A two-year-old boy and his baby sister were alone for three whole days in their Virginia home just feet away from where their parents and another teenager were slashed to death in a gruesome triple murder, according to testimony.
James Herdman, a detective with the Spotsylvania County Sheriff’s Office, testified during a preliminary hearing on Wednesday in court where three of the five Philadelphia men arrested in the case are being tried for murder.
Body cam footage was played in court showing deputies arriving at the bloody murder scene on May 29, 2019.
Investigators arrived to find the dead bodies of Rachel Ozuna, 34; her son, Kyrrus Ozuna, 14; and her boyfriend, Michael Coleman, 39.
All three victims were bound and had their throats slashed, WRC-TV reported.
Authorities believe that the murders were the result of a drug deal gone bad as Coleman was said to have been trafficking large amounts of cocaine, according to investigators.
The bodies of Michael Coleman (center right), his partner Rachel Ozuna (center left) and her son Kyrrus Ozuna (left) were discovered inside their Spotsylvania, Virginia home on May 29, 2019. Investigators believe they were murdered three days before
A two-year-old boy (above) and his baby sister were alone for three whole days in their Virginia home just feet away from where their parents , Rachel Ozuna and Michael Coleman, and Rachel’s teenage son, Kyrrus, were slashed to death in a gruesome triple murder, according to testimony from a detective
Two other suspects – Jamal Kelvin Bailey (left), 30, and James Christopher Myers (right), 30 – also face first-degree murder charges
Durward Anthony Allen, 29; Montel Jaleek Wilson, 28; and Hugh Cameron Green, 31, have all been charged with several counts of first-degree murder.
Two other suspects – Jamal Kelvin Bailey, 30, and James Christopher Myers, 30 – also face first-degree murder charges.
The murder charges against Green, Allen, and Wilson were certified to a Spotsylvania grand jury after Wednesday’s hearing, according to The Free Lance-Star.
Bill Neely, a court-appointed lawyer representing Green, said the case against him was ‘very, very thin.’
Myers was only recently extradited to Virginia to stand trial. Bailey is being held in custody in Pennsylvania on an unrelated charge.
Wilson is the nephew of Coleman’s former wife. He is also the half-brother of Allen, according to investigators.
During the preliminary hearing, a sheriff’s deputy played body cam footage showing Rachel lying face down in a pool of blood that covered the nursery floor in the home.
Rachel’s two-year-old son was standing next to his mother’s dead body while her infant daughter was inside a swinging infant seat just a few feet away.
The lead detective in the case believes that the murders took place on May 26, 2019 – three full days before investigators found the bodies and recovered the two surviving children.
The undated file photo above shows Rachel Ozuna, 34. She was found face down in a pool of blood after her throat was slashed, according to investigators
Investigators believe that the motive for the murders was drug-related. It is alleged that Coleman (left) was a major trafficker of cocaine who kept as much as $100,000 in cash in the home
Police were called to the home after the father of Kyrrus Ozuna (above), Benjamin Jimenez, found his son’s body. Jimenez went to the home to check up on his son after not being able to reach him for days
In the police body cam footage, a sheriff’s deputy is seen speaking softly to the children.
The deputy picks up the two-year-old and then the infant, carrying them past the grisly crime scene and out of the house.
The two children suffered from dehydration and were crying when they were found, but were otherwise not injured.
The boy’s diaper was overflowing when he was found by deputies, the court heard on Wednesday.
During the preliminary hearing, prosecutors played a 911 call from Kyrrus’ father, Benjamin Jimenez, who had just arrived at the home to check on his son after he was unable to make contact with him for several days.
During the 12-minute call, Jimenez is heard sobbing as he describes the scene to the dispatcher.
‘What do you think is going on in the house?’ the dispatcher asks Jimenez.
‘Somebody got murdered,’ Jimenez replied.
‘Where is your son?’ the dispatcher asked.
‘He’s in the bathroom tied up and in a pool of blood,’ Jimenez responded.
Jimenez’s 12-minute 911 call was played in court during a preliminary hearing on Wednesday. The image above shows the home where the bodies were found in May 2019
Jimenez was not aware at the time he made the 911 call that Rachel and Coleman were also in the home having been slashed to death.
Investigators believe that the murders were drug-related. Coleman is alleged to have been a large-scale dealer who kept as much as $100,000 in cash inside his home.
Sheriff’s deputies also found equipment used to package kilo-sized packages of cocaine, according to WRC-TV.
According to Herdman, cell phone records indicated that the suspects’ mobile devices were in the vicinity of the murders at the time they took place.
Investigators claim to have recovered video from the cell phone of one of the suspects.
The video is said to show the suspects at a Philadelphia strip club on June 1, 2019 – just days after the murders.
The suspects are allegedly seen in the video brandishing large stacks of $20 and $100 bills. Authorities believe that those bills were obtained in a robbery of Coleman.
Investigators also said that cell phone data shows that the suspects left Philadelphia on May 25. One photo said to have been obtained by investigators shows the suspects at a motel pool in Fredericksburg, Virginia.
According to investigators, the suspects left the Fredericksburg area at around 1:30pm on May 26 and were back in Philadelphia later that same day.
Coleman (seen above in this undated file photo with his infant son) was 39 years old
Coleman and Ozuna are seen in the above undated file photo
Green’s lawyer, Neely, dismissed any suggestion that authorities had evidence to implicate his client.
‘He’s been held for a year now and there’s still been no evidence linking him to the crime,’ Neely said.
‘Anybody could have had those phones.’
The judge ruled that the ‘combined weight’ of the circumstantial evidence justified sending the case to trial.
Investigators collected DNA samples from the suspects. Those samples will be compared to traces found at the crime scene.
According to court records, authorities did not obtain those samples earlier due to COVID-19 restrictions in Pennsylvania.
