Jury selection is scheduled to start Thursday in the murder trial of Carlton Henderson, the Stonington man accused of stabbing to death his girlfriend during an assault witnessed by the woman’s 12-year-old son.
Henderson, 47, will be tried before a 12-member jury in New London Superior Court on charges of murder and risk of injury to a minor in the 2019 killing of 41-year-old Brandia Irvin at her Mechanic Street apartment in Pawcatuck.
Henderson, who is being held at the MacDougall-Walker Correctional Institution on a $1.5 million bond, was slated to appear in court on Monday but the case was moved to Thursday.
On Nov. 30, 2019 at 8 a.m., Stonington police fielded a 911 call about a disturbance at an apartment at 77 Mechanic St., where Henderson was living at the time. Officers arrived to find Irvin lying on the ground outside her apartment with blood pooling around her. Police said she appeared to have been stabbed in the neck, according to the affidavit for Henderson’s arrest warrant.
While attending to the wounded woman, two Stonington police officers saw a tan Nissan Maxima pull out of the driveway. The officers signaled for Henderson to stop but were almost run down as he made a getaway, according to the warrant.
Police spoke to the neighbor who had called 911 and learned that Irvin’s 12-year-old son had come to her apartment upset, saying Henderson was killing his mother.
In an interview with Stonington police detectives, the son said he had been in the room with Henderson, who he knew as “Chico”, as he fought with his mother.
At one point, Irvin told Henderson, “Wait, just let me hold my son,” according to the warrant.
Police said the boy watched Henderson push his mother against the wall, grab her by the hair and hit her with a knife.
“The son heard his mother say to Henderson ‘Just stop, we can talk’ at which time Henderson replied ‘no, it’s over.’ The mother told her son to get help at which time he ran to the neighbor’s residence next door,” the warrant states.
Police said they interviewed acquaintances of Henderson who described Henderson as paranoid and possibly using “wet,” the combination of marijuana and PCP. When Henderson was informed by family members of the seriousness of the assault, police said he denied any memory of the incident.
Henderson was later captured in Norwich.
Irvin was taken to Westerly Hospital and then transferred by Life Star helicopter to Yale-New Haven Hospital where she died six days later. Henderson, who had initially faced a charge of attempted murder, was then charged with murder.
Henderson has an extensive criminal background that dates back to 1994 and includes a drug sales conviction and a three-year prison sentence for a conviction on charges linked to a 2003 armed home invasion in New London.
Henderson is represented by special public defender Jerome Paun, who has filed a series of pre-trial motions that includes a request to exclude Henderson’s prior convictions so as not to prejudice the jury.
Senior Assistant State’s Attorney Christa Baker is prosecuting the case to be tried before Judge Shari Murphy.