Crime
The woman allegedly claimed she could hear voices in her head telling her to kill someone in the store or she would be killed.
A Tewksbury woman is facing an attempted murder charge after she allegedly stabbed another woman repeatedly Thursday at the Macy’s Herald Square store in Manhattan.
Kerri Aherne, 43, was charged with attempted murder, two counts of assault, criminal possession of a weapon, and endangering the welfare of a child, New York City police said in a statement obtained by The Boston Globe.
The 39-year-old victim was stabbed in one of the store’s bathrooms while she was changing her 10-month-old daughter’s diaper, according to police. When officers responded to a 911 call at around 3 p.m., they found the woman with multiple stab wounds to her back and a laceration on her arm, the Globe reported.
The victim’s husband was standing outside the bathroom and waiting for her with their other two children, police told CBS News. He saw the suspect walk into the bathroom, and when he then heard screaming inside, he rushed in and helped his wife subdue her until store security arrived.
The woman, a tourist from California, was taken to the hospital and received several stitches, according to CBS News. Her baby fell from the changing table during the attack and “sustained redness and swelling to her forehead.”
Both the victim and her baby have since been released from the hospital, CBS News reported. The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department later confirmed that the woman and her husband are employed there.
When Aherne was arraigned Friday, prosecutors said she told police that she was discharged from Manhattan Psychiatric Center, where she had been staying for more than a year, the morning of the alleged attack, according to CBS News. Though Aherne has no criminal history in New York, she was arrested in Massachusetts in 2018 for allegedly posting a threat on Facebook to kill Sen. Elizabeth Warren.
Prosecutors said Aherne purchased a knife at Macy’s on Thursday, which she allegedly used later that day to attack the victim. CBS News reported that Aherne was searching for someone to kill in the store because voices in her head “told her she had to kill someone or she would be killed.”
Aherne said she “could not tolerate hospitals any longer” and preferred to go to prison over going back to a hospital, according to CBS News.
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