19-Year-Old Charged In 2 Stabbing Deaths

A 19-year-old Snohomish County man was charged Wednesday in the stabbing deaths of an Arlington-area man and his son.

Chad M. Walton faces two counts of aggravated first-degree murder. He’s scheduled to be arraigned Friday in Snohomish County Superior Court.

Prosecutors did not say whether they will seek the death penalty.

Walton was arrested late Sunday after he went to the sheriff’s office voluntarily for questioning, sheriff’s spokeswoman Jan Jorgensen said.

Both Herbert Joyce, 54, and his son, Westley Joyce, 17, died from knife wounds, she said.

Jorgensen said Walton was a neighbor of the Joyces and had been invited into their home. She said investigators believe the father and son were killed after an argument over drugs.

Sheriff’s officers went to the Joyces’ mobile home in a rural area between Arlington and Granite Falls Dec. 26 after receiving a call saying the pair had not shown up for a family gathering. They were last known to have spoken with relatives on Dec. 22.

Investigators found 40 to 50 marijuana plants growing in a shed on the property, Jorgensen said.