There is no crime as foul as murder. Murders are mostly driven by complex personal or professional motives. The killer takes such as extreme action only when he/she believes that they can justify the action to themselves. But there are some people who have murdered for small petty reasons that are insanely unbelievable. From killing for not getting thanks for making dinner to fighting over a pack of Cheetos, we bring you 10 such murders with utterly stupid motives.

1 Fergus Glen, a 36-year-old man from Wainuiomata, New Zealand, hacked his brother to death with an ax in 2003 because he was enraged that his brother did not have the decency to thank him for making dinner.

Fergus Glen was an unemployed man who lived with his parents. In March 2003, his 33-year-old brother Craig came to stay at the house with Fergus and his parents. Apparently, Craig was a married man with three children but had recently separated from his wife.

The brothers had been constantly fighting for the past couple of months prior to the murder. There had been occasions where they have had physical fights. But according to the reports, the evening before the murder was quite a happy one with Fergus cooking dinner for his family. The only tiny mistake that Craig made was not to thank Fergus for the dinner that he prepared.

Fergus later confessed to the police that he stayed up after everyone had retired for the night and drank whiskey. Then dark thoughts enveloped his mind so he picked up the ax and brought it down eight times on his sleeping brother.

“He just annoyed me and I did it. I’m not proud, but I did it,” Fergus reported to the authorities. Fergus was sentenced to life imprisonment. After serving ten years of his sentence in jail, he became eligible for parole, but it was denied because it was determined that his reasons for murder were inexplicable.(source)

2 Franklin Paul Crow, a 59-year-old man from Florida, brutally bludgeoned his roommate to death with a sledgehammer in 2006 after an argument over toilet paper.

Franklin Paul Crow pleaded guilty to the murder of his roommate, 58-year-old Kenneth Matthews. According to homicide reports, Crow brutally attacked his roommate hitting him eight times with the handle of the sledgehammer and also twice with the claw end of a hammer. The victim’s body was discovered by their landlord.

The victim, Kenneth, was a Vietnam War veteran and he liked to fish, hunt, and ride his bike. He met Crow at a bikers bar, Ma Barkers Hideaway, and took him in as a roommate. According to the victim’s sister, he even provided for Crow and brought him along to Thanksgiving dinner with his family. But after around a year later, Crow brutally murdered his roommate. Apparently, they had been fighting over the absence of toilet paper in the bathroom when Matthews pulled out his rifle and Crow attacked him.

The victim was left with a fractured skull, broken fingers, and fatal wounds to his head and face. His body was unrecognizable, and he could only be identified from his fingerprints that were on record. In a letter to a judge from jail, Crow stated, “I have accepted the fact I’ll never see my people again, or go fishing, or ride my motorcycle anymore.” He further added, “It is hard for me to stand down, but if I am in the wrong which I know I am, I am ready to except [sic] and deal with the circumstances.” Crow is serving  22.5 years in prison.(source)

3 Alexandra Tobias, a 22-year-old mom from Jacksonville, Florida, was so obsessed with the Facebook game Farmville that when her 3-month-old baby started crying during a game, she violently shook the baby to death for breaking her concentration.

Alexandra Tobias was a 22-year-old mom with 3-month-old baby son. One fine day in January 2010, she was playing the farming simulation Facebook game Farmville when her baby, Dylan Lee Edmondson, began to cry. She got so angry at the baby for disturbing her in the middle of the game that she shook him violently. She then stopped to smoke a cigarette to compose herself and then continued shaking the baby. When the baby stopped breathing, she called 911 frantically saying that, “He’s only 14 weeks old; he’s not breathing.”

When the investigators arrived, she told them that a dog knocked her kid off a couch. He then hit his head and stopped breathing. But later she admitted to violently shaking the baby that led to his death.

Tobias’s friends and family described her as a fun-loving person. But she had her share of tough days that life had handed her. She found her mother dead in 2008 and has also confided with a psychiatrist that she was raped at a younger age. Moreover, her relationship with the father was intense. and they were both arrested for domestic violence just a few weeks prior to the murder of the baby.

She was sentenced to 50 years in prison in 2011.(source)

4 Shaakira Dorsey, a 16-year-old teen, was brutally beaten to death by her classmate when she allegedly made fun of her classmate’s fart in front of a group of girls.

In 2012, a 16-year old teen from Ohio was killed by her fellow classmate who became furious over getting teased by the victim. Witnesses say that Shaakira Dorsey, the victim, was heard making fun of her classmate in front of a group of girls for farting. Infuriated at being teased, the classmate started beating Shaakira. She was so brutally beaten that Shaakira collapsed unconscious after the fight was broken up by her stepdad.

Authorities arrived on the scene after receiving two separate 911 calls. An ambulance team was treating Shaakira when the police arrived, but she breathed her last soon after that. Her classmate has been charged with murder, but her name has not been released by the authorities.(source)

5 Brenda Spencer, a 16-year-old girl from Cleveland, shot and killed two adults and injured many children at an elementary school when she open fired at them from her home because she just hated Mondays and wanted to simply liven up the day.

This incident occurred at the Grover Cleveland Elementary School on 29 January 1979. Sixteen-year-old Brenda lived in the house just opposite to the school. Her parents were separated and she lived with her father in poverty. On the morning of January 29, 1979, Brenda just started shooting from her home at the children who were waiting outside the school. When the school principal, Burton Wragg, heard the shots, he came outside to help the children and was eventually shot in the effort. A custodian, Mike Suchar, was also shot and killed while trying to protect the children. A police officer who responded to the call was also injured. Apart from this, eight of the children were injured.

After the shooting, Brenda barricaded herself in her home. When a reporter from the San Diego Union-Tribune contacted her over the phone and asked her to state the reason for her malicious actions, Brenda said, “I don’t like Mondays. This livens up the day.” The gun she used for the shooting was a semi-automatic .22-caliber rifle which her father gave to her as a Christmas present.

Brenda was tried as an adult and pleaded guilty to the two murders and for assault with a deadly weapon. She was sentenced to 25 years in prison and, as of 2017, she is still in prison.

Bob Geldof was inspired by this incident to write the song “I Don’t Like Mondays” for his band, the Boomtown Rats.(source)

6 Dana Sue Gray is a serial killer in America who assaulted and murdered three elderly ladies and injured one in 1994 in order to support her hefty expense habits and addiction to shopping.

Being a shopaholic can be deadly, and this what Dana Sue Gray proved to the world. In 1994, Dana murdered three elderly ladies and took their credit cards with her after murdering them. After each murder, she used to go on a massive shopping spree with the credit cards stolen from the victims. Because of lack of evidence, Gray was never suspected of the murders. It was only when her third victim, Dorinda Hawkins, survived her assault and provided a detailed description of her attacker to the authorities.

Gray was finally caught when the credit card company called up the second victim’s family to let them know of the insane spendings happening on her card. The police went and interviewed all the merchants from where Gray shopped. They obtained a complete description of the culprit, put two and two together, and followed her to catch her in the act. Gray was seen going shopping with the credit card of her fourth victim, whom she had just murdered.

Gray initially pleaded insanity for all her wrongdoings. But when a neighbor was able to place Gray at her fourth victim’s house just before the murder, Gray changed her plea and pledged guilty. In 1998, she was sentenced to life imprisonment without parole and currently resides in the California Women’s Prison in Chowchilla.(source)

7 Candace Brito and Vanesa Zavala repeatedly kicked an innocent woman in the head that led to her death outside a nightclub located in Santa Ana because both the women were too proud to walk away from the fight.

Pride is a dangerous thing. Pride makes you do things that normally you would have walked away from, like a brawl. Candace Brito and Vanesa Zavala were also too proud to walk away from a fight. And somehow, the fight transpired to be the murder of an innocent woman, Annie Kim Pham.

The incident took place outside a Santa Ana nightclub. The case progressed with only accounts from eyewitnesses and cellphone videos that were made by bystanders. Witnesses said that both the women took turns to kick the victim on the head while she was wrestling another person. The prosecutors were unable to pinpoint the decisive moment that must have led the two accused to brutally hit the victim. Authorities also rejected claims that the fight was racially motivated or instigated when the victim accidentally photobombed a photo of the accused women.

Both the women received six years in prison.(source)

8 Curtis Reeves, a 71-year-old retired police officer, shot and killed a man at a movie theatre following an argument over the victim sending texts from his mobile phone during the movie.

In January 2014, Curtis Reeves, who was an ex-police captain (retired) from Tampa, Florida, shot Chad Oulson, 43, inside a movie theatre. Apparently, the men engaged in a verbal argument over Chad texting from his phone during the movie. As per police reports, Chad threw his packet of popcorn at Curtis’s face. Enraged by this, Curtis took out his handgun and shot Chad at his chest killing him on the spot. Apparently, the victim was texting his daughter.

During his trial for second-degree murder, Curtis Reeves tried to use to Florida’s “Stand Your Ground” law to justify his shooting of the victim. “Stand Your Ground” is a law that was constructed for Florida residents. As per this law, a person has the right to use deadly force in case they fear that a threatening person has the potential to cause them physical harm or death. Curtis Reeves pointed to the popcorn-throwing activity by the victim to justify his actions under the “Stand Your Ground” defense. But based on eyewitness statements, the court ruled against the defendant’s claim that it was an act of self-defense.

The defendant then appealed against this ruling, and as of December 11, 2017, the appeals court found some merit in his “Stand Your Ground” defense. The case is on hold as of now until the appeals court rules.(source)

9 David Scott, a 49-year-old St. Louis man presumed to be homeless, fatally stabbed another man to death when he refused to share his bag of Cheetos.

David L. Scott, a 49-year-old man, was convicted of the murder of Roger Wilkes, a 42-year-old. Multiple witnesses reported that the two men were apparently fighting over a bag of Cheetos that Roger Wilkes had. When Wilkes refused to hand over the bag of chips, David took out a knife and stabbed him in the chest. The bike patrol police were notified by witnesses and were given the description of David. The police arrested him a few blocks away from the crime scene. They also recovered the murder weapon, the knife, which was in David’s possession when he was arrested.

Initially, both the men were presumed to be homeless. But later, the police were able to locate the residences of both the victim and the culprit. Upon David’s arrest, it was also found that he had a long charge sheet with previous convictions for robbery and assault. Wilkes was immediately taken to the hospital where he was pronounced dead. David was charged with second-degree murder.(source)

10 A South African man was beaten to death by his family, that includes his wife and two kids, for wanting to watch the FIFA World Cup instead of a religious show in 2010.

All 61-year-old David Makoeya wanted to do was to watch the FIFA World Cup in peace. But his family, that consisted of his wife, his daughter, and his son, were adamant about watching a religious show. They refused to change the channel and David ended up battling them for the remote for the TV. When he failed to grab the remote, he manually tried to change the channel using the buttons on the  TV.

This is when all hell broke loose. His family got enraged by his actions and started beating him. Authorities later reported that they banged David’s head repeatedly against the wall which led to severe head injuries. Later, the court released reports which showed that the victim was stabbed in the back too. They called the police only after he was severely injured. David was already dead when police arrived at his house.(source)