Daughter Repeatedly Stabs Elderly Mother For Refusing To Say Prayer

A daughter stabbed her mother five times after she refused to recite the Santeria, an Afro-Cuban religious prayer.

The suspect, identified as 33-year-old Jackeline Cordero, a resident of the Lower East Side neighborhood of New York City, stabbed her 60-year-old mother at the family's Madison Street apartment on Tuesday, July 26.

According to the police, Cordero grabbed a butcher knife and threatened to kill her mother if she didn’t recite the Santeria.

When the mother refused, Cordero stabbed her once in the stomach, and then four more times, after the elderly woman refused again, police said.

The wounded mother managed to escape to a neighbor’s apartment, from where she called 911 and alerted the authorities.

Responding officers located Cordero on the roof of the building. She was arrested and charged with assault and taken to Bellevue Hospital, police said.

Emergency services transported the injured mother to Bellevue Hospital. She is expected to make a full recovery.

Santeria, which translates to 'Way of the Saints', is a syncretic religion founded on Yoruba beliefs and traditions. The religion teaches that through offerings and prayers, individuals can help evolve their unevolved spirits.

In a similar incident, a 14-year-old boy has been accused of stabbing his mother to death and critically injuring his father in the San Francisco Bay Area, California, on Friday, July 23.

On Friday afternoon, officers in Fremont, 40 miles southeast of San Francisco, responded to a home after neighbors called 911 reporting that a teen was wandering around drenched in blood.

Responding officers found the mother unresponsive and the father critically wounded.

Paramedics conducted life-saving measures to revive the mother but pronounced her dead at the scene. Meanwhile, the father was rushed to a nearby hospital in serious but stable condition. The injured victim spoke to the police and deemed his son as the suspect.

The investigators set up a perimeter to locate the teen suspect and located him some 1.6 kilometers away during a 30-minute search of the neighborhood. He was taken into custody.

The exact motive behind the crime is unclear. An investigation is underway.