Man Charged In Stabbing Deaths Of Mom, Grandmother In Jersey City
JERSEY CITY, N.J. (CBSNewYork) -- A man is facing murder and other charges after his mother and grandmother were found stabbed to death inside a Jersey City apartment.
As CBS2's Raegan Medgie reported, friends said they have no idea why.
Staring blankly and sitting in green, Kevin Hodges listened via video conference to the charges he's facing for stabbing his mother and grandmother to death.
Police responded to an apartment at the Arlington Gardens housing development around 8:30 p.m. Monday.
"Jersey City Police Department received a 911 call that there was someone in 305 Randolph Avenue screaming for help," Hudson County Prosecutor Esther Suarez said.
Officers had to use a fire escape to get inside, 1010 WINS' Glenn Schuck reported. They then discovered the bodies of 56-year-old Rebecca Hodges and her 76-year-old mother, Dorothy Bradshaw.
Both women had been stabbed several times, officials said. They were pronounced dead at Jersey City Medical Center.
"I love them, they sweet people. I knew them all my life," Lovette Roach said.
Along with the women, police also found a bloodied meat cleaver, sword, and plastic kitchen knife.
Hodges' son was arrested a short time later, according to Hudson County Prosecutor Esther Suarez. He allegedly told police that he had stabbed his mother.
"He was apprehended not far from the apartment," Suarez said.
Hodges, 36, was arraigned on two counts of murder and four counts of weapons possession.
Neighbors, who knew the family for nearly a decade, were shocked. They said the family of three seemed very close, especially the mother and daughter who neighbors said did most everything together.
"Nobody don't know but him and God, and I pray for him because he ain't never going to be the same. He ain't got nobody, all he had was them," one neighbor said. "His mother praised the ground he walked on."
Koreem Perry said he was in disbelief that Hodges could do such a thing.
"I wouldn't think that he would do that. He loved his mother, he loved his grandmother. Those were the only two people he had on this earth. I couldn't say he was in the right state of mind when he did it,"Perry said.
Outside of the apartment complex where the crime took place were two bunches of roses -- one for Dorothy and one for Rebecca. The man who dropped them off did not want to be on camera, but said the women were like community mothers.
"They gave the shirt off their back, they fed people, anybody in the community who needed a place to go to their house, they would always welcome," Perry said.
"Everybody is shocked to hear that around here. I never see anyone fighting around here or nothing, It's real quiet all the years I've been coming through," said Shelley Majette who has family in the same building where the gruesome crime took place.
Suarez said Hodges has a brief criminal history, but did not elaborate.
The motive for the killings is unclear.
