Dentist 'said he hated his parents' then stranged mum to death at luxury mansion

A dentist told a neighbour he hated his parents for "pushing him" into the profession, then murdered his mum at their Beverly Hills mansion to inherit a share of her $12 million (£8.9m) estate.

Daniel Yacobi strangled his 67-year-old mum Violet to death in 2017 and was arrested four months later after a coroner ruled her passing a homicide. Concern grew for Violet on October 10, 2017, when she failed to answer a call from her brother, who had offered to take her to the mechanic for her car.

It was out of character for the mum, who had almost spent a year mourning the loss of her husband Solomon, a physician who died in 2016.

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Violet was tragically found dead that evening at the bottom of the grand staircase in her $8 million (£5.9m) home. Daniel at first managed to dodge the authorities, posting a Facebook message on what would have been Violet's 68th birthday.

It read: "I know you and Dad are up there smiling down on us." But by February the following year, he was arrested and later charged with murder.

"He choked the life out of her," LA County Deputy District Attorney Shane Michael said during opening statements at a delayed trial on July 21, 2025. "[He] left her there in her home - the home he lived in as a young person going to high school and when he graduated from college."

Dean Summers, the brother of one of Daniel's neighbours, testified during the trial that Daniel was deeply depressed. "He told me [his parents] pushed him into dentistry, and that he hated being in dentistry, and that his mother was very controlling," Summers said. "He said he hated his mother and he hated his father."

Family friend Joseph Mamalinger previously told police that just weeks before Violet died, Daniel had asked him: "Hey, what do you know about inheritance tax?" Mamalinger said he replied: "I think your mom is healthy. Why are you asking me that?" Daniel then became flushed and left, Mamalinger said.

Investigators also found that Daniel had searched online, "does the choke hold create a bruise?" His lawyer argued that Violet was not strangled, and had actually died from blunt force trauma after falling from the second-story balcony.

Daniel Yacobi was found guilty of murder on August 22, according to PEOPLE. He has been sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parol, almost eight years after he was first arrested.