A Brooklyn Park man attempted to bludgeon his elderly father to death with a hammer during a fight in the basement of their house, Anne Arundel police said Wednesday.
Shortly after 10 a.m. Tuesday, Matthew Bradley, 43, told police he killed his father, Leland Bradley, according to police.
Officers found Leland Bradley, 80, alive but bleeding from head wounds in the basement of the house on the 200 block of Exeter Court
in Brooklyn Park.
Bradley told police his son began acting strangely while they were out to breakfast and grew increasingly disoriented on the drive home from the restaurant, according to police.
When they arrived at the house, Matthew Bradley began arguing with his father and attacked him, police said.
He wrapped an electrical cord around his father’s neck to strangle him, then dragged him to the basement and beat him with a hammer, police said.
Anne Arundel firefighters and rescue personnel treated Leland Bradley at the scene and took him to a nearby hospital.
He was then transferred to the University of Maryland Shock Trauma Center in Baltimore City for multiple head lacerations, police said. The extent of his injuries was unknown late Wednesday afternoon.
Police said Matthew Bradley struggled with officers and had to be restrained. He was transported to an undisclosed medical facility and charged Wednesday with first- and second-degree attempted murder and assault, police said.
Police spokesman Sgt. John Gilmer declined to comment on what prompted the attack.
“I can’t say if [Matthew Bradley] suffered from a mental illness, because that would be getting into his medical history,” Gilmer said.
A neighbor, who declined to give her name, said she did not hear arguing on the quiet cul-de-sac and was unaware of the incident until police cars blocked off the street.
She described Leland Bradley as a friendly neighbor.
