Woman Who Stabbed Couple Sentenced to 6-Year Prison Term

A 23-year-old woman was sentenced Monday to six years in state prison for stabbing a Northridge couple who brought her to their home from a Hollywood bar.

Aurora Harris of Durham, Calif., pleaded guilty in March to two counts of assault with a deadly weapon for attacking Edward Todd Hume, 26, and his girlfriend, Heather Mahoney, 17, in what Superior Court Judge John H. Farrell called “a frenzy of violence.”

Harris punctured Hume’s lung with an eight-inch butcher knife and stabbed Mahoney three times. Harris met the victims when they and two friends, who had been drinking, picked her up in their rented limousine in front of the Cat House bar in Hollywood, Hume and Mahoney testified at a preliminary hearing.

Her attorney, Public Defender Nelda Barrett, said the Aug. 4 crime was the “tragic result” of Harris’ abuse of prescription drugs. Before the stabbing, Harris admitted that she took codeine and also had several drinks, court documents state.

“I have no doubt that she wouldn’t be before the court were it not for the abuse of drugs,” said Deputy Dist. Atty. Ken Barshop.

Harris and her mother told court officials before the sentencing that Harris had planned to move back to Durham, near Redding, and enroll in a drug treatment program.

Hume and Mahoney brought Harris to their home in the 17700 block of Kinzie Street because she told them that she had nowhere to spend the night, Barshop said.

The couple said Harris could sleep on their living room sofa and went upstairs, court documents said. Hume later went downstairs to investigate after hearing a refrigerator door open.

Hume said at the preliminary hearing that he found Harris spilling a wine cooler on the kitchen floor. He tried to push her out of the house and she stabbed him in the hip with a small kitchen knife, he said. Mahoney testified that she heard Hume scream, “I’m stabbed!” so she came downstairs and tried to wrestle the knife out of Harris’ hands. Harris stabbed her twice in the arm and slashed her across the back as she tried to flee, Mahoney said.

Harris then grabbed a butcher knife and stabbed Hume in the chest, Hume said. She was arrested shortly afterward while sitting in Hume’s truck.