Man to spend the rest of his life in prison for murder of elderly Phoenix man

Thomas Samuel Wallace (From Archive)

A man will spend the rest of his life in prison for the murder of a 79-year-old Arizona man over two years ago.

What we know:

In a statement released on April 151, officials with the Maricopa County Attorney's Office said 61-year-old Thomas Samuel Wallace was sentenced to natural life in prison for murdering 79-year-old Kenneth Maynard Peterson.

Per court records, Wallace was found guilty of a count of first degree murder, a count of unlawful use of means of transportation, two counts of trafficking in stolen property, and a count of abandonment or concealment of a dead body on March 14.

The backstory:

According to officials with MCAO, Peterson was found dead in 2022.

"During a nearly one-month period in the fall of 2022, Phoenix Police received multiple requests to check the welfare of Peterson, who had not been heard from in weeks," read a portion of the statement. "When officers entered his home, they discovered his decomposed and dismembered remains hidden in trash bags."

According to our initial report on the incident, Peterson's remains were found near Indian School Road and 27th Avenue.

Investigators said when Wallace was arrested, he was driving Peterson's truck.

"Additional evidence – including items sold at a pawn shop, surveillance video, and digital forensic evidence recovered from cell phones – linked Wallace to the murder," officials with MCAO wrote.

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