TEMPE, ARIZ. – A mother has been arrested after police say she killed her two children with a meat cleaver Saturday.
Cops were called to the 4100 block of S. Mill Avenue and officers found a deceased 9-year-old and 7-year-old inside the apartment.
Police say the mother, Yui Inoue, threatened to kill her husband during an argument about money to move to Japan before the fatal attack.
Inoue has been charged with two counts of first degree murder.
AZ Central reported: At the house, officers found large amounts of blood near a bedroom and found the bodies of the two children partially covered by blankets. Self-defense wounds, including cuts from a sharp object and “some amputations,” were found on the bodies that told a story of a violent attack, the statement read.
After “waking up” to the scene, Inoue said she took a bath and went to a local police station around 7:30 a.m., the statement explained.
Police previously said Inoue flagged down an officer at the department’s Apache substation near Broadway Road and McClintock Drive and said she was “hearing voices telling her to kill her kids,” Carbajal said.
Officers saw cuts and blood on Inoue that they say match up with the scene. In her car, police found a bag with bloody clothes and a meat cleaver, which they believe was used in the attack, according to the statement.
Inoue and her husband had filed for divorce in April but were still sharing the house while living in separate rooms, police said on Sunday. The husband claims when he left, the children were asleep and had no concerns that Inoue would harm them. He says he slept in his car and was not at the house at the time of the attack, the statement read.
“It was very tragic what officers encountered this morning, obviously, where we’re trying to support the father through this, as well as our officers that are just dealing with this horrific incident for something this traumatic to happen to them and what they must have gone through prior to that or during that is something that we can’t even quantify,” said Tempe police Sgt. Steve Carbajal. “But we have a lot of officers right now that are struggling.”
