Bronx mom described by relatives as obsessed with demons charged with murdering her two young sons
The young Bronx mother described by relatives as obsessed with demons has been charged with murdering her two young sons, police said Monday.
Dimone “Brenda” Fleming was charged with two counts of murder Sunday but has not yet been released from St. Barnabas Hospital. She was taken there for psychiatric evaluation after 11-month-old Octavius Canada and 3-year-old Daishawn Fleming were found dying.
Fleming, 22, is also charged with two counts of depraved indifference.
The boys were discovered Saturday night in the bathtub inside her family’s apartment in a shelter on Echo Place near the Grand Concourse in Mount Hope.
They were submerged in water, hidden underneath clothing and stabbed numerous times, police said. The city Medical Examiner will determine if they died from their stab wounds or drowning.
Octavius’ father, Columbus Canada, 31, told police he had been staying in his car after getting into a fight with Fleming the night before. He returned home Saturday night to find the boys’ lifeless bodies.
Minutes earlier, police had responded to a 911 call describing the mother as unhinged. She was naked on the bed, police said, with the oven on, with one person saying Fleming wanted to burn the home down.
The boys were not discovered then because the officers were mistakenly told by a family friend they were with Columbus Canada, police said.
The suspect has no criminal record and no documented history of mental illness.
And while police still haven’t established a motive, Canada’s family believes she killed her children after becoming convinced they were demonic.
Octavius’ great aunt, Casey Canada, told the Daily News Fleming had been talking obsessively about “demons.”
“She thought the kids were devils,” Casey Canada said. “She said she was afraid of them,”
Still, Fleming’s love for her kids was genuine, she said.
“She definitely loved them, for sure,” Casey Canada said. “That wasn’t fake.”
