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Brian K. Templeton of Edgewater Park pleaded guilty in August to first-degree aggravated manslaughter, according to Burlington County Prosecutor Scott Coffina.
Templeton admitted to beating his sleeping 77-year-old mother, Doris Templeton, to death in October 2019 with a frying pan inside their Courtyard apartment, Coffina said.
He wanted to sell her belongings to buy cocaine, according to the prosecutor.
Before his sentencing on Friday, Templeton told Superior Court Judge Philip E. Haines that he was not in the right frame of mind due to his drug addiction.
“I do feel remorse,” Templeton said in the Mount Holly courtroom. “She was the only person that I really had.”
An investigation found that after Templeton bludgeoned his mother, he stuffed her body in a cedar chest and left it there for a few days. He then loaded it into the back of his car and parked the vehicle at the pizza shop where he was employed. Her body was discovered by investigators about three weeks after she had been killed, Coffina said.
“This is a horrifying crime for several reasons,” Coffina said.
Templeton’s father abandoned their family when he was a toddler, and he was raised by his mother.
"When this defendant looks back on her determination and dedication to be there for him, he will have to contrast memories of that commitment with the savage way he killed her, and the unimaginably callous treatment shown afterward to her remains," Coffina said.
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