Two Children Stabbed To Death In Upper West Side NYC Apartment; Nanny Arrested

Law enforcement officials told WABC-TV that two other adults were also found stabbed in the apartment, at 57 W. 75th St. on the Upper West Side. The nanny was arrested after surviving what appeared to be a self-inflicted stab wound to her neck. She was listed in extremely critical condition at St. Luke’s Hospital.

One neighbor told the New York Times that screams could be heard from the apartment around 5:30 in the afternoon. The children, two boys, ages 1 and 6, were rushed to the hospital but were pronounced dead on arrival. It was not reported how many times the children were stabbed.

“It’s a chaotic scene,” one fireman told the Times.

Rima Starr, a music therapist who lives on the same floor, said the terrible screams came around 5:30 pm. Starr also said the nanny could have been a relatively new hire.

“There was bloodcurdling screams from a woman and man’s screaming,” Starr said. “The mother’s was just bloodcurdling screams.”

“There was some kind of screaming about, ‘You slit her throat!’ It was horrible,” she told the Associated Press. “I met [the nanny] in the elevator, the day before yesterday, and was making small talk.”

NBC News reported that police told area businesses to close their doors earlier than scheduled.

The mom came home with her 3-year-old child to find the gruesome scene. Police suspect it was at that time the nanny, whose name was not released, turned the knife on herself. She is not expected to live.

Starr told the New York Times she wasn't overly familiar with the family, just that the mother was a doctor and her husband a successful lawyer. The mother was questioned by police in the lobby while clearly in a state of shock.

"She was screaming in a psychotic state," she said. "She was not lucid."

Other neighbors watched quietly as the bodies were carried via stretchers into waiting ambulances as the entire block from Central Park West to Columbus Avenue was closed down. The luxury apartment building called La Rochelle is a prewar structure.