Enfield woman arrested after two bodies found
Grandmother and her boyfriend were killed inside Enfield home
Enfield police found a young woman “covered in blood” inside her grandmother’s home Sunday evening moments after her grandmother and her grandmother’s boyfriend were brutally attacked and fatally stabbed.
Enfield police found a young woman “covered in blood” inside her grandmother’s home Sunday evening moments after her grandmother and her grandmother’s boyfriend were brutally attacked and fatally stabbed.
Harlee Swols, 22, “had blood all over her clothes and was showing no emotion at all” when the first arriving police officers took her into custody at gunpoint inside the Alden Avenue home, according to a police report released Monday afternoon.
James Samuel Bell, 63, was pronounced dead at the scene and Maryrose Riach, Swols’ 72-yearold grandmother, was rushed to Baystate Medical Center in Springfield, where she died from her injuries, police officials said Monday morning.
Swols was held on $1 million bond following an arraignment
Monday on charges that she violated a protective ordered issued after a domestic incident last month.
She had not been charged with murder as of Monday afternoon but prosecutors and Hartford Superior Court Judge David P. Gold signaled during her brief court appearance that “much more serious charges” are expected as detectives continue their investigation.
Police first responded just after 6:30 p.m. Sunday to the home at 17 B Alden Ave. in Enfield after a neighbor reported hearing someone calling for help, a police incident report details.
The first officers at the scene spotted broken glass all over the porch and stairs and encountered a woman laying face down in a pool of blood, still apparently breathing, according to the report. As one officer began trying to kick in the front door, he saw a woman, later identified as Swols, move into the kitchen area so he aimed his gun at her and ordered her to stop moving.
The officer reported hearing a shower running and that Swols was still fully clothed but “soaking wet with water and blood,” according to the report. The officers took Swol into custody in a police cruiser while they continued to search the house for other victims or suspects.
Officers then found Bell kneeling at the corner of a bed with his throat slashed and stab wounds to his arms and back, the report said. Paramedics arrived and pronounced Bell dead but found Riach with a faint pulse and rushed her to the hospital, where she died soon after.
Swols was treated for wounds on both of her hands, which were each covered in blood, and investigators noted her jeans had tears all over her legs and rear, the report said.
Investigators briefly interviewed Swols about the incident but police opted to only charge her with violating a protective order for the time being, Enfield Police Chief Alaric Fox said.
“At this point she is charged only with a violation of a protective order that had been issued in relation to an earlier dispute between the parties ... at that same address,” Fox said. “We would characterize that as a family disturbance at a misdemeanor level.”
Records related to that case were not immediately available Monday afternoon.
Swols appeared in person at her arraignment in Hartford where she stood silently before Gold during the brief hearing. Her public defender noted she has worked at an Enfield Dunkin’ Donuts location for two years and had no prior arrest history before the July domestic incident, but Deputy Assistant State’s Attorney Danielle O’connell briefly outlined the police report and noted police already have a “very strong case” for additional charges.
Fox declined to release additional details about the incident, citing the ongoing investigation. The large police scene at the home had cleared Monday afternoon after Enfield and Connecticut State Police major crimes squad detectives processed the home for forensic evidence overnight, prompting several road closures throughout the neighborhood.
Swols was ordered held on a $1 million bond on her current violation of a protective order charge and is scheduled to return to court on Aug. 26.