Son accused of beating his dad with a wrench over inheritance

A man accused of trying to murder his father allegedly used a wrench to beat and torture him for four hours following an argument about his dead mother’s $2 million fortune. 

Jason Heyworth, 37, is on trial in New York for the 2017 attempted murder of his 71-year-old father Eric Heyworth. 

During the trial in Manhattan Supreme Court on Wednesday, jurors were shown gruesome photos of the injuries the elder Heyworth sustained in the attack in June 2017. 

The photos show Eric’s face covered in blood and his eyes swollen shut. 

Prosecutors say Heyworth beat his father so badly in his East Harlem apartment that he was in a coma for two months. 

Eric, a retired public school teacher and Harvard graduate, suffered brain damage from the attack and is now in an assisted-living home. 

Heyworth, who is an amateur filmmaker, is accused of attacking his father after going to his childhood home to speak to him about a dispute over his late mother’s fortune. 

Prosecutors say that Heyworth and his brother each inherited $1 million following their mother Virginia Paris-Heyworth’s death in 2012. 

He is alleged to have swindled away his inheritance on hotels and expensive restaurants.

Heyworth had allegedly demanded that his father give him more money and let him move back into the family apartment on East 106th Street. 

During the trial in Manhattan Supreme Court on Wednesday, jurors were shown gruesome photos of the injuries the elder Heyworth sustained in the attack in June 2017

The photos show Eric’s face covered in blood and his eyes swollen shut. Prosecutors say Heyworth beat his father so badly in his East Harlem apartment that he was in a coma for two months

Prosecutors say that Heyworth – who is a Columbia University graduate – went to the apartment on the day of the attack to find his father had changed the locks. 

He allegedly found a way into the home and attacked his father with a wrench. 

A neighbor testified that he heard high-pitched screams coming from the apartment and called police three times, the New York Post reports. 

Eric, a retired public school teacher and Harvard graduate, suffered brain damage from the attack and is now in an assisted-living home

When police responded to the home, Heyworth opened the door for detectives and they reported seeing a bloodied and half-naked Eric trying to drag himself from the bedroom. 

Eric allegedly told police that his son had injured him before later slipping into a coma when he was rushed to a hospital. 

‘This defendant tortured and brutalized his own father for hours nearly killing him because of greed,’ prosecutor Sarah Marquez told the court.  

“He will never be the same man.’  

Meanwhile, Heyworth’s defense attorney Todd Spodek told jurors that Eric was angry his wife, who had been married to for 30 years, had left him $60,000 compared to the $1 million each she had given their sons. 

The defense claims that Eric attacked his son first.  

In his opening statements on Tuesday, Spodek referenced Marvin Gaye’s song ‘What’s Going On’ – suggesting the two cases were similar. 

‘Unfortunately Marvin Gaye had issues with his father and when he went to see him, he was shot and killed. When Mr Heyworth went to see his father to work out issues, he was attacked with a wrench,’ the defense attorney said.  

Heyworth’s defense attorney Todd Spodek told jurors that Eric was angry his wife, who had been married to for 30 years, had left him $60,000 compared to the $1 million each she had given their sons