Woman who killed friend over Facebook feud and spilled milk gets 15 years

Kayla Henriques, 20, pleaded guilty to manslaughter Wednesday and will serve 15 years behind bars for the stabbing death of Kamisha Richards, 22, in February 2011 after the two feuded on Facebook and via text messages.

By Oren Yaniv - NYDailyNews.com

Thursday, August 1, 2013

A young Brooklyn woman copped to killing her good friend, literally over spilled milk, skirting a murder rap and a possible life sentence, the Daily News has learned.

Kayla Henriques, 20, pleaded guilty to manslaughter Wednesday and will serve 15 years behind bars for the stabbing death of Kamisha Richards, 22, in February 2011 after the two feuded on Facebook and via text messages.

"It was a tragedy all around," said defense lawyer Frederick Spiegel.

Richards was demanding $20 that she lent Henriques to buy supplies for her one-year-old son Alex, and threw the baby's milk out in fury, according to court documents.

"So, they started arguing," Det. Christopher Obdyke, who had questioned the defendant, testified in a hearing last month. "They also started texting back and forth while they were in the same apartment."

The argument, at the East New York apartment of Henriques' grandmother, escalated.

"She was close to scissors and grabbed it. I ran to the kitchen and grabbed a knife," the then 18-year-old killer wrote in her confession. "She swung and I swung. Then Kamisha kept yelling 'This b---h stabbed me.'"

Richards died of a single stab wound.

The two were good friends, with Richards taking the orphaned Henriques under her wing, throwing her a baby shower and helping plan Alex' birthday, friends said at the time.

They also noted a beef the young women had over Facebook in which they exchanged threatening posts in the days leading to the incident.

Prosecutors said the plea agreement was approved by the victim's family. Henriques was facing 25 years to life had she been convicted of murder.

She will be sentenced Aug. 21.

Her Facebook page still carries a final message from the day following the slaying.

"I can't be leave this happen I'm sorry I send my condolences to her family," it said. "RiP kamisha."

Friends on Facebook, Before Death Interrupted

By Al Baker - Cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com

March 2, 2011

The online profiles of two young women at the center of a Brooklyn homicide case — an 18-year-old murder suspect and the 22-year-old friend whom she is accused of killing — offer reflections of their broken lives.

In one photo on her Facebook page, the suspect, Kayla Henriques, is wearing a black tank top T-shirt, a manicured hand leaning provocatively on her hip. (Two people indicated they liked the portrait.) In another, she appears pregnant and is smiling, dressed in a white top adorned with a pink ribbon, cradling her belly with her hands, her head angled to one side.

On the Facebook page of the victim, Kamisha Richards, she offered a photo of herself leaning into a man’s embrace as they jointly held a drink. Most of her page is accessible only to friends (Ms. Henriques was one of them), but she allowed the public some insight into her life. Under activities and interests, she spoke of having it all together, with some profanity and capital letters used for emphasis: “HERE I AM … STRONG I STAND … TAKING NO [expletive deleted] … INTIMIDATED BY NO [expletive deleted] … LAUGHING AT DUMB HOES … LETING DUMB [expletive deleted] SCREAMING GO … [expletive deleted] THE WORLD … LEARNING WHO MY REAL FRIENDS ARE … KEEPING FAKE [expletive deleted)] VERY FAR … REALIZING MY PURPOSE ON THIS EARTH … N WARNING.”

She also divulged that she graduated from high school in 2006, went on to earn a degree last year from John Jay College of Criminal Justice and lives in Brooklyn. Ms. Henriques, meanwhile, disclosed that she attended John Adams High School and was a single female who is “interested in men.”

Most of what is on the women’s pages — typical of what is found in many social networking sites — is an exercise in self-marketing or self-promotion. Few people tend to list bad habits or outline their familiar or class struggles or offer unflattering photographs of themselves.

Indeed, hours after her arrest on Tuesday morning, Ms. Henriques’s Facebook page was mysteriously sanitized. All of the threats and arguments that she and Ms. Richards had traded over several hours Sunday afternoon and evening were deleted. In its place was a message of condolence for the killing, placed there via BlackBerry, while Ms. Henriques was already in custody.

In more spontaneous postings, Ms. Henriques and Ms. Richards seemed more like traditional Facebook friends, exchanging innocuous conversations. One such dialogue on Feb. 19 was laced with the clipped and coded language of text messages.

At first Ms. Henriques, whom some friends referred to as KK, began by writing that people apparently considered her a “bank,” and that she wished that “my mother was here.”

“Who u talking about???” Ms. Richards wrote back.

“Everybody were u at,” Ms. Henriques responded, in a quip free of punctuation.

“@work and I got my own $$ so don’t say everybody,” Ms. Richards wrote back.

To which Ms. Henriques responded: “Lol not u.”

“Oo where u @,” Ms. Richards asked.

“In tha house,” Ms. Henriques replied.

“O ok,” Ms. Richards said.

The reference Ms. Henriques made to “tha house” was apparently where she lived — according to the police — with her 11-month-old son; her brother, Ramel; and other relatives. Ms. Richards, who was dating Ramel Henriques, also stayed there frequently.

It was also where investigators say the killing occurred on Monday night after the two young women argued over $20 that Ms. Richards gave Ms. Henriques for baby formula and diapers. Their dispute — which was splayed on Facebook for anyone to see — revolved around Ms. Henriques using the money for some other purpose.

At one point in the online arguing between Ms. Henriques and Ms. Richards, the suspect’s sister, Shanika Henriques, weighed in, first trying to stifle Ms. Richards, telling her she was “bugging” out over “20bucks.”

“Kamisha shuddup. Enough is enough … U didn’t even have to write all that on fb.”

She also warned Ms. Richards that “mad nosey” people could read it all.

Shanika Henriques also seemed to warn her sister, telling her, “Kk relax 5.”

Kayla Henriques confesses to fatal stab of Kamisha Richards in Facebook feud over diaper money: cops

By Matthew Lysiak , Christina Boyle and Larry Mcshane - NYDailyNews.com

Tuesday, March 1, 2011

A Facebook feud over a $20 loan for diapers left an aspiring Brooklyn lawyer dead - fatally stabbed by a teen mom who turned on her life-long friend, police said.

Kayla Henriques, 18, calmly ate Chinese food after confessing to the vicious Monday night attack on Kamisha Richards - who had long treated the killer like a kid sister, sources told the Daily News.

"The world lost an angel for $20," sobbed a distraught Nicole Colter-Henry hours after the knife was plunged into her daughter's chest.

"It's senseless," she said Tuesday, tears streaming down her face. "She didn't deserve this."

Family and friends said Richards, 22, took the accused killer under her wing when Henriques' mother died 15 years ago.

Last year, Richards threw a baby shower for Henriques - and she was helping plan a first birthday party in May for the suspect's son Alex before the fatal falling-out over a package of Pampers.

A weary-looking Henriques, her hair unkempt and her hands cuffed, barked at reporters outside the 75th Precinct stationhouse when asked if she felt bad about the slaying.

"No, 'cause it was a mistake," she snapped. "I was protecting my kids."

Richards - who was dating Henriques' brother Ramel - was irate after the teen asked for $20 to buy Pampers last Friday but instead spent the cash on other items.

"They had been beefing for about three days," said Barbie, a neighbor in the Cypress Hills Houses.

The once-friendly pair traded Facebook insults over the weekend, with one of Kayla Henriques' uncles saying the hard feelings were further fueled by ugly text messages.

"B---h man up ... I'm here make a move," read one Facebook post from Henriques, known in the neighborhood as "KK."

In another exchange, Richards - the eventual victim - left a Sunday night message: "Kayla now u getin outa hand ... I hope u having fun entertaining the world ... Trust, IMA HAVE THE LAST LAUGH!!!"

Kayla Henriques offered a terse, ominous reply: "We will see."

Police found a kitchen knife at the crime scene on Sutter Ave. in East New York. Police sources said they followed a blood trail to a neighboring building where Henriques was arrested.

"Kamisha, I miss you," wrote Ramel Henriques, 25, on his Facebook page. "I need you baby."

Richards, who was awaiting her Law School Admission Test results and hoped to begin law school in the fall, died at Brookdale University Hospital shortly after the stabbing.

"My daughter's dead!" the victim's enraged father screamed at the crime scene, where about 25 stunned relatives and friends gathered.

Richards was a graduate of John Jay College of Criminal Justice and worked security for JPMorgan Chase, relatives said. She also worked at a nursing home.

Skeptical police sources said Henriques claimed the stabbing was in self-defense after Richards came after her about 10:30 p.m. on Monday.

Richards' mother didn't believe that claim. She had trouble accepting her daughter was really gone.

"Her boyfriend came over Sunday night and promised that it was all just Facebook bluster - that no one would hurt my baby," recalled the grieving mom. "Now my baby is dead."

With Joe Jackson, Barry Paddock, Rocco Parascandola, Edgar Sandoval and Simone Weichselbaum.

A $20 Loan, a Facebook Quarrel and a Fatal Stabbing

By Al Baker and Tim Stelloh - The New York Times

March 1, 2011

The dispute between the two friends began over $20, money that had been given to buy baby formula and diapers, but that went for some other purpose. Days later, it became a heated public matter, splayed on the two young women’s Facebook pages.

At 5:44 p.m. on Sunday, one of them, Kamisha Richards, 22, wrote that this would be “the last time u will con me into giving u money.” Ten minutes later, the other, Kayla Henriques, 18, replied, “Dnt try to expose me mama but I’m not tha type to thug it ova facebook see u wen u get frm wrk.”

The war of words escalated over Facebook. In capital letters, at 8:52 p.m., Ms. Richards said that she would have the last laugh. Ms. Henriques replied within seconds: “We will see.”

They exchanged more messages, until about 9:30 p.m. on Sunday.

About 24 hours after their last Facebook exchange, Ms. Richards was dead, killed by a kitchen knife to the chest delivered inside an apartment in East New York, Brooklyn — according to the police, the home of Ms. Henriques, Ms. Richards and relatives of both women, including Ms. Henriques’s brother, who was dating Ms. Richards.

By about 1:30 a.m. on Tuesday, Ms. Henriques had been arrested, after witnesses helped point investigators in her direction, and the suspect “said things to implicate herself,” according to a law enforcement official. “It was witnessed by several people, in the apartment,” the official said.

In retrospect, some of the clues were spread like electronic bread crumbs for anyone to see.

Ms. Henriques was charged with second-degree murder and criminal possession of a weapon, said a spokesman for the Brooklyn district attorney’s office.

Deputy Commissioner Paul J. Browne, the Police Department’s chief spokesman, said the Internet postings added pieces to investigators’ knowledge, though it was not immediately clear if those clues had been gleaned before Ms. Henriques’s arrest.

“Like so many things these days, elements of this case emerged on Facebook,” Mr. Browne said.

To the victim’s relatives, it seemed unreal that the Facebook entries could foreshadow such violence. In fact, Ms. Richards did not consider the exchange she had with Ms. Henriques serious, said her sister, Schneiqua Henry, 20.

“She didn’t pay it any mind,” Ms. Henry said. “She thought it was just another argument.”

Ms. Richards’s stepfather, Dunstan Henry, 42, said she was not someone who was easily provoked to fight. “She’s the type of person that would let you run your mouth off and she wouldn’t say nothing,” said Mr. Henry, who raised Ms. Richards since she was a newborn, after her biological father returned to Kingston, Jamaica.

Ms. Richards graduated from college in May, held two jobs and hoped to enter law school. She had been dating Ramel Henriques on and off for about seven years. Ms. Henry said she lived in the same complex as Ms. Henriques, the Cypress Hills Houses, but in a different apartment.

Ms. Henry said she believed her sister had given Ms. Henriques money in the past, though she said the two had never fought over the loans.

Mr. Henry said Ms. Richards had helped care for Ms. Henriques’s 11-month-old son. “My daughter was taking care of Kayla,” he said. “She gave her $20 to be there for her like a big sister.”

Detectives are investigating whether Ms. Richards had claimed Ms. Henriques’s son as a dependent for tax purposes, and “whether that was an element in the dispute between the women,” the official said.

But that notion angered the victim’s brother, Donell Henry, 21, who said of Ms. Richards: “She didn’t use nobody as a tax write-off. When anyone needed anything in that house, she provided for them.”

What Ms. Henriques used the $20 for was not immediately clear on Tuesday. But those who knew Ms. Richards said that when it became clear that the money had not been spent on milk and diapers, she asked for it back.

In one Facebook exchange, Ms. Richards used an acronym indicating she was laughing hard, and wrote, “girl bye I guess I’ll c u later just bring the money.”

Things quickly deteriorated when the two met on Monday night in an apartment of the complex where the women were living, officials said.

An argument started in the kitchen, and Ms. Henriques, who had her son with her, passed the child to a friend who was there, Ms. Henry said.

At one point, Ms. Richards opened the refrigerator door and saw the baby formula and poured some of it out, and said it was “half of what” Ms. Henriques owed her, the official said.

The argument then continued into one of the three bedrooms in the apartment, where Ms. Richards was mortally wounded.

“The next thing you know, she stabbed my sister in the heart,” Ms. Henry said.

Ms. Richards staggered out into the hallway, and someone tried to apply pressure to her wound, as others called 911. But she was declared dead on arrival at Brookdale University Hospital and Medical Center, officials said.

On Tuesday, Ms. Richards’ relatives were still making funeral arrangements.

The oldest of five siblings, she had graduated from John Jay College in May with a degree in criminal justice, said Yasmin Payne, 22, a longtime friend. Ms. Richards planned on attending Brooklyn Law School, and took the LSAT in December. She worked two jobs through college, friends and family members said, one as a security guard at JPMorgan Chase in Manhattan and the other as a housekeeper.

At her home in Jamaica, Queens, on Tuesday, Ms. Richards’s mother, Nicole Colter-Henry, 39, said she had raised her family in the Cypress Hills Houses but moved because she was “tired of the projects.”

“I wanted something better for them,” she said of her children as she stood surrounded by photos of her oldest daughter. “I’m never going to see my daughter. All over $20.”

No one from Ms. Henriques’s family could be reached. But later Tuesday, a message appeared on Ms. Henriques’s Facebook page, even as she was in custody.

It said: “I can’t be leave this happen I’m sorry I send my condolences to her family RiP kamisha.”

And as that message was added, many others that chronicled the women’s fight suddenly disappeared.