Woman Dies After Assault Inside San Jose Apartment
Editor's note, police have since said that this case is no longer considered a homicide.
SAN JOSE (CBS SF) - A woman died at a hospital after being found wounded at her North San Jose apartment Wednesday morning, and police are investigating the death as a homicide, a police spokesman said.
"We believe it was the direct result of some kind of assault," police Sgt. Jason Dwyer said.
Officers were dispatched to an apartment building on Lundy Avenue at 10:24 a.m. Wednesday after the fire department informed police of suspicious circumstances there.
Fire department personnel had responded to a report of a female in distress at the apartment, Dwyer said.
She was conscious when fire personnel arrived but quickly took a turn for the worse and died at a hospital at 11:09 a.m., Dwyer said. He said investigators are still looking into the circumstances of the assault.
Police are withholding the woman's name until her family has been notified of her death.
Neighbor Roseann Chidley said the victim was 62, and had lived at the Creekview Inn studio apartments at 965 Lundy Ave. for four or five years.
Chidley, 69, said she and the victim share the same birthday and were friends. She said she saw emergency responders working on her this morning.
"When I came out to see her, they were doing CPR and her stomach was distended. It was so big it looked like a fat woman, and she's not fat. I didn't know it was her," Chidley said.
Chidley said her friend had a dog, and had frequent visitors at her apartment.
"She was always letting people into her room," Chidley said. "She trusted everybody. You tried to tell her 'don't do it,' but she wouldn't listen."
Chidley said a woman named "Kelly" had been living with the victim up until Monday, and had stolen her cellphone and charger. She said Kelly had recently been evicted from an adjacent apartment building.
Another neighbor, 31-year-old Diamond Williams, said she lives in the studio above the victim's.
"She had a lot of company a lot of the time," Williams said.
Williams said she had seen the victim on Tuesday walking to the leasing office.
"She mumbled something. She's always in her own world," Williams said.
Williams said the same people would stop by the victim's apartment several times a day, and that she had heard that someone had been bullying the victim recently.
The killing marks San Jose's 30th homicide of this year. At this time last year, the city had recorded 23 homicides, police said.
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