Chilling moment man confesses to killing elderly parents and burying remains at their home | World | News

In a shocking televised confession, 53-year-old New Yorker Lorenz Kraus admitted to murdering his elderly parents and burying their bodies in the backyard of their suburban home. The chilling interview, broadcast by CBS6 on Wednesday, unfolded mere hours after police unearthed human remains at the property, capping a mystery that began with the couple’s disappearance in 2017.

Kraus, described by authorities as deranged, sat down with CBS6 reporter Greg Floyd and calmly detailed the gruesome acts. “I buried them in their property,” he stated matter-of-factly when questioned about the fate of his parents, Franz and Theresia Kraus. Mr Floyd pressed further: “You buried them in the back of your house in Albany?” To which Kraus replied with a chilling simplicity: “Yes.”

The confession escalated as Kraus described the method of killing. When Mr Floyd asked: “You suffocated them? You suffocated your parents,” Kraus initially stammered, attempting to invoke his “Fifth Amendment rights”. 

However, he soon nodded and conceded: “Yeah, basically. My father, after he died, my mother put his head on his chest, and after a few hours, I finished her.” 

Kraus elaborated that he had choked his father with his hand before strangling his mother with a rope. It took him several days, he claimed, to decide on burying the bodies in the backyard.

The investigation into the Krauses—Franz, who would have been 92, and Theresia, 83—began not with suspicion of foul play, but financial irregularities. 

Law enforcement, tipped off by the Social Security Administration in May 2025, conducted a welfare check after noticing the couple continued collecting benefits despite their absence. Officers found no trace of them at the Crestwood Court home. 

As reported by The Times Union, the probe initially focused on financial crimes, but escalated when a relative’s 2020 welfare call revealed a neighbour’s claim that the Krauses had moved abroad.

Kraus, undeterred by the digging that uncovered one set of remains on Wednesday and another on Thursday, proactively contacted news outlets. 

In his sit-down with Floyd, Kraus framed the killings as an act of mercy. 

He insisted: “I did my duty to my parents. My concern for their misery was paramount.” 

He cited his mother’s injury from crossing a road and his father’s inability to drive following cataract surgery as justifications. 

However, when asked if he had killed them, Kraus said: “I would never have done such a thing, knowing what I did was wrong.”

Kraus also launched into a bizarre rant about society, saying: “My goal is for the American people to recognise that there is 40 million boomers, they are all going to go through the same kind of problems. 

“It affects all of us, and we need to widen up the law so people can deal with these kinds of problems.” He even asked for the interview be aired on YouTube, confirming he was of sound mind.

After the interview Kraus exited the CBS6 building and was promptly arrested in the car park. An unnerving statement he released to outlets, ignoring his parents entirely, promoted a wild scheme to replace state and federal governments with a board of trustees. 

He also suggested prosecution under German law if the public rejected his plan, while linking politicians like New York Governor Kathy Hochul and President Trump to conspiracy theories.

Albany Police Chief Brendan Cox, in a Thursday press conference, noted: “While we are confident that those are the remains of Franz and Theresia Kraus, we still need to do some work and confirm who that is.” 

Investigators continue to probe the cause of death, as the community grapples with this macabre tale of filial betrayal masked as compassion.