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A four-year-old was asleep in her Texas bedroom on Super Bowl Sunday while her mother was at work and her babysitter was downstairs when her brother launched his horrific plan.
Ella Bennetts mother Charity, was working a late shift at Buffalo Wild Wings when her teenage brother, Paris Lee persuaded their babysitter to leave at 10pm, saying the siblings would be fine until Charity came home. Once she was gone, he crept into Ellas bedroom and killed her in cold blood - and his explanation was chilling.
Paris initially pretended to be insane and claimed he had thought his little sister was a demon. However, he later pleaded guilty and admitted that hed killed Ella because he was angry at Charity and wanted to hurt her. Meanwhile, young Ella faced a horrific death and had her future ripped away from her all at the hands of her brother.
On the night of Feb. 4, 2007 Paris committed a crime that would put him in prison for 40 years when he was just 13. He could be released on parole next year.
Charity was working her shift, serving customers in a sports bar when police officers turned up with devastating news her four year old daughter Ella had been "hurt".
Thrown into a state of panic, she begged to be taken to her immediately, then asked about her son. To her horror, officers then told Charity "we have him".
Paris, a exceptionally bright teenager with an IQ of 141 had gone into his halfsisters bedroom and began battering and strangling her, before plunging a knife into her 17 times.
The schoolboy then casually rang a friend and chatted for six minutes before eventually contacting police. He even feigned performing CPR before finally confessing his actions.
Initially, Paris claimed to have experienced demonic hallucinations. However, he later made a far more chilling admission.
The teenager informed the police he had initially planned to also murder his mother Charity when she came home.
But, as Charity revealed to the New York Post, he then realised "if he'd killed me, I only would have suffered for five, 10, 15 minutes.
"But, if he left me alive [without Ella], I would suffer for the rest of my life."
In 2017, Charity courageously shared her remarkable story of grappling with the grief of losing one child and finding forgiveness for the other.
Speaking in the documentary called 'The Family I Had' Paris said: "I chose to do my crime and I take full responsibility for my crime. And I wouldn't say there was a predisposition to what happened. I'm not insane and I don't suffer from any mental illness."
Charity, however, has forgiven him. She told the New York Post: "I have forgiven Paris for what he did, but it's an ongoing process. If he was free, I would be frightened of him."
Charity now has a third child, four-year-old Phoenix, and strives to help other families navigating the justice system.
In 2011, she established a non-profit organisation named ELLA Foundation - an acronym for Empathy, Love, Lessons and Action.
"On the night that Ella died, I vowed to do something meaningful in her memory," Charity added. It also gave me a place to direct my rage, other than at my child."
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