Semeria Greene Update: Detroit boy, 4, tells authorities his mom killed his sister, report says
(CBS/AP) DETROIT - Semeria Greene, the 26-year-old Detroit mother of five charged with felony murder and first-degree child abuse charges in the stabbing death of her 8-year-old daughter, Tameria, was implicated in the crime by her 4-year-old son, the Detroit Free Press reports.
According to the paper, the boy told authorities he saw his mother holding a knife on Dec. 30, the day Tameria was found unresponsive on the floor of the family's apartment. The girl had been stabbed in the chest and was pronounced dead on arrival at a hospital.
The boy reportedly spoke with authorities at a children's advocacy center and told them his mother "had a big knife and cut his sister and his mother killed Ti-Ti," the Detroit Free Press reports, citing an amended petition released by the Department of Human Services in connection to the case.
The paper says Human Services is looking to permanently remove Greene's maternal rights to her remaining four children and have them adopted by relatives.
Prior to the death of Tameria, child welfare workers had known of problems with the family for at least two years and had unsuccessfully tried to take Greene's children into protective custody.
Authorities are still looking into whether Jovan Mull, the father of three of Greene's children, was home when the fatal incident took place. The Detroit Free Press reports Mull has previously been convicted on drug charges and had his paternal rights to three other children, born to a different mother, taken away.
The funeral for Tameria is scheduled for tomorrow but according to the Detroit Free Press, Deborah Carley, the division chief of the Children and Youth Services Division at the Michigan Attorney General's Office, has requested that Greene's other children not attend, out of fear they might be influenced by family members to lie and change their story about what may have happened.
Greene's four children, all boys, are currently split up between two foster homes, the Free Press reports.