WARREN (AP) — A 17-year-old Detroit-area girl accused of killing a classmate in school was laughing as she chased the victim and stabbed her in the chest and back, authorities said Friday as they filed a first-degree murder charge.
Tanaya Lewis was arraigned in Warren District Court, two days after 16-year-old Danyna Gibson was stabbed with a steak knife in a classroom at Fitzgerald High School. Police said there was animosity between the straight-A students over a boy.
Lewis appeared in court via video from jail and was denied bond. Her parents watched from the courtroom gallery. A lawyer for her wasn’t present.
“Premeditation is abundant in this case, as simple as the fact that she brought a knife to school,” Macomb County prosecutor Eric Smith told reporters, explaining the first-degree murder charge.
“The defendant chased the victim throughout the class while this was going on. ... This was over something as simple as the victim being friends with a boy,” Smith said.
Warren police Det. Donald Seidl told a judge that other students reported Lewis smiling and laughing as she pursued Gibson. A teacher got Lewis out of the room, he said, but the girl tried to get back in, declaring, “I’m going to kill her.”
Classes resumed at Fitzgerald High for the first time since Wednesday.
“I wouldn't wish this on my worst enemy,” Gibson’'s father, Preston Gibson, told WJBK-TV. “In my heart I felt hate, but then again I had to remember from what I heard, hate is what got her here.”
- Posted September 18, 2018
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Police: Teen vowed to kill classmate who was slain
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