Eric Campbell Sentencing

Eric Alexander Campbell, 23, of Alvin, Texas, was charged with first-degree burglary, second-degree arson, robbery with a dangerous weapon, larceny of a motor vehicle, financial card theft, identity theft and two counts of cruelty to animals in the New Year’s Day 2015 deaths of Jerome Faulkner, 73, and his wife, Dora Faulkner, 62.

Authorities said Campbell and his father, Edward Watson Campbell, stormed into the Faulkners’ home, robbed them, set fire to the house and killed them before fleeing in both the couple’s Chevrolet Silverado and a stolen SUV.

After the murders, the Faulkner’s bodies were loaded into their pickup truck which the Campbells drove to West Virginia.

After a shootout with police there the next day – New Year’s 2015 – investigators found the bodies in the truck bed under a mattress.

Edward Campbell killed himself in March 2015 at Raleigh’s Central Prison, where he was being held.

Eric Campbell claimed he didn’t know his father intended to kill the couple. He thought it was just going to be a robbery.

Campbell is the first defendant to face a capital punishment trial in Granville County in 25 years.