Oxnard Motorist Fatally Stabbed

Detectives were looking for suspects Monday in the fatal stabbing of an Oxnard woman during an argument that began outside a convenience store.

Lucille Jefferson, 22, drove herself to St. John’s Regional Medical Center with multiple stab wounds and collapsed in the emergency room about 10:20 p.m. Sunday, said Oxnard Police Sgt. Jim Seitz.

She died at 4 a.m., after hours of surgery. Jefferson was the seventh homicide victim this year in Ventura County and the third in Oxnard.

Jefferson moved from Los Angeles weeks ago with her young son to stay in Oxnard with relatives, said a friend of the family. Others who had gathered at the family home, about a mile from the stabbing, declined to comment.

Witnesses told police that Jefferson and two passengers in her car were trying to leave the parking lot of a convenience store at Rose Avenue and 1st Street, less than a mile from the hospital. But another car was blocking the exit.

“Apparently, she started yelling, ‘Move the car; get out of the way,’” Seitz said.

The other car turned out of the parking lot, and Jefferson followed it to a stoplight yards away at Santa Lucia Avenue.

Jefferson got out of her car and walked toward the other vehicle. She continued yelling at the occupants of the car, but police were unsure who stabbed her.

Witnesses described two occupants of the car as Latino women in their late teens or early 20s.

“We don’t think the girls in the car did the stabbing, but we know they saw what happened,” he said. “We’re hoping that whoever these girls were in the car will come forward and tell us what happened.”