CLEVELAND —
A Cleveland woman was charged with murder Saturday in the stabbing death of her best friend, who tried to drive away afterward and fatally struck the accused woman’s 2-year-old daughter, police said.
The two women were sitting in a running parked car Thursday when they got into an argument, police said. Kimberly Black left the vehicle, went into her house, returned with a knife and stabbed Sharice Swain in the face and neck, said Sgt. Sammy Morris, a police spokesman.
The wounded Swain then stepped on the gas pedal and hit Black’s two young children, who were standing near the car. Two-year-old Kimshia Ruffin was killed, and her 1-year-old sister, Taraji Ruffin, was struck, but her injuries were not considering life-threatening, police said.
Black, 29, was found naked several blocks away and arrested Thursday night. She has been in custody since and wasn’t available to comment. It wasn’t clear whether she has an attorney.
Black is due in court Monday morning.
Police have not said what started the argument.
It also wasn’t clear whether Swain, 29, hit the children intentionally or accidentally. Neighbors who went to the aid of Sharice Swain after she was stabbed think Black was the intended target of the revving vehicle, said Nikki Randall, 30, whose daughter goes to school with Black’s 6-year-old daughter.
“It was on purpose,” Randall said. “She was actually trying to hit the mama.”
The car also struck a house, collapsing the roof of the porch.
The women had been “best friends since birth” and Swain considered Black a cousin, according to the victim’s mother, Anita Swain. She said she didn’t know what started the argument and declined to comment further.
Black was arrested less than a block away from the location of the now-demolished house where the remains of 11 murdered women were found in 2009. The killer, Anthony Sowell, is appealing his murder conviction and death sentence.
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