Overview
- Police found 61-year-old Joanne Crawford with multiple stab wounds in her Far Rockaway home and pronounced her dead after a call to the residence on Tuesday morning.
- Her 26-year-old son, Armel Crawford, was arrested after running into the surf near Beach 62nd Street and the Rockaway boardwalk and taken into custody at the scene.
- Queens prosecutors told a court on Wednesday that the victim suffered 11 stab wounds, including an abdominal wound through the liver and a blade pushed into the throat.
- Armel Crawford was arraigned on second-degree murder and fourth-degree weapon possession charges and was ordered held without bail by a Queens judge.
- Relatives and neighbors described a long strained relationship and said police had responded to earlier nonviolent domestic disturbance calls at the home, a detail now part of the ongoing investigation and prosecution.