A Clark County Superior Court judge set a no-bail condition Friday in the case against a 59-year-old Vancouver woman accused of trying to stab her husband to death after he told her he wanted a divorce.
Momlami Dara has been jailed on suspicion of second-degree attempted murder.
Senior Deputy Prosecutor Anna Klein requested the no-bail condition during a first appearance hearing, arguing that the victim will be weakened and vulnerable if he is released from the hospital, and there is no combination of release conditions that would ensure his safety. Judge Bernard Veljacic agreed.
The routine hearing took longer than usual because the attorneys’ comments were translated over the telephone by a Laotian interpreter.
According to a probable cause affidavit, Vancouver police officers were dispatched Thursday night to the 2800 block of East 24th Street, on the edge of Fourth Plain Village, for an incomplete 911 call. A woman stated she’d stabbed her husband with a knife when he tried to end their relationship.
The woman told dispatchers “she decided to take his life,” the affidavit says.
When police arrived, Dara was standing at the front door of her home with a phone in her hand. She immediately said that she stabbed her husband and then pointed to the right side of her upper chest.
“She stated she just gets mad sometimes, and doesn’t see everything clear,” the affidavit says.
Dara’s husband was rushed to the hospital and into surgery, court records say. He reportedly told hospital staff that his wife attacked him.
Klein said the victim remains at the hospital in an intensive care unit. The knife barely missed the man’s aorta, she said. A second stab in his abdomen nicked his liver.
“A doctor indicated she almost succeeded in taking his life,” Klein told the judge.
Court-appointed defense attorney Sean Downes requested the court set a “reasonable bond.” Downes said Dara has no criminal history, and the allegations do not indicate a propensity for violence. Dara has family in the area and children elsewhere in Washington, he said.
Veljacic said the circumstances showed Dara likely had violent behaviors, and noted a second allegation, provided by Klein, that Dara had thrown boiling water at her husband earlier Thursday.
An arraignment hearing was set for Dec. 18.
