Grove home, finding he struck and strangled them so he could collect half of their estate. Jurors also found true special-circumstance allegations that he committed multiple murders and that the killings were carried out for financial gain.
Navarrete's parents, 73-year-old Augusto Tacsuan Navarette and 70-year-old Marjorie Jane Tomas Navarette, were found dead inside their home in the 9000 block of Crosscourt Way on June 28, 2024, according to sacbee.com. Prosecutors said Navarrete stood to inherit half of his parents' estate at the time of the killings, a motive the outlet reported was central to the case against him.
A Resentment Rooted in Repaid Debts
A Resentment Rooted in Repaid Debts Prosecutors said Navarrete's parents had repaid other family members for debts their son owed, a development that caused him to resent them. The same outlet reported that prosecutors also told jurors Navarrete had scammed friends and family with fake investments. Jurors ultimately found that the murders of both his mother and father were committed for financial gain, a special circumstance that elevates the severity of the conviction.
Mask, Gloves and a Scooter Ride to the Garage
According to the same report, Navarrete parked his vehicle several blocks from his parents' house, put on a mask and gloves, and rode a kick scooter to their residence. Once inside, the district attorney's office said he struck both his mother and father on the head with an object before strangling them to death in the garage, a sequence of events reported by sacbee.com.
After the killings, Navarrete fled the scene in his parents' car, according to fox40.com, parking it a short distance from where he had left his own vehicle before riding the scooter back to retrieve it. Investigators later found the scooter used that day at Navarrete's home, and automated license plate readers and traffic cameras helped the Elk Grove Police Department track his movements, per the sacbee.com account.
A Text to the Dead, Then a 911 Call
In a detail that unsettled investigators, elkgrovenews.net reported that Navarrete sent text messages to his deceased parents later that morning, inviting them to dinner. He eventually drove to his parents' house with his children after his sister could not reach them, then reported his parents' deaths and their missing car to police, setting the official investigation into motion.
DNA analysis identified Navarrete's genetic material beneath his mother's fingernails, the outlet's report states, forensic evidence that became part of the case prosecutors built against him. Investigators also used license-plate-reader and traffic-camera footage to identify Navarrete driving away in his parents' vehicle, corroborating the physical evidence collected at the scene.
Sentencing Set for Next Month
The jury convicted Navarrete last Friday, according to elkgrovenews.net, capping a case that stretched from the 2024 double-homicide investigation to this month's verdict. He is scheduled to be sentenced on November 13, 2026, at 9 a.m., per fox40.com, and prosecutors have said he faces a maximum sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole, as reported by CBS Sacramento.
The case echoes other Central California instances of adult children charged in the killings of their parents. In one comparable case, a Fresno man who admitted to killing his parents at their home in 2022 was sentenced to 100 years to life in state prison, according to ABC30 Fresno.
