An 18-year-old man, Omarion Daitron Ivory, has been arrested in connection with a September homicide in Port St. Lucie, Florida, according to police. The case, which involved the murder of 67-year-old Francis Devon Gennace, is being investigated as a potential serial killer scenario.
Ivory, a resident of Southeast Lansdowne Avenue, was apprehended on Wednesday. He is facing charges of first-degree murder with a weapon and armed burglary of a dwelling committing battery. Gennace was found dead in his home on Southeast Albatross Avenue on September 12, four days after he was last seen alive. The cause of death was determined to be blunt force trauma to the head and approximately 45 stab wounds.
Gennace’s absence was first noticed when he failed to show up for work at a local auto body business. His co-workers alerted the police, who conducted a welfare check at his home. At the time of the murder, Gennace’s wife, Joan, was in New York visiting family. She told investigators that she had been away for about a month and had last spoken to her husband on September 7.
The investigation into Gennace’s murder revealed no obvious suspects or red flags, according to Assistant Chief Leo Niemczyk. He noted that in most violent crimes, the victim and the suspect are usually known to each other, but this was not the case in this instance.
The breakthrough in the case came from video surveillance footage and a bloody hammer. Police recovered approximately 600 hours of video from homes in the area, which showed an individual walking towards Gennace’s home on the morning of September 8. The same individual was later seen riding a bicycle away from the area.
Further investigation revealed that Gennace started missing phone calls from his family around 10:45 a.m. on the same day. On September 20, a detective noticed a call regarding a man matching the description of the person in the video attempting to break into another home. The man, later identified as Ivory, was found in the area with a hammer in his backpack. The bicycle he was riding was determined to have been stolen from a home near Gennace’s.
Ivory’s arrest was facilitated by the discovery of shoe patterns that matched those found at the murder scene and a partial fingerprint on a knife at the scene that was identified as Ivory’s. Additionally, Gennace’s DNA was found on the hammer that was recovered from Ivory.
Niemczyk stated that Ivory has a juvenile arrest history and a mental health history. His family has indicated that he is a paranoid schizophrenic, although this has not been officially confirmed. Ivory has previously been held under the Florida Mental Health Act, also known as the Baker Act, which allows for the involuntary detention of individuals deemed a threat to themselves or others.