Charles Avey gets life in prison for son's necktie strangling at Wal-Mart

​When Charles A. Avey's wife told police he had attacked her with a hammer, Avey thought he needed revenge. So he took his 14-year-old stepson to the Germantown, Wis. Wal-Mart and strangled him to death with a necktie. Now he will sit in prison for the rest of his life.

Avey, 38, was sentenced to life in prison with no chance of release. He admitted to killing his stepson to get the boy's mother back for talking to police. His stepson, Cody, was in eighth grade at the time of his murder.

At his April 1 court hearing, Avey said he wrapped the necktie around Cody's neck and intended to kill him inside the van he was driving.

More from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel:

He had told his stepson only that the two of them were going "for a ride" late in the afternoon of Nov. 15, according to an investigator's report.

After he parked the van outside the Wal-Mart, Avey told Cody only that "they were going to sit there and talk," according to a summary of the investigator's interrogation of Avey.

After murdering the boy, Avey covered the body with clothing and book bags and left the van to meet a friend.