Authorities: Drugs, alcohol no factor in Linfield student’s slaying

McMINNVILLE, Ore. (AP) — Drug and alcohol tests on the body of the killer don’t shed any light on the deadly and unexplained stabbing of a Linfield College student last year, authorities say.

The results show that a tree farm worker never known to be violent was not drunk or high when he walked into a convenience store and stabbed Parker Moore, a Linfield College student he’d never met.

The Nov. 15 stabbing has baffled investigators, who haven’t uncovered a motive and say they may never know why it happened, KGW-TV reported. They say there was no confrontation between Moore and his killer.

Police fatally shot the killer, Juventino Bermudez Arenas, 33, after he returned to the store.

Officers said he advanced on them with a kitchen knife, and witnesses confirmed their account. Family members said Arenas was a Spanish speaker who had told them he was returning to the store to surrender.

Recently completed toxicology tests showed Arenas had a blood-alcohol content of 0.01 percent, said Yamhill County District Attorney Brad Berry. He called that figure unremarkable. The level at which a driver is presumed drunk is 0.08 percent.

The post-mortem testing also ruled out “common drugs of abuse” and pharmaceuticals such as oxycodone, methadone, hydrocodone and anti-depressants, Berry said.

Arenas was in the country illegally and lived with family members in a home near the 7-Eleven store, said Yamhill County sheriff’s Capt. Tim Svenson.

He had just one minor infraction on his criminal record and was working as a laborer at a tree farm, Svenson said.

The store is across the street from the main entrance to the Linfield College campus, where Moore, 20, lived. He was a sophomore from Woodinville, a business student, and a linebacker on the football team.