Louisiana man charged with murder in stabbing deaths of his son, sister and nephew

( AP )

A Louisiana man who was arrested for the fatal stabbings of a woman and two children was being treated for schizophrenia and started hearing voices the day before, a relative said.

The 30-year-old Amite man was arrested on three counts of first-degree murder after the Thursday killings. Family members identified the victims as the suspect’s son, 1-year-old Hayden Madison; his sister, 40-year-old Rhonda Powell; and Powell’s son, 10-year-old Braylon Powell.

The suspect remained jailed in St. Helena Parish on Saturday, and a sheriff’s dispatcher said she did not know whether he had seen a judge or had a lawyer.

The parish Sheriff’s Office said all three were dead when deputies arrived.

The suspect and his son were living with Powell according to cousin Deondra Robertson-Warner, who told WBRZ-TV that the day before the stabbings, relatives took him to a hospital after he started hearing voices.

However, the hospital gave him a different kind of medication than he normally gets, Robertson-Warner said, and refused to commit him to inpatient psychiatric treatment despite requests by relatives who said he was acting aggressively.

“No one in that home survived because the mental health system failed him,” Robertson-Warner told WAFB-TV. “Had he been committed, he would be where he needed to be today, and my other family members would be alive.”