A Des Moines man convicted in the vicious stabbing of his girlfriend has been sentenced to life in prison.
Clarence Reed Jr., 35, was convicted last year of first-degree murder in the 2022 death of Randi Light. Reed called police to report a woman was dead, and first responders found Light dead from numerous knife wounds. Evidence from the home suggested the attack had begun in the bedroom and continued in the living room, where her body was found.
Reed admitted to investigators he’d stabbed Light, claimed she had attacked him first with a hammer, and said that things “got out of hand.”
Reed was tried in August 2023 before Judge Heather Lauber, and in September she filed her verdict finding him guilty. In particular, she wrote, Light’s body had more than a dozen stab wounds to the arms and torso received prior to the cut across the neck that killed her, suggesting a protracted and intentional assault.
Even if Light had attacked Reed first, which Lauber wrote was not “supported by the evidence,” the attack continued long after any legitimate claim of self-defense was over, Lauber found.