Barely three weeks after about six Asian women were killed by a gunman at different spas in Atlanta, another Asian-American woman has been reported dead by stabbing while walking her dogs in southern California.
The victim, Ke Chieh Meng, an 64-year-old woman, suffered several stab wounds to her stomach and was left to die on the spot.
She was later taken to a local hospital where she was pronounced dead.
The incident happened on Saturday, April 3 around 7:30am in Riverside’s LA Sierra neighbourhood.
The suspect, Darlene Stephanie Montaya, a 23-year-old woman was arrested near the scene and has been taken to jail without bail.
The Police Department debunked assumptions that this is related to the recent happenings on Asian-violence case going on at the moment.
According to a statement made by the police’s spokesman, Ryan Railsback, “There was nothing to suggest that the victim was attacked due to her ethnicity.”
Montoya with a history of drug use and brushes with law enforcement has been described as ‘transient’.
“We’re going to try to research drug-abuse history and her mental-health history,” Railsback said.
Saturday marked Montoya’s second arrest in less than a week after she was detained on March 30 for allegedly attacking a white woman with a skateboard at a shopping center.
However, she was charged with assault with a deadly weapon in the earlier incident but was released without bail due to COVID-19 restrictions.
Montoya was booked into the Robert Presley Detention Center on suspicion of murder, a weapons violation, and being under the influence of an illegal substance.
She is currently in jail for a second murder-related case.
