FORT WORTH — A 68-year-old oil and gas businessman was sentenced to life in prison on Thursday for gunning down his girlfriend's ex-husband in the street outside her Benbrook house.
Johnny Lloyd Patton Jr. acknowledged shooting Richard Slatkin on Oct. 1, 2013, but said the shooting was justified because Slatkin had repeatedly threatened to kill him.
Patton was convicted of a murder charge earlier Thursday.
"Patton had skated by his entire life," said prosecutor Eric Nickols. "He was violent, manipulative, dangerous and abusive."
According to prosecutors and testimony this week, before the shooting, Patton made repeated 911 calls saying that Slatkin was intent on killing him. One of those calls was played in court again on Thursday during Nickols' closing argument.
Prefacing the playing of the recording, Nickols said that everything that Patton said to the dispatcher was a calculated lie.
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