3 Children Slain; Man Is Detained

BALTIMORE —  Three young children were found decapitated Thursday in an apartment in northwest Baltimore, police said.

The mother of the two 9-year-old girls and 10-year-old boy found their bodies when she arrived home late Thursday afternoon, said Deputy Police Commissioner Kenneth Blackwell.

Blackwell said a weapon was found outside the apartment but he did not elaborate.

The mother, who neighbors said was Latino and speaks little English, notified a neighbor, who called 911.

Homicide detectives were questioning a “person of interest,” said police spokeswoman Nicole Monroe. The man was detained a few blocks away from the crime scene, she said.

Blackwell said the man’s relationship to the children, if any, was not known.

One of the children was completely decapitated and two were partially beheaded, said Kevin Cartwright, a Fire Department spokesman. They were found in separate bedrooms of the first-floor apartment, Blackwell said.

The crime scene left police shaken.

The first officer on the scene “couldn’t handle it” and had to give the call to another officer, Blackwell said. “Walking in on a scene, seeing children of that tender age in that condition, certainly breaks your heart.

“I’ve been around for 35 years and I’ve seen, unfortunately, my share of murders, but I’ve never seen something as bad as this.”

Al Johnson, who lives in the apartment complex, said he heard the mother screaming in Spanish and also called 911.

“They freely run around,” Johnson said of the children. “No one watches them because it’s such a safe place. It’s really hard to believe.”

Roger Stanley, 45, who lives around the corner from the apartment complex where the children’s bodies were found, said the neighborhood is generally safe.

“A lot of people in the neighborhood don’t know the people living in this complex,” he said. “This is more of a transient place. It’s shocking, especially in a neighborhood like this.”