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SLASHERRussell Millikin Desiree MitchellKnife-wielding nightmare haunts Ottumwa familyBy JOHN STANGand KATHY BERGSTROMCourier staff writersThe air conditioner’s cool breeze may have saved Desiree Mitchell’s life, her parents think.A sleeping Mitchell had a heavy blanket over her when she was attacked by a knife-wielding intruder in her bedroom early Thursday morning.The blanket apparently deflected the first stab with a steak knife, resulting in a tiny back wound, her parents said.She woke up and began screaming. The attacker began striking her with a fireplace poker, splitting an ear.The noise brought her mother to the scene, disrupting the attack.Ottumwa police think Mitchell was the second attempted murder victim of Oskaloosan Russell Mil-,;kin, who was arrested minutes later.Millikin, 26, is also charged with attempting to murder Brenda Overturf with a knife on July 16.Mitchell, 16, lives with her mother, Marty, and stepfather, Rex Larson, down the street from Overturf’s North Court Hill home.The Larson family knew about the bedroom slashing of Overturf.They locked their doors and windows at night.Rex Larson kept a loaded .45-caliber automatic pistol handy.But Marty Larson was nervous i bout her daughter’s bedroom being located in an out-of-the-way corner.The family thought they were safe. But they weren’t.An intruder pried open a locked living room window — breaking the oak window sill and a caulking seal.No one heard the intruder walk through the house about 3 a.m. The padded carpet and noisy air conditioning fans covered a lot of sounds.A sleeping Marty Larson thought she dreaming when she heard “a horrible blood-curdling scream” come from her daughter’s bedroom.Marty Larson rushed from her bedroom into her daughter’s at the opposite corner of the second floor.As she rounded a corner by the back stairway, Marty Larson came face to face with the barechested intruder standing at the top of the stairs.“I scared him as much as he scared me,” she said. “He stared at me with eyes as big as anything.”A nightmarish chase between mother and attacker developed.The intruder — armed with a butcher-type knife taken from the kitchen — chased Marty Larson back down the hall.She screamed for her husband to get the gun. He was groping for it in the bedroom._SiasherPlease turn to page 8
Newspaper Details
Ottumwa Courier
Ottumwa, Iowa, US
Sat, Jul 30, 1988
Page 1
Full Page
Clipped by
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USA 09 Aug 2020
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