'Come now, I've killed my children.' 911 transcripts
By ABBY SIMONS,
After attacking her two young daughters with a knife and ax, Sylvia Sieferman calmly told a dispatcher, "Come now, I've killed my children," according to 911 transcripts released this week.
A neighbor who called 911 described Sieferman as "a single mom with a lot of pressure and she's lost it," they said.
An additional attempted first-degree murder charge was filed Thursday in Ramsey County District Court for the attack on 11-year-old Linnea. The charges say Sieferman stabbed and slashed the girl's throat and left her for dead.
A second-degree-attempted murder charge filed last week accused her of attacking Hannah, who is nearly 12, with an ax and stabbing her before the girl escaped to a neighbor's house.
Prosecutors waited to file the additional charges until they knew more about Linnea's condition. Like her sister, she was in stable condition Thursday at Gillette Children's Hospital. Linnea's condition was upgraded from critical Tuesday, said Roseville Police Capt. Rick Mathwig. The wounds to the girls are expected to cause "serious permanent disfigurement" according to the charges.
Sylvia Sieferman, who stabbed herself, is in stable condition at Regions Hospital.
Friends say the 60-year-old Sieferman adopted the girlsfrom China, and was under financial pressures and other stresses before attacking the girls Aug. 21. The transcripts said that while Linnea lay in her room believed dead, Hannah ran to a neighbor's home. According to the charge filed Thursday, Sieferman later told detectives in the hospital that she had previously thought of hurting the girls and wanted "them dead so they wouldn't have to deal with my screw-ups." She added, "I hurt them. I hoped I could kill them quickly. No one believes or likes me anymore. I have no friends, no work colleagues."
Sieferman is expected to be booked into the Ramsey County Jail upon her release from the hospital. Police are considering upgrading the charges for the attack against Hannah to attempted first-degree murder, Mathwig said.
Abby Simons • 612-673-4921