A woman whose husband stabbed his entire family in a deadly Deerfield Beach standoff faces charges herself, the Broward Sheriff's Office said Friday.
Deanna De Jesus, 38, faces aggravated manslaughter and child neglect charges, authorities said.
She was taken into custody by Lake Mary Police officers and will be transported to Broward.
On Feb. 9,the De Jesus family went from Port Orange to Highland Woods RV Park in Deerfield Beach and went to an RV owned by 76-year-old Ovila Plante and Pierrette Beauchemin.
William De Jesus, 41, who was an Oxycodone addict and who was found to have cocaine in his body, shot and killed Plante and then took his girlfriend hostage. Beauchemin escaped later.
In the RV, William De Jesus stabbed his 9-year-old and 7-year-old sons several times. Deanna De Jesus didn't stop the stabbing of her children, and "protested only when her husband stabbed her," authorities said.
When Deanna De Jesus realized her husband was dead and that one of her sons was alive, he didn't go or call for help.
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"As hours passed, she said nothing and did nothing to save her sons' lives," authorities said.
After five hours, a SWAT team entered the RV and found William De Jesus and one son dead. The other son and Deanna De Jesus were critically wounded, but both survived.
Both William De Jesus and and the son he killed had cocaine in their systems when they died.
She also told a witness that she knew her husband sometimes gave their sons drugs, authorities said. Officials said William De Jesus probably drove to South Florida to buy drugs.
According to the Department of Children and Families, the boys had been allowed to return to William De Jesus and his wife despite a troubled history, and one of the boys called his father "Jackson Monster."
In February 2008, she told authorities that they both had been molesting their two sons, newly released DCF documents show.
