The 29-year-old arrested Friday in a northern Vermont death investigation is accused of killing his father and seriously hurting his mother with a baseball bat, according to Vermont State Police.
Jordan Lawyer is facing charges of second degree murder and first degree aggravated domestic assault in connection with the incident, which happened in Enosburgh. He's been held without bail following his arrest Friday, and was set to face a judge on Monday.
His father who was fatally injured was identified as 54-year-old Todd Lawyer, according to Vermont State Police. An autopsy determined his cause of death was blunt force trauma, and ruled the manner of death as homicide.
Lawyer's mother, 58, was said to be in stable condition at the hospital as of Friday night.
The three lived together in a house on West Enosburgh Road.
Police had issued a bulletin Friday morning saying they were searching for Lawyer. In an update around 11:30 a.m., they said they had located Lawyer and he had been taken into custody.
State police said Lawyer was wanted in connection with an incident that began around 8:45 a.m. when they received a call for a disturbance at a home on West Enosburgh Road, also known as Route 108, near Tyler Branch Road. Responding units found one person dead outside the home. A second person was taken by ambulance to an area hospital for treatment.
According to police, Lawyer was apprehended at about 11:20 a.m. Friday in downtown Enosburgh. He and the black Jeep Cherokee he was driving were the subjects of a “be on the lookout” alert after he was seen fleeing the property where an alteration occurred earlier in the morning.
Law enforcement personnel including state police, the Warden Service Division of the Vermont Department of Fish & Wildlife, and the U.S. Border Patrol flooded the area, and a state trooper located the Jeep on Vermont Route 105 west of Enosburgh. The vehicle, driven by Lawyer, sped off when the trooper attempted to initiate a stop, and a short pursuit ensued eastbound along Route 105.
State police said that law enforcement discontinued their pursuit as the Jeep entered Enosburgh.
Once in the central part of town, the Jeep stopped after it collided with a vehicle driven by a game warden. According to state police, troopers deployed a less-than-lethal impact round to bring Lawyer into custody.
Lawyer was undergoing evaluation and treatment of injuries at Northwestern Medical Center in St. Albans, state police said. No other injuries were reported as a result of Friday’s incidents.
Anyone with tips that could aid investigators is asked to call Vermont State Police at 802-524-5993. Anonymous tips may be submitted online at https://vsp.vermont.gov/tipsubmit.
Enosburgh, a town of about 2,800 residents, is located in northern Vermont, not far from the Canadian border.
