HIDDEN VALLEY LAKE — A 10-year-old girl was stabbed to death Friday afternoon in the gated community of Hidden Valley Lake. Tessa Faith Walker succumbed Friday to the stabbing injuries after being transported to Redbud Hospital in Clearlake. Her 13-year-old sister, Kristen Marie Walker, was also stabbed and flown to the Children”s Hospital in Oakland for treatment of her injuries, but is now at home.
A Saturday press release written by public information officer Chief Deputy James Bauman said deputies responded to calls reporting a stabbing on Firethorn Road in Hidden Valley Lake at about 4:30 p.m., along with rescue personnel from Cal-Fire. While both victims were being treated, deputies learned from eyewitnesses that a male adult was responsible for the assaults and that the suspect had fled to his home a short distance away on Sugarbush Court.
The suspect, James Ronald Pagan, 31, was detained at his home for questioning and arrested on charges of suspicion of murder, attempted murder and assault with a deadly weapon. He was transported from the scene at approximately 6:30 p.m. to the Lake County Jail, where he is being held on $1 million bail. An arraignment is expected to take place today at 1:30 p.m. in Department 2 of the Lake County Courthouse in Lakeport, according to District Attorney Jon Hopkins.
The girls” father, Lower Lake physician Dr. Ronald R. Walker, said in a written statement to the Press Democrat his family has forgiven the suspect and is relying on their Christian faith during their time of grief.
“We are very grateful to those who are supporting us with their prayers,” Dr. Walker wrote in his statement. “We forgive the man who took our daughter from us, even for this short time, for by forgiving others, we ourselves are forgiven.”
“We are grieving the loss of our very precious daughter, Tessa Faith Walker ? a beautiful, intelligent, happy and alive young woman, full of dreams, including being a doctor like her “daddy” ? by this senseless act of violence.”
“We are very thankful that our daughter, Kristen Marie Walker, is doing well physically and that she is now at home with us,” Dr. Walker wrote.
A memorial near where a knife was recovered and where eyewitnesses said the stabbings took place grew over the weekend, with stuffed animals, flowers, balloons and letters left at a four-foot-tall white cross a neighbor built.
A small kitchen knife was recovered at the scene Friday, but not confirmed as the weapon used. Authorities recovered it a half-block from where the girls lived on Firethorn Road. Detectives had circled the knife and surrounding asphalt in orange spray paint. There was what appeared to be blood smeared on the knife”s blade.
On Monday afternoon, a 2004 green Saturn registered to Pagan was towed away from the tidy, single-story home where he lived. The Sugarbush Court residence is located within view and just one home over from Firethorn Road where the knife was recovered.
Neighbor Todd Mullin lives in a home near where the memorial is located. His father built the white cross at the memorial, which he said has grown over the weekend. He said he didn”t know the Walker family very well and that the community is “trying not to talk” about the incident too much.
“Tessa seemed really friendly. She had a lot of friends in the neighborhood,” Mullin said. He did not see the incident occur. “I came out in the aftermath, and saw people calling the police. From what I”ve seen it looks like it happened in the street.”
The Lake County Sheriff”s Department did not confirm the mental condition of the suspect in its press release, but a Press Democrat article quoted Pagan”s mother at the door of the Sugarbush Court home as confirming her son did have mental health issues.
Contact Elizabeth Wilson at ewilson@record-bee.com
