Aidan von Grabow was a fifteen year old teen killer from Colorado who would murder Makayla Grote
According to court documents Aidan von Grabow would go to the home of Makayla Grote and knocked on the door. Authorities believe his intended victim was Makayla Grote younger sister who von Grabow attended schoold with. However when Makayla answered the door Aidan would stab the twenty year old multiple times causing her death.
Aidan von Grabow would later be arrested. When police searched his home they would find a list of people that he intended to kill
Aidan von Grabow would be plead guilty and would be sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole for 40 years
Aidan Von Grabow Now
| Name: VON GRABOW, AIDAN Age: 21 Ethnicity: WHITE Gender: MALE Hair Color: BLONDE Eye Color: BLUE Height: 6′ 01″ Weight: 191 | DOC Number: 196377 Est. Parole Eligibility Date: 02/06/2063 Next Parole Hearing Date: Mar 2063 This offender is scheduled on the Parole Board agenda for the month and year above. Please contact the facility case manager for the exact date. Est. Mandatory Release Date: Est. Sentence Discharge Date: 01/20/9999 Current Facility Assignment: COLORADO TERRITORIAL CORRECTIONAL FACILITY |
Aidan von Grabow Videos
Aidan von Grabow Case
On November 18, 2017, the Longmont Police Department was dispatched to 2450
Airport Road regarding a young woman who had been stabbed. When officers arrived, they
found 20-year-old Makayla Grote fatally wounded in the breezeway of her apartment building.
Her sister, a minor at the time, provided the police with the name of the attacker. Officers
located Aidan Von Grabow shortly after midnight on that same night, parked in a residential
neighborhood. During a search of the Defendant’s home, officers located a self-titled “Death
List” which listed numerous acquaintances of the Defendant. The police realized that the home
outside which the Defendant had been arrested belonged to a family on the “Death List”. The
investigation further revealed that the Defendant had deliberately planned and executed the
crimes charged.
Aidan Von Grabow was subsequently charged with Murder in the First Degree, several counts
of attempted murder, attempted arson, menacing, stalking, and other offenses. The Defendant
was a juvenile at the time of the commission of the offenses; the District Attorney’s Office
petitioned to prosecute him as an adult, and the Court transferred the case to the District Court in
March of 2018, after a week-long hearing.
On May 3, 2019, Aidan Von Grabow pled guilty as an adult to one count of Murder in the First
Degree. In addition, he pled guilty to two counts of Attempted Murder, two counts of Stalking,
one count of Menacing, one count of Criminal Extortion, one count of Attempted Arson, and one
count of Harassment. The People dismissed one count of Menacing, a count of Assault, and a
count of Criminal Mischief, all three of these charges involved the Defendant’s mother and
grandfather.
The Defendant was sentenced on the count of Murder in the First Degree to life
imprisonment in the Department of Corrections. He was sentenced on each of the Attempted
Murder counts to 24 years in the Department of Corrections, he was sentenced on the Attempted
Arson and the Extortion counts to 6 years each in the Department of Corrections and was
sentenced on each of the Menacing and Stalking counts to 3 years in the Department of
Corrections
The sentences on the above counts will run concurrent to each other but will run
consecutive to the sentence on the Harassment count. On that count, the court imposed credit for
time served. It is important to note that each of the above-referenced sentences represents the
maximum of the presumptive range for the charged offense.
Additionally, the Defendant pled guilty as a juvenile to one count of Attempted Murder
and one count of Aggravated Juvenile Offender and was sentenced to 3 years and 11 months in
the Division of Youth Services to run concurrent to the sentences imposed in the adult cases. As
part of the plea agreement, the parties agreed that the Defendant can remain in the Division of
Youth Services until his 21st birthday at which time he will be transferred to the Department of
Corrections to complete his life sentence. He will be eligible for parole, as required by law, after
having served 40 years (less earned time).
District Attorney Michael Dougherty stated, “There is no sentence that could ever repair
the loss and trauma that this defendant inflicted on the victims. We are pleased with this
outcome because it is the best possible resolution for the victims of this horrific event and for our
community. The prosecution team did an outstanding job on this case; this guilty plea and life
sentence is a direct result of our team’s commitment to securing justice for the victims and the
family. The District Attorney’s Office thanks the Longmont and Lakewood Police Departments
for their persistence, dedication, and superior investigation in this case. The Longmont Police
Department apprehended the Defendant for this horrific murder and, as a result, prevented him
from going on to harm others, as he had planned.
https://assets.bouldercounty.gov/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/Von-Grabow.pdf
Aidan von Grabow Sentencing
Aidan von Grabow today pleaded guilty to fatally stabbing Longmont resident Makayla Grote at her home in 2017 and was sentenced to life in prison, but he will be able to apply for parole after 40 years.
Aidan von Grabow, 17, pleaded guilty to first-degree murder in Boulder District Court Friday morning. The first-degree murder charge typically carries an automatic sentence of life in prison without parole, but because von Grabow was a juvenile at the time of the murder, he will be eligible to apply for parole after 40 years.
If he is released from prison, von Grabow will spend the rest of his life on parole.
He also pleaded guilty to two counts of attempted murder, two counts of stalking, menacing, criminal extortion, attempted arson and harassment. He was sentenced to 24 years on the attempted murder counts, six years on the attempted arson and extortion counts, three years on the menacing and stalking counts, and time served on the harassment charge. The sentences for those remaining charges will be served concurrently with the life sentence.
He also pleaded guilty as a juvenile to attempted murder and one count of aggravated juvenile offender.
Prosecutors dropped the remaining charges of assault, menacing and criminal mischief.
He will serve his sentence at the Division of Youth Services until he is 21, when he will be transferred to the Colorado Department of Corrections to serve the remainder of his sentence.
Aidan von Grabow will be eligible for up to 10 years of earned time for good behavior toward his parole date, but will not start accruing that time until he is transferred to the Department of Corrections.
Von Grabow stabbed Grote, 20, at her Longmont apartment on Nov. 18, 2017, when he was 15. Police believe he intended to kill Grote’s younger sister, who went to high school with von Grabow.
Grote answered the door instead of her sister, and von Grabow stabbed and killed her while her sister was able to lock herself in another room.
“This was a beautiful life cut tragically short defending herself, her home, and her family from an unspeakable act of violence,” Hartman said. “As a father of a son and a daughter, I can’t imagine the unspeakable loss of Makayla’s family.”
Grote’s sister addressed the court before leaving the room in tears, while Grote’s father wrote a letter and her mother spoke to the court, calling von Grabow a “monster.”
“You have changed all of our lives forever and took an important girl from us forever,” Dennette Grote, the victim’s mother, told von Grabow. “There never will be forgiveness. You took away a piece of my forever happiness.”
Aidan von Grabow did not address the court during his sentencing.
Grote’s sister was just one of several people and families on von Grabow’s “death list,” which prosecutors said he was stockpiling materials for and was attempting to carry out even after killing Grote.
“If it wasn’t for the swift intervention of Longmont police, many more innocent people could have been killed,” said prosecutor Michael Petrash, who said the serious nature of the crime was the reason prosecutors tried von Grabow as an adult and insisted on the plea to first-degree murder.
Dennette Grote said she felt relief that the sentencing was over and that they got a life sentence without having to go through a trial. While Aidan von Grabow did not speak, she said he hoped he was listening.
“I hope he has heard what I had to say,” she said.
Hartman said he granted some expanded media coverage for this hearing so people would understand the impacts and prevalence of teenage violence, and encouraged anyone dealing with their own cases to use the state’s Safe2Tell line.
“This sentence is particularly poignant because of the events surrounding the 20th anniversary of Columbine,” Hartman said, referencing the recent school shutdowns due to an armed woman. “We see these events being replayed again and again with tragic results. I granted expanded media coverage not because of any prurient interest people may have in this case, but mainly to demo this occurs in our community and all communities.”
‘Something broke’
While Aidan von Grabow did not addres the court, his mother Veronica von Grabow spoke to the judge and Grote’s family, some of whom blamed her in their statements.
“I very much respect the pain that the Grote family is experiencing,” she said. “I can’t fathom it, I can’t fathom losing my daughter the way that you did … She didn’t deserve to die.”
She said she doesn’t condone her son’s actions, and does not know what led to them.
“He was a sweet and gentle child,” she said. “Something broke, what that something was I can’t say, but my God it broke, and in such a hurtful way, causing so much pain and suffering and loss that I can’t even wrap my head around it.”
Von Grabow’s attorneys at one point indicated they believed the effects of an acne medication were to blame for von Grabow’s sudden behavioral changes.
“There were no warning signs beyond typical teenage behavior,” von Grabow’s attorney Mike Rafik said. “He went from a quiet and introverted musician, athlete and student with no criminal history to rageful and homicidal. This homicidal ideation was sudden and nonsensical.”
But prosecutor Adrian Van Nice said the medication was just the latest in a long line of excuses Aidan von Grabow presented since his arrest, including teachers, friends and doctors.
“Everybody but himself,” Van Nice said. “Then this specatularized boogeyman in the form of big pharma. ‘It wasn’t me, the drugs made me do it.’”
Van Nice added that the stipulation in the sentence for the youth center before prison was not an admission that his age was a mitigating factor in anyway, but a safeguard should he ever make parole.
“There is a possibility the defendant will be returned to the community,” Van Nice said. “It is our hope that by giving him a few additional years in juvenile system with a focus on rehabilitation, we can in some way mitigate the risk he may pose if and when he is ever released.”
Hartman said he hopes von Grabow takes advantage of the opportunity.
“The book of life is long for the defendant, and largely unwritten,” Hartman said. “I hope he can come to right the scales of justice in some fashion.”
Aidan von Grabow Links
Makayla Grote Death: Aiden von Grabow Pleads Guilty To Murder
Colorado teen gets life in prison for fatally stabbing woman