A Florida woman has been arrested for stabbing her elderly mother to death after detectives disputed her claims of self-defense.
Kelly Ann Olivier Tinsley, 49, waiting seven hours after killing her mother to call 911, and then told Brevard County deputies that 69-year-old Cheryl Maggard Meurer attacked her, Law&Crime reported.
“Ms. Tinsley showed your affiant several lacerations to her legs and injuries to her right hand she claimed were caused by the decedent; however, none of the injuries appeared consistent with defensive knife wounds,” deputies wrote in an arrest affidavit.
Meurer, however, did have defensive wounds, the medical examiner found. Meurer had “multiple wounds consistent with defensive knife wounds” on her hands, left arm, right ankle, right knee, and neck, documents say.
Tinsley called 911 at about 5:15 a.m. on Tuesday and said she had stabbed her mother, but hung up the phone when a dispatcher asked for more information. Deputies arrived 10 minutes later and forced their way inside the home, where they found Meurer under a blanket on the floor inside the doorway in a pool of blood.
Tinsley was lying awake on a pillow in the hallway, facing the front door.
Tinsley allegedly told investigators that her mother had told her Monday night she “needed to find a bigger place to be a better mom,” to which she jokingly replied, “F*** that!”
Then, she said, Meurer came at her with a knife and hit her in the mouth. The two struggled over the knife, she said, and ended up o nthe floor.
“Ms. Tinsley held the blade of the knife to the decedent’s neck and told her, ‘Quit coming at me!’” the affidavit said. “At which time, the decedent leaned [forward], still trying to attack her, causing Ms. Tinsley to ‘poke’ her in the neck.”
Tinsley said the two kept fighting until Tinsley “noticed the decedent’s eyes were changing.”
She said she then went into the laundry room and changed clothes, washing her face and hands with water from the washing machine. The coverered her mother with a blank because the blood made her sick, then she laid down, calling 911 seven hours later.
Authorities said Tinsley had no injuries to her face, lips, or the inside of her mouth.
Tinsley has been charged with manslaughter.
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[Featured image: Kelly Ann Olivier Tinsley and Cheryl Maggard Meurer/Brevard County Sheriff’s Office]
