CLEVELAND -- A former mental patient talked of driving out devils during an 18-hour ordeal of torture that ended with one of his young daughters decapitated and a son of his wife fatally stabbed, police said.
A third child, burned and stabbed, was hospitalized in critical condition.
Darnell Parker, 26, also scalded and burned his common-law wife, Linda Davis, 24, during 18 hours of torture that ended Friday afternoon, Cleveland homocide detectives said.
'During the ordeal his wife said he was talking about driving the devil out of their (the victims') bodies,' Detective Gregory Kunz said. 'The mother is in shock and it's difficult to piece this together.
'It will probably be a couple of days before we sort all this out,' Kunz said when asked if charges had been filed against Parker.
Detectives said Kashonna Davis, 2, was decapitated and Myril Davis, 8, was stabbed in the chest and back. The boy, who also suffered burns on his face, died after being rushed to a hospital.
Natalia Davis, 4, was in critical condition with multiple stab wounds and burns.
Parker also was hospitalized, with a stab wound in the chest that was apparently self-inflicted.
Kunz said they were told Parker is the father of the two youngest children.
Linda Marie Davis, 24, the mother of all three children, freed herself Friday afternoon from the couple's apartment and called for help from another unit at the Garden Valley public housing estate.
'She was being abused,' Kunz said. 'He had tied her up and put her in scalding water and lit papers and put them against her head and neck. She was unconscious part of the time.'
Kunz said Parker opened the door on a grisly scene when the police arrived.
'Kashonna was decapitated and her head was on the stove,' he said. 'He had lit a burner and put the head on it face down. The body was in the bathtub submerged in water.'
He said Parker apparently began the torture at 9 p.m. Thursday and continued it until the mother escaped at about 3 p.m. Friday.
Police took Parker into custody when they arrived at the apartment.
'He's got no criminal record with us, just a couple traffic tickets,' Kunz said. 'All we know from the wife is that he had been released from the Cleveland Psychiatric Center in the latter part of July.'
