"Daughter pleads not guilty to killing mother in Malden" by Peter Schworm Globe Staff June 16, 2015
MALDEN — When police arrived at the Main Street apartment building Monday morning, Marie Luxama’s daughter was outside on the sidewalk, tears running down her face. She had come to check on her mother, but no one answered the door.
After kicking in the locked door, officers found Luxama lying in a pool of blood, the victim of multiple stab wounds. They heard noise from upstairs, where they found another of Luxama’s daughters, Sharlyn Savain.
Hands in the air, Savain, 24, said “Lord Jesus, I did it,” police wrote in a report on the slaying. “I did it.”
As her tearful relatives looked on, Savain pleaded not guilty in Malden District Court Tuesday to killing her mother, and was ordered to undergo a psychiatric evaluation to determine her competency. Outside the courthouse, her lawyer, George Murphy, declined to comment on her mental status.
Savain looked only briefly at her relatives in the courtroom during Tuesday’s arraignment on murder charges. Bracketed by court officers, one of whom held her by the arm, she initially appeared to be fighting back tears, and later closed her eyes for long stretches.
Relatives of Luxama, 58, cried as they watched Savain, and dabbed away tears. One woman wept as a man sitting beside her patted her on the back.
Outside the courtroom, they declined to comment, and hurried past the reporters and cameramen.
Authorities described the killing as a “terrible act of domestic violence,” but did not detail the attack or any potential motive. There were no records for Savain or her mother in Malden District Court.
Nearly all of the arraignment was held at a private sidebar with the judge.
When police arrived around 10:30 a.m. Monday, Luxama was unresponsive, and was pronounced dead at the hospital.
According to police, Savain had moved out of her mother’s apartment a few months ago, and had returned to move some of her things.
Luxama’s landlord, who lives upstairs, told police he gave Savain the keys to her mother’s apartment, thinking “nothing of it,” but that she returned about 20 minutes later with blood on her.
“In the name of Jesus, I killed her and I’m killing you,” she said.
When the landlord said he was going to call the police, the report stated that she said “we don’t need the police. I’m gonna kill you.”
She began to punch and push the landlord, but he was able to hold her down and later forced her into the bathroom while he called for help, authorities said. While she was in the bathroom, the landlord could hear her repeating “In the name of Jesus,” police said.
When police arrested her, Savain had a deep cut in her right hand.
After police handcuffed her, they applied pressure to her wound while restraining her.
Police were brought to the apartment building, just outside the downtown area, after receiving two 911 calls, one requesting a well-being check on Luxama, the other reporting the disturbance between Savain and the landlord, the police report said.
The landlord said he had not seen Savain since she moved out.
At her home, a neighbor described Luxama as a friendly woman who had lived there about a year.
“It was terrible what happened to her,” she said, declining to give her name out of respect to the family. She was not home at the time of the attack, she said.
Savain is due back in court July 6.
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