Slain Girl’s Mother Says She Forgives : Hearing: A murder trial is scheduled after witnesses describe the night a 3-year-old was stabbed to death by a member of Jacob’s Well Christian Centre in Fullerton.

When Michael R. Pacewitz walked into court in his yellow Orange County Jail jumpsuit Friday, he exchanged smiles with Joanne Boydston, the mother of the 3-year-old girl he has said he killed on orders from Satan.

“God told me to forgive him,” said Boydston, who attended the same church as Pacewitz. “I had to. I was so tormented, it was the only way I could find peace.”

Pacewitz, 21, is charged with the stabbing death of Marcelline Onick, Boydston’s daughter, in a Fullerton apartment the morning of March 3. Pacewitz is also charged with attempted murder in the stabbing attack the night before on his mother, Elena Fontaine, and her boyfriend, Juan Marin, at their Anaheim home.

Boydston, clutching her Bible to her chest, listened intently during a preliminary hearing as Deputy Dist. Atty. Bryan F. Brown guided witnesses who described the night of terror.

Boydston was composed until Fullerton Police Officer Linda King testified about finding the body. Overcome, she bolted from the courtroom and sobbed uncontrolably.

She returned in time to hear Municipal Judge Stephen J. Sunvold bound Pacewitz over to stand trial in Superior Court on three counts: murder of the child and attempted murder of Fontaine and Marin. Sunvold scheduled that arraignment for May 24.

Boydston, 25, has known Pacewitz and his family for years. She and Pacewitz had sat just a row apart at a revival meeting the Wednesday night before the killing at their church, Jacob’s Well Christian Centre in Fullerton.

After the hearing Friday, Boydston was approached by Ron Pacewitz, 20, the defendant’s brother.

“Could I speak to you for just a minute?” he asked. She stepped to a side of the courtroom hallway with him.

“Could I just . . . just have a hug?” he asked.

Boydston folded her arms around Pacewitz, who was on the edge of tears.

“Everything’s going to be all right,” Boydston told him.

At the hearing, Marin testified through a Spanish interpreter that Michael Pacewitz came to his mother’s home in Anaheim on Friday night, March 2, and soon afterward ordered his mother into the bedroom. Marin said he next heard screams and saw Pacewitz on the bed holding a knife. He was yelling at his mother, “You lied to me!” Marin testified.

Marin said when he tried to intervene, Pacewitz hit him in the face and tried to stab him, then chased his mother onto the patio.

When the blade on the kitchen knife became bent, Pacewitz returned to the kitchen for a second one, Marin said.

Pacewitz stabbed his mother several times, and struck and slashed Marin on the hands, authorities said at the time.

By the time police were called, Pacewitz was gone.

Shortly after the first attack, Boydston and a girlfriend spotted Pacewitz standing at a gas station on Katella Avenue near Disneyland and offered him a ride. He accepted, saying nothing about what had just happened. Boydston said she did not suspect anything was wrong.

Pacewitz was still in the car when Boydston got out at her Fullerton apartment. A short time later, Boydston left home for the evening. She left her daughter and 9-month-old son in the care of the baby boy’s father, Wes Robinson.

“We were still close, and he had watched the children many times,” she said about Robinson after Friday’s hearing.

Later Robinson left for the evening, leaving the children in the care of a next-door neighbor. Pacewitz, who was staying with the neighbor, then ended up baby-sitting the children alone when the neighbor also left.

Pacewitz told The Times Orange County Edition that he killed the girl on orders from Satan but sat in the apartment for several hours while the children slept before making his final decision.

He called Fullerton police from a pay telephone and told them that he had been high on crystal methamphetamine and “had done something wrong,” according to Police Officer King’s testimony.

King said she met Pacewitz and found a butcher knife in his back pocket.

Outside the courtroom Friday, Boydston said she was not sure what kind of punishment Pacewitz should be given.

“I just hope he gets the psychiatric help he so desperately cried out for,” she said.

Friday was the first time she had seen him since that night. She said her smile and soft “hello” to him had been spontaneous.

“I really believe that it was Satan who controlled him that night,” she said. “because no human is capable of committing such a wicked deed.”