A young woman is stabbed to death on Christmas morning In the early hours of Christmas morning in 2016, a promising young female artist's life was tragically cut short in Denver, Colorado. Twenty-one-year-old Kayla Burke was fatally stabbed in the Capitol Hill neighborhood. The incident, which unfolded around 2 a.m. on the 1400 block of Pearl Street, is believed to be a case of domestic violence.
Earlier that evening, Burke had requested police assistance for a 'civil standby' as she moved belongings out of the apartment of her former
boyfriend, 23-year-old Marshall Westcott. After retrieving her things, she informed the officers she was fine and would wait for a ride. Some time later, a violent altercation occurred.
Police responded to calls of a fight and discovered a horrific scene. Burke was found unresponsive and died at the location. Another man, a 20-year-old friend of Burke's named Joseph O'Neill, was also attacked and sustained serious injuries. Witnesses reported seeing a man with a knife, who allegedly stated, 'I just killed some people,' before turning the weapon on himself.
The suspect, identified as Marshall Westcott, was found with what appeared to be self-inflicted knife wounds to his neck. When confronted by police, he initially did not comply with commands to drop the knife and was subsequently tased. Westcott was taken to the hospital for his injuries, which were not considered life-threatening, and was later arrested. The Denver District Attorney's Office formally charged Westcott with first-degree murder for the death of Kayla Burke and attempted first-degree murder for the attack on Joseph O'Neill.
