Claire Miller, of Manheim Township, was being charged with
criminal homicide as an adult in the death of her 19-year-old sister Helen, the Lancaster County District Attorney’s Office said.
“This certainly is an incredibly tragic and unusual case,” District Attorney Heather Adams wrote in an email to local
station FOX43.
When officers arrived at the home, they found Claire Miller standing outside and spotted what appeared to be blood in the snow near the driveway, according to a police complaint obtained
by Lancaster Online.
The teen also appeared to have blood on her pants.
Officers said they heard her repeatedly say, “I stabbed my sister”, and watched as she appeared to try washing her hands in the snow.
Claire Miller pointed the officers to a bedroom where they discovered 19-year-old Helen Miller with a stab wound in her neck, officials said.
Helen was found lying on her back with her hands up near her head and a bloodstained pillow covering her face, according to the complaint. The “large knife” was still in Helen’s neck, just above her chest, when the officers removed the pillow.
“I don’t know that I have ever been a part of something that is quite as sad as this,” Manheim Township Police Chief Tom Rudzinski
told WHTM-TV.
Claire Miller was taken into custody at the scene and was being held without bail at the Lancaster County Prison. She was charged as an adult because homicide is not considered a delinquent act in Pennsylvania.
The tragic news shocked the community of Manheim Township, which has a population of about 38,000.
“It’s not the kind of thing we would expect in our neighbourhood,” Sarah Delia, a neighbour who said she did not know the family personally,
told FOX43. “It’s very quiet and peaceful.”
Steve Lisk, principal of Lancaster Country Day School where Claire was enrolled as a ninth-grade student, told the station the “tight-knit school community” was “surprised” and “grieving” over the news. The school was offering counselling services.
A preliminary court hearing for Claire Miller was set for February 26.
Teen’s unthinkable act while parents slept
It was filed in criminal court without any testimony or deliberation, because that’s the way the law is written in Pennsylvania. Juveniles ages 10 and up accused of murder start out in adult court and the only way to get the case into juvenile court is if the defense attorney can convince a judge it is in the public interest.
Pennsylvania is among about a dozen other states where the burden of proof is automatically placed on a juvenile who has been charged with murder.
In many other states, when juveniles are charged with crimes, the burden is on the prosecutor to prove the suspect should be “certified” to stand trial as an adult.
Pennsylvania’s law means Claire Miller, 14, of Manheim Township, who is
accused of stabbing her older sister in the neck early Monday, is currently being treated as an adult, including having her name and mugshot released to the public and spending her incarceration in the county prison without bail.
Prison officials said Tuesday they have her alone in a cell in the female unit of the prison, where she will not interact with any adult prisoners. She is being constantly observed by a camera in the cell and a dedicated staff member, said Deputy Warden William Aberts.
Aberts said her case represented the first time they had a juvenile female locked up at the prison. They do not have dedicated space for female juveniles, he said.
She has a preliminary hearing scheduled for 1:30 p.m. Friday.
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