An IT worker is accused of killing a businessman he worked for and hiding the body in a Mojave Desert cave, Madera County’s sheriff said.
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The arrest was announced by Sheriff Tyson Pogue three days after 75-year-old Robert Boyajian was reported missing from his home at Bass Lake, a resort community in the Sierra Nevada foothills.
In detailing the case at Thursday’s press conference, Pogue gave this timeline:
The disappearance: An employee in Boyajian’s real estate business called the sheriff’s office on Monday, July 14, to request a welfare check, saying Boyajian had missed an appointment and could not be reached.
Deputies who went to the house found Boyajian’s only vehicle in the garage. His phone and wallet could not be found, and his bed had been stripped of its sheets.
The investigation: In attempting to access the home’s cameras, the deputies spoke by phone with a man who had done computer and home-security work for Boyajian. Despite his instructions, they were unable to access the images; the system’s video recorder was not in the closet where the IT specialist said it would be.
Deputies then looked into transactions from Boyajian’s bank account and found that $1,000 had been withdrawn around 8:30 p.m. Sunday, July 13, from an automated teller machine in Clovis.
The ATM captured images of the man who made the withdrawal. He was identified as the IT worker to whom deputies had spoken about the security system — 21-year-old Audrik Matevosian.
The interview: On Tuesday, July 15, deputies spoke in person with Matevosian and searched the Clovis home where he lives with his parents. In the young man’s bedroom they reportedly found two handguns; one had been reported stolen in Fresno, and the other was listed on Boyajian’s concealed-carry permit.
Matevosian first told investigators that Boyajian had committed suicide, and later contended the older man had “requested that he assist him in ending his life,” Sheriff Pogue said. He eventually confessed to killing Boyajian, saying he resented his employer because of disparaging statements he had made about Matevosian’s family, Pogue said. The sheriff added that financial gain is also considered a motive.
Matevosian reportedly said he killed Boyajian in the Bass Lake home on Saturday, July 12, then put the dead man in a body bag he had bought from Amazon. With a car he had rented the previous day, he drove at least 250 miles to the Mojave Desert and left the body in a cave, he said.
The discoveries: The suspect reportedly led investigators to Boyajian’s phone, near Fresno’s Woodward Park, and his wallet, in a gym locker. The body was found on Wednesday, July 16, at the desert site to which he had directed them, in San Bernardino County.
Matevosian is being held without bail on charges including first-degree murder and grand theft. Pogue said investigators consider it a premeditated crime, with the evidence including the car rental and the purchase of the body bag.
The cause of death will be determined by the coroner’s office in San Bernardino County.