BOLIVAR, Mo. -- A woman from rural Polk County is in jail after deputies say she cut the throat of her 4-year-old son early Tuesday. A detective says Doinita Mitaru, 44, told him she intended to kill all nine of her children with the same knife.
Mitaru is charged with first-degree assault and armed criminal action. As of Tuesday night, the boy was in critical condition at a hospital in Springfield.
The probable cause statement used as the basis of the charges says emergency responders were called to the family's home at 5068 Highway U, north of Morrisville, sometime before 5 a.m. Deputies arrested Mitaru at the scene. Detective Billy Simpson interviewed her later at the sheriff's department.
Simpson says Mitaru admitted she "attempted to kill" the boy "by cutting his neck with a knife. She also advised that her intentions were to kill all nine of her children with the knife . . . but that she was unable to because her children woke up and started screaming after she cut the neck" of the 4-year-old boy. Simpson wrote that the children range in age from 4 to 19.
