A mother and father from the High Desert have been found guilty of murdering two of their children and abusing two others.
Maurice Jewel Taylor Sr., 39, and Natalie Sumiko Brothwell, 48, were convicted Tuesday of two counts of first-degree murder with special circumstances and two counts of felony child abuse, according to Los Angeles County District Attorney Nathan Hochman. The special circumstances refer to multiple murders in the same case.
The gruesome event unfolded on Nov. 29, 2020, the DA’s Office says, when Taylor and Brothwell fatally stabbed two of their young children, Maliaka, 13, and Maurice Jr., 12, in their Lancaster home on the Sunday after Thanksgiving. After the murders, the parents forced their two younger children, who were 8 and 9 at the time, to view the bodies and then confined them to a room, starving them for several days.
The deceased children were found in separate bedrooms days after the murders with what investigators called “some type of sharp trauma” from “either a stabbing or slicing device” after Los Angeles County Fire Department crews were dispatched to the home, located in the 45000 block of Century Circle, for reports of a gas leak after neighbors reported a foul odor…