A San Diego, California, man who traveled to Texas to kill his boyfriend in 2020 has been sentenced to life in prison.
Law enforcement authorities said 25-year-old Alexander Yoichi Duberek stabbed 30-year-old Chad Luera 93 times on the side of a rural road on Oct. 31, 2020.
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He was indicted in September 2021 and pleaded guilty in July 2022 to one count of interstate domestic violence resulting in death, authorities said in a news release. He was sentenced Thursday by U.S. District Judge James Wesley Hendrix.
Authorities said Duberek intended on visiting his boyfriend, who lives in Plainview, and arrived at the Lubbock airport that evening.
Duberek took a taxi to a Sam’s Club and purchased a Toyota Camry for $3,000 in the parking lot. He then drove to a Walmart and bought a knife, hatchet, gas can, collapsible shovel, headlamp, clothes, boots, personal hygiene items and first aid kit, the release states.
He then drove to Luera’s home, where he told his family that he planned on taking him out on a date. They had planned on staying at a hotel, prosecutors said at Thursday’s sentencing hearing.
“This defendant looked his boyfriend’s family in the eyes and described the date night he had planned for the two of them. But instead of providing a romantic evening, he carried out a sadistic, premeditated plan to take the life of a 30-year-old man and callously dispose of his body,” U.S. Attorney Leigha Simonton said in the release.
He then killed Luera and dumped his body, but then fled to Houston.
There, he sold the Camry in an auction. Blood was later found in the backseat of the Camry.
He was wanted by authorities until March 18, when he turned himself in to the police in San Diego.
“After viciously attacking him, the defendant left this wonderful human life, who he reportedly loved and wanted to marry, on the side of the road, like yesterday’s trash, like his life didn’t matter, to bleed to death,” the victim’s aunt said at the sentencing. “Why would he extinguish a light that shone so brightly for so many? Why didn’t he just stay in California, move on with his life?”
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