A Trinidadian mother made a graphic discovery when she returned to her home to find her child decapitated.
Earlier this week, on the night of April 8, Tricia Villaruel and her longtime boyfriend got into a domestic dispute, which prompted her to go to the police station to report it, Newsday reported. However, when Villaruel arrived back home with officers, she found her 4-year-old daughter, Amarah Lallitte, dead.
The suspect is accused of cutting off the child’s head and placing it in a barrel, according to the report. Her body appeared to be dragged from room to room.
The Trinidad & Tobago Guardian reported that the man was a father figure to Lallitte. He was still on the scene and was taken into custody.
“I never thought he would have done that. He loved Amarah,” Villaruel told the outlet. “He would have killed for her, he always protected her. He was never violent to her.”
Villaruel explained that she left her daughter with the relative because she wanted to get help quickly. She got to the station, which was just a short distance from her home, just after 10 p.m.
“I was in the station making the report at the time. When I left, she was on the bed watching her tablet,” she added. “But he try to drag me into the room because he look like he was going to harm me. I called her to come but she not coming. She was laughing like she thought we were playing so I had no choice.”
According to reports, Villaruel and the suspect have been in each other’s lives for four years, and she said she’s never seen him act violently. However, that night, something shifted. She claimed he was acting “like… he was a different person,” adding that “different personalities were talking” to her.
It’s unclear if the suspect was charged in connection to the crime, but law enforcement reportedly questioned him. Officials say that the harrowing scene has left an impact on the responding officers. An autopsy found Amarah had suffered blunt force trauma to her head. The father told Guardian Media that when he viewed his daughter’s body he saw she’d sustained stab wounds to her face, an eye was missing an eye, and her lips had been cut.
“It was a traumatizing thing to see,” Superintendent Richard Smith said during an interview with Newsday. “To go in and see something like that, especially if it is the first time that you have ever seen anything like that would be impactful and not in a good way.”
Smith said that counseling services were given not only to the officers, but to Lallitte’s family and community.
