Nehemiah Griego, The Teenage Serial Killer Who Murdered His Entire Family
Bernalillo County Sheriff’s DepartmentNehemiah Griego was 15 when he killed his parents and three of his siblings.
In the early morning hours of Jan. 19, 2013, a 15-year-old boy named Nehemiah Griego walked into his parents’ bedroom with a rifle from the family’s gun cabinet and shot his sleeping mother in the face. The sound awakened his younger brother, nine-year-old Zephaniah, who left his room to see what was happening. Nehemiah told Zephaniah what he’d done — and then shot him in the head, too.
As Nehemiah’s two younger sisters, five-year-old Jael and two-year-old Angelina, cried in their bedroom, the teenage serial killer shot them as well. Now alone in the house, Nehemiah waited for his father, a former pastor who worked the night shift at a homeless shelter, to return home.
When Greg Griego walked in the door around 5 a.m., Nehemiah shot him four times. He then spent the day with his 12-year-old girlfriend and her family. Later that evening, he went to church and told members that his family was dead.
Someone called the police, who arrived at the Griego home to find the five bodies. The more investigators learned, however, the stranger the case got.
Find a GraveThe entire Griego family was buried together.
The Griego family was deeply religious — far more so than most American families. Nehemiah’s parents home-schooled their children and only allowed them to socialize with other church families, yet the boy seemingly had a sexual relationship with his young girlfriend. Phone records revealed that Nehemiah had sent her a picture of his mother’s dead body the night of the murders and then exchanged several sexually explicit text messages with her.
According to court records, investigators also discovered that Nehemiah’s father had taught him to use the guns and sometimes ordered him to patrol the family’s property with them due to the elder Griego’s “paranoia and distrust of neighbors and the government.” The teen also reportedly had plans to carry out a mass shooting elsewhere and die by exchanging gunfire with police officers.
Griego initially pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity, but in October 2015, he admitted to two counts of second-degree murder and three counts of child abuse resulting in death. He was sentenced to life in prison and will be required to spend 30 years behind bars before he is eligible for parole.
