Brooklyn mom who cited demons is charged in son’s pillow slaying

NEW YORK (AP) — A mother who claimed demons overtook her before she smothered her 9-year-old son with a pillow was charged Tuesday with his murder, prosecutors said.

Olivia Jnnoel tried to kill herself by jumping in front of a subway train after smothering her son, Kanil, on Nov. 1, the Brooklyn district attorney’s office said.

She was arraigned at the hospital where she remained for depression and was charged with second-degree murder, first-degree manslaughter and endangering the welfare of a child. If convicted, she could face 25 years to life in prison.

Jnnoel, 27, told detectives that “demons overtook her,” police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said. She told officers the trouble began when her son woke up still upset that a playmate hadn’t come to his family birthday dinner the night before, and she called the boy over to her bed and killed him, Kelly said.

The boy’s father was at work at the time. Police said Jnnoel warned him during a telephone conversation: “You’re going to have to forgive me.”

Jnnoel became remorseful after the slaying, police said, and jumped in front of a train at a station in Coney Island. She suffered a broken leg and severed fingers.

The boy’s father, Evans Joseph, discovered Kanil’s body about 30 minutes later in the family’s third-floor apartment in Crown Heights.

One of the boy’s aunts, Lusca Joseph, said the family, which is from St. Lucia, never knew of any problems.

“(Jnnoel) was a good mother. She was great,” the aunt said. “I don’t know what had driven her to do something like this.”

Jnnoel’s attorney, Jonathan Sims, had no comment.

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