Woman who stabbed boyfriend, left kids on 405 FWY before dying in crash identified
Detectives have connected the deaths of an infant in Culver City and a man in Woodlands Hills to a single suspect: the child's mother and the man's girlfriend, according to the Los Angeles Police Department.
The deadly spree allegedly began early this morning when the woman stabbed her longtime boyfriend, who has since been identified as 29-year-old Jaelen Allen Chaney, to death after a fight in Woodland Hills, LAPD Valley Homicide detectives said.
Neighbors at the Montecito Apartments said the couple had a volatile relationship and heard screams coming from the apartment at around 4 a.m. that morning.
"I called 911," said Richard Berglund, who found Chaney's body. "I said, 'Something bad has happened here.'"
She allegedly took her two kids into her car before removing them for an unknown reason on the I-405 Freeway near Centinela Avenue in Culver City.
California Highway Patrol officers found the two girls — an 8-month-old infant and a 9-year-old — at around 4:30 a.m. on the right shoulder of the freeway. The baby died at the side of the road while the girl was hospitalized with moderate injuries.
Detectives on Tuesday determined that the killings were connected to a deadly single-car crash in Redondo Beach, which killed Danielle Cherakiyah Johnson, the mother of the children and girlfriend of the man killed.
"The primary suspect in the case and mother of the children, 34-year-old Danielle Cherakiyah Johnson, is suspected of carrying out a homicide in the City of Woodland Hills, prior to the minors being located by CHP on the freeway," said a statement from California Highway Patrol investigators. "It is believed that Johnson fled the murder scene in a dark colored Porsche Cayenne. While traveling northbound on I-405 near Centinela Ave, the minors fell or were thrown out of the moving vehicle. Johnson then fled the scene and made her way to Redondo Beach where she was involved in a traffic crash and succumbed to her injuries."
The identity of the minors has not been released. Investigators say that the child who survived the tragic sequence of events spoke with them to tell them what she had witnessed.
LAPD investigators say that the couple had been dating for about three years and were living together. They say that Johnson was still married to another person and going through a divorce. She is currently under the care of the Department of Children and Family Services.
"There's no prior incidents of domestic violence reported between the two," said LAPD Lieutenant Guy Golan. "No calls for service at their apartment and they'd been living there for about a year and a half now."
It's unclear if Chaney was the father of the infant who died. Family members say he was a United States Air Force veteran.
The investigation was a collaboration between LAPD, CHP and Redondo Beach Police Department.
Anyone with further information is urged to contact investigators at (323) 644-9550.