Man Freed After Killing 6-Year-Old Logan Tipton

A Kentucky man who broke into a family’s home in 2015, took a knife from their kitchen and fatally stabbed 6-year-old Logan Tipton as he slept has been released on parole after serving about 7 years of a 20-year sentence behind bars.

Ronald Exantus, an Indiana dialysis nurse, is listed as being on mandatory reentry supervision, with his parole beginning Oct. 1, 2025, and ending June 18, 2026, according to Kentucky Department of Corrections records reviewed by PEOPLE. WKYT, WDRB and WLKY report he was freed early through good-time and education credits.

Exantus was sentenced in April 2018, at age 34, to 20 years after a jury found him not guilty by reason of insanity for Logan’s death, but also guilty but mentally ill on assault charges, according to the Associated Press. Court records reviewed by PEOPLE also show the jury returned a not guilty by reason of insanity verdict on the burglary count.

The killing happened on Dec. 7, 2015, when Exantus drove from Indianapolis to the Tiptons’ Versailles home, entered while the family slept, went into the kitchen, took a knife and stabbed Logan in his bedroom as the boy slept, according to CBS News. Logan’s father was injured while subduing the attacker, per the outlet, and two sisters were also hurt.

“When I got to the top of the stairs, he attacked me with a knife,” Logan’s father, Dean Tipton, told WKYT. “He stood up with me on top of him, just stood up and threw me 10 to 15 feet across the room and went after my daughter,” he told KKTV.

“He stabbed me in the back, and then stomped on my head,” Logan’s sister Dakota Tipton told the outlet. “And I remember waking up across the room, not where I was at, and I looked and he was killing Logan and Logan was screaming.”

“He didn’t just kill my son,” Heather Tipton, Logan’s mother, said during Exantus’ sentencing hearing, per LEX 18. “He killed every member of my family, every single one of us, and every person that’s sitting here today is a completely different person than they were when they went to bed December 6.”

“You took a human being’s life,” the boy’s father said, per the outlet. “Mentally ill or not, your life should be at least life in prison without the possibility of parole. It just seems like a 6-year-old’s life is worth more than 10 years in prison.”

The family says officials told them Exantus will serve six months of parole in Florida before returning to Kentucky supervision, per WKYT, WHSV and WAFB.

“I’ve had my talks with God, but like I told the court, if I ever cross paths with him, I will kill the man,” Dean Tipton told WKYT.

The AP reports the Kentucky Supreme Court upheld Exantus’ convictions in 2020.