AP

David Lee Patterson

The Dallas man who recently confessed to an Oregon cold case murder spoke out Thursday.

David Lee Patterson turned himself into Richardson police and told officers there that he was the man behind a murder that occurred 17-years ago.

It was a case Oregon police said they never thought would be resolved. But in the end, Patterson said he just couldn't live with the secret anymore.

Patterson said he was provoked on the night that proved fatal in May of 1991.

"They attacked me in my sleep, and that's what led up to that confrontation there," he said.

The confrontation began when Eric Lamon, 21, and two friends were walking home from a Portland nightclub.

Patterson, who was homeless at the time, said he was sleeping when the group of young white men started beating him up and yelling racial slurs.

"During the course of the attack he was kicking me - all in my face and head - and broke a couple of teeth," Patterson said. "And I don't know if I was bleeding or not, but I didn't have time to think about that. All I had time to think about was I had a weapon."

He said he used that weapon to fire one fatal shot that hit Lamon in the back.

"You carry something around for 17 years and it becomes a living part of your body," he said of the murder.

During the months following the murder, Patterson said he sent three unsigned confession notes to a Portland newspaper. Police confirmed the paper received the confession notes.

Patterson has waived extradition and will head back to Oregon at the end of March.