Tonight, July 12, at 10 p.m. the story of Karl Karlson will appear in an episode of “American Greed” on CNBC titled “A Father’s Greed.”
Karlsen was convicted for the murder of his first wife, Christina, and later his son, Levi, in two separate incidents.
Karlsen took out a $700,000 insurance policy on his son just weeks before his death in 2008, and later admitted to causing a pickup truck on a wobbling jack to fall on his son, then leaving him to die at Karlsen’s Yale Farm Road in Varick.
He was convicted for his murder in 2013 after it was originally ruled accidental in 2008.
Seneca County sheriff’s investigators took a closer look years later when Karlsen’s second wife, Cindy, secretly recorded conversations where he admitted to killing Levi. She took the recordings to police and he is currently serving his sentence in Clinton Correctional Facility.
Last year he was convicted for the murder of his first wife in Calaveras County, California, who died in a fire weeks after Karlsen took out a $200,000 life insurance policy on her. He was sentenced to life without parole.
Karlsen is eligible for parole in New York in 2027, and if he makes it will be sent to California to finish out his life sentence.
FingerLakes1.com is the region’s leading all-digital news publication. The company was founded in 1998 and has been keeping residents informed for more than two decades. Have a lead? Send it to [email protected].