Funeral held for man police say was killed by son

Mourners crowded into a rural eastern Arizona church on Monday for the funeral of a man that police say was killed by his 8-year-old son.

People who couldn't get in either crowded around an open door or sat on chairs set up outside St. John the Baptist Catholic Church.

Vincent Romero was shot last week along with a man who rented a room in his house.

Police say Romero's son planned and methodically carried out the killings, and confessed to them.

But the boy's attorney says police overreached in questioning the boy without representation from a parent or attorney and did not advise him of his rights.

The church is in front of the school where the boy was in the third grade.

The funeral came on the same day the 8-year-old boy was due in court to face two counts of premeditated murder.

Police say the boy, a third-grader, confessed to planning and carrying out the shooting deaths of his father, Vincent Romero, 29, and a co-worker who rented a room from him. The men were found dead inside Romero's home northeast of Phoenix on Wednesday.

Authorities had no motive for the shootings.

``That's what's puzzling to us,'' Police Chief Roy Melnick said Monday on NBC's ``Today'' show. ``There's no record of any problems in school, no reported abuse.''

A man who identified himself as "Mike," and said he is a friend of Vincent Romero and had worked with him, called News 92-3 KTAR's "Ankarlo Mornings" Monday.

"Mike" said he knows that Romero would not have abused his son or done anything else wrong. He called Romero "a perfect father."

"Vince was absolutely in love with his son," Romero said. "Vince was the most dedicated father. Used to make daily trips on his dime from St. Johns to Mesa to work with us. When he finally decided to quit, one of the reasons -- and I believe it was a major reason -- was he wanted to be with his boy."

"Mike" said that Romero wanted "to live the smallt ow life, raise his son properly. He wanted to take his son hunting and do everything that all of us fathers would love to do and have the opportunity to do with their son."

Romero came from a family of hunters and wanted to make sure the boy wasn't afraid of guns, said the Very Rev. John Paul Sauter of St. Johns Catholic Church. He said the father taught his son how to use a rifle to kill prairie dogs.

Police say the boy used a .22-caliber rifle to kill his father and the other man, Timothy Romans, 39, of San Carlos.

"There is premeditation in this," Melnick said. "He's charged with premeditated murder, which means he planned it, carried it out methodically. He was very skilled in what he did. His father was a hunter, so I believe the child was treated as a hunter."

St. Johns police are hoping a judge will agree to try the boy as an adult but admit it's unlikely.