Paris Bennett Murders 4 Year Old Sister

Paris Bennett was a thirteen year old from Texas who would murder his four year old sister in order to punish his mother

According to court documents Paris Bennett was upset with his mother over her on and off again drug use so decided the best way to make her suffer was for her to lose both of her children.

On February 4, 2007, Paris Bennett and his four year old sister Ella Bennett were being watched by a babysitter as their mother Charity Bennett had to work late. Paris was able to convince the babysitter that their mother was coming home early and that the babysitter was free to leave

Once the babysitter was gone from the home Paris would go to Ella Bennett bedroom and would sexually assault the four year old girl who he would then stab over a dozen times.

Following the murder Paris Bennett would call a school friend and right after would call 911 telling the operator that his four year old sister had turned into a demon and he had to kill her. The operator told Paris to perform CPR and the thirteen year old killer would pretend to do so.

Officers would arrive at the home and Paris Bennett was taken into custody

Before his trial was to begin Paris would make a deal with prosecutors that would see the sexual assault charge drop and he would plead guilty to Capital murder. Due to his age at the time of the murder Paris would be sentenced to forty years in prison

Paris Bennett Current Information

SID Number:    07898441

TDCJ Number:    01804782

Name:    BENNETT,PARIS LEE

Race:    W

Gender:    M

Age:    32

Maximum Sentence Date:    2047-02-04       

Current Facility:    FERGUSON

Projected Release Date:    2047-02-04

Parole Eligibility Date:    2027-02-05

Inmate Visitation Eligible:    YES

Paris Bennett Case

An Abilene teen who admitted to murdering his 4-year-old sister will serve the remainder of his 40-year sentence in an adult prison.

A hearing was held at the Taylor County Courthouse this week to make the determination.

In August 2007, Paris Lee Bennett, who was 13 at the time, admitted to stabbing his sister, Ella Lee Bennett, in February of that year. Bennett is now 18 years old.

He was sentenced to 40 years in state custody and has been held in a Texas Juvenile Justice Department facility in Giddings, Texas. Bennett will turn 19 in October and the juvenile facility cannot hold offenders past that age.

Bennett began his transfer hearing Tuesday to determine whether he would be moved from the juvenile facility to a prison under the Texas Department of Corrections.

Judge Robert Harper ordered a closed hearing due to psychological testimony given about Bennett. Wednesday afternoon, Harper ruled Bennett will serve out the rest of his sentence in prison.

Bennett will be eligible for parole after serving half of his time. Since he has been in state custody since February 2007, Bennett has built up credit for the time served in the juvenile system.

Assistant District Attorney Harriett Haag said she is pleased with the ruling.

“I’m glad it’s over. It was a tragedy. It was a terrible loss of a beautiful little girl and a destruction of a family,” she said. “It’s a true tragedy and I’m glad my part of it is over with,” Haag said.

Abilene teen to serve remainder of 40-year sentence — for killing 4-year-old sister — in adult prison

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Paris Lee Bennett Now: 2027 Parole, Full Case Timeline

Paris Lee Bennett is one of the youngest convicted psychopaths in modern American true crime, and in 2026 his name is trending again because his parole clock is almost up. On February 4, 2007, the 13-year-old from Abilene, Texas, murdered his 4-year-old sister Ella Bennett by stabbing her 17 times while she slept. He did not kill in a rage, he killed with a plan: to emotionally destroy his mother, Charity Lee.

Nineteen years later, Bennett is 32, housed in the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, and will face the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles for the first time in February 2027. If denied, he will remain locked up until 2047. His mother, who once visited him monthly, now runs a victims’ foundation named for Ella and has publicly said she will likely have to go into hiding if he is released.

This is not the American Idol singer Paris Bennett. This is the case that spawned the documentaries The Family I Had (2017), Psychopath with Piers Morgan (2019), and Investigation Discovery’s Evil Lives Here: My Child the Killer (2026).

The family history that shaped Charity Lee
To understand the crime, you have to understand Charity’s childhood. Charity is the daughter of Kyla Claar Bennett, who was charged in 1980 with conspiring to murder her husband, James Robert Bennett Jr. Kyla was controversially found not guilty after what she later joked was “manipulating” the jury. Charity grew up believing her mother was guilty, and seeking attention she never received, Charity became addicted to drugs as a teenager.

That generational trauma mattered on the night of the murder, because Charity had recently relapsed. Paris later told evaluators that watching his mother spiral again was his breaking point, not because he wanted to save Ella, but because he wanted to punish Charity in the most permanent way possible.

Paris Lee Bennett: warning signs ignored
Paris was not an average 13-year-old. Family members and later forensic psychologists documented homicidal ideation since early childhood, conduct disorder traits, and an unusually high IQ paired with manipulative charm. He was articulate, calm under pressure, and able to read adults.

Teachers described him as “too adult.” He had no history of physical abuse toward Ella before that night, but he later admitted to sexual abuse, and investigators found he had been viewing graphic pornography in the weeks leading up to the murder. These are classic red flags in juvenile psychopathy assessments, and they were missed because Paris presented as the protective older brother.

February 4, 2007: Super Bowl Sunday
Charity was working a late shift at Buffalo Wild Wings in Abilene because it was Super Bowl XLI night. She hired a teenage babysitter to watch Paris and Ella. Around 10:00 PM, Paris convinced the babysitter to leave early, telling her Charity would be home soon and that he could handle bedtime.

Once alone, he waited. Sometime before 11:30 PM CST, he walked into Ella’s bedroom with a kitchen knife and stabbed her 17 times. The attack included both stabbing and strangulation elements. Ella never woke up.

What happened next shocked even veteran detectives. Paris called a school friend and chatted for six minutes, then dialed 911 at 11:42 PM. On the recording, he feigned psychosis, telling the dispatcher he thought Ella was a demon. When told to perform CPR, he pretended to count compressions while pacing the room, never touching his sister. Police arrived before 12:30 AM and arrested him without resistance.

Texas law and why he got 40 years, not life
Because Paris was 13, Texas could not try him as an adult. The minimum age for adult certification in Texas is 14. He was charged in juvenile court with capital murder and pleaded guilty.

The judge gave him the maximum allowed: 40 years in the Texas Youth Commission, with parole eligibility after 20 years. At age 19, he was automatically transferred to adult prison to serve the remainder. He will be first eligible for parole in February 2027. If he is never granted parole, his mandatory release date is February 2047, when he will be 53.

During proceedings, standardized testing documented significant psychopathic traits. Evaluators noted his lack of remorse, glibness, and instrumental violence, meaning the murder was a means to an end, not an emotional explosion.

The Piers Morgan interview that reignited outrage
In June 2019, Piers Morgan flew to Texas to interview Paris behind protective glass for ITV’s Psychopath. Paris, then 25, was composed and chillingly honest.

“For many, many years there was just this hot, flaming ball of wrath in the pit of my stomach and it was directed at my mother,” he said. He explained, “One of the reasons that I chose to kill my sister and not someone else is because I knew that by doing so I could hurt my mother in the worst possible way. I took both her children away in one swoop.”

Viewers were horrified when Paris said he deserved a second chance: “Yes, I did commit a monstrous crime but does that one mistake define my entire life… I don’t think it does.” The interview confirmed for many experts that his psychopathic traits remained intact.

Where is Paris Lee Bennett now in 2026?
As of May 10, 2026, Paris Lee Bennett (TDCJ inmate number available via public search) is incarcerated in a medium-security Texas prison. He has maintained a clean disciplinary record in recent years, completed his GED and several college correspondence courses, and works in the prison library.

He has not expressed public remorse for the sexual abuse component, and in 2021 Charity cut off all contact after learning Paris had become involved with a woman on bond for planning a mass shooting who lived only two hours from Charity’s home. Charity said, “I finally accepted it is okay to love him as my son but really dislike the man he has become.”

Prison psychologists continue to rate his risk of violent recidivism as high, and experts have told Charity she and her youngest son Phoenix, born in 2013, are at risk upon his release. She has stated she will likely need to relocate and change her identity if parole is granted.

Charity Lee and the ELLA Foundation
While Paris sits in prison, Charity built a second life devoted to Ella. She founded The ELLA Foundation (ellafound.org), which supports families of violent crime and educates about childhood trauma and psychopathy. She wrote the memoir How Now, Butterfly, works at a Fort Worth school, and speaks nationally.

Her decision to keep visiting Paris for 14 years, then stop, is the core of The Family I Had. The 2017 documentary follows three generations: Kyla (accused of killing her husband), Charity (mother of a murderer and a victim), and Paris. It is considered one of the most unsettling true-crime films because Charity never demonizes Paris, she humanizes the impossible choice.

In 2026, ID’s Evil Lives Here episode “The Child I Thought I Knew” revisited the case ahead of the parole window, driving a new wave of Google searches.

Life inside and the rehabilitation debate
Can a diagnosed psychopath be rehabilitated? The consensus in forensic psychology is no, not in the traditional sense. Psychopathy is not curable, it is manageable. Paris has participated in anger management and cognitive behavioral programs, but his PCL-YV scores as a teen were in the high range, and adult follow-ups show persistent manipulative traits.

The Texas parole board will weigh four things in 2027: institutional behavior, victim impact statements (Charity and extended family will submit), psychological risk assessment, and the nature of the offense. Historically, Texas rarely grants early parole in child-family murders with sexual components.

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