Less than six months after an Ellenwood man was released from prison, prosecutors said he went into his stepfather’s metro Atlanta room looking for money and brutally attacked him as he slept.
“Don’t kill me,” the 72-year-old shouted as his stepson, Jarvis Oneal Cloption, stabbed him repeatedly in the face, neck and arm, according to the DeKalb County District Attorney’s Office. Amid cries for help, the stepfather’s 52-year-old friend intervened, but prosecutors said Cloption attacked him as well. The two victims were hospitalized but survived.
On Friday, Cloption pleaded guilty to two counts of abuse of an elder person and three counts of aggravated assault in connection with the Sept. 4, 2020, stabbings, the DA’s office said. Following a plea agreement, Superior Court Judge Yolanda Parker-Smith sentenced Cloption to 20 years in prison with the possibility of parole.
According to investigators, Cloption had been staying at his stepfather’s home in the 2200 block of Boulder Run Trail after being released from prison in Mississippi on March 23, 2020. He was also previously incarcerated for two years at the shuttered Rivers State Prison in Milledgeville in the early 1990s, according to online records from the Georgia Department of Corrections.
At about 1 a.m., prosecutors said Cloption attacked his sleeping stepfather with a knife, threw the man to the ground and stole his wallet. The attack was heard by a friend of Cloption’s stepfather who was staying at the house and tried to help. But the DA’s office said Cloption stabbed him in the face, arm and head.
Channel 2 Action News
Channel 2 Action News
The stepfather was rushed to Grady Memorial Hospital, while his friend was taken to Atlanta Medical Center. Their names were not released.
Two days after the stabbings, Cloption was arrested by MARTA police and booked into the DeKalb jail, according to online records.
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