Police investigating an apparent murder-suicide in south Charlotte said a 33-year-old man suspected of killing his wife and two children before killing himself Monday night may have lived for two weeks in an apartment alongside the bodies of two of his three alleged victims.

Kenneth Jermaine Chapman also forced two of his surviving children to live with the bodies of their dead siblings, police said. One of those survivors, a 10-year-old girl, continued to go to school each day, worried, police said, that her father might kill her 2-year-old brother.

Fearing for her brother’s safety, police said, the girl never told teachers or anyone else that two of her siblings lay dead in an upstairs room.

The girl told police that her father would occasionally ask whether she smelled anything rotting. Afraid that she, too, might be killed, police said, the girl would always answer “no.”

Police said the girl also suspected that her father had killed her mother, 34-year-old Nateesha Ward Chapman.

Police found Nateesha Chapman’s body early Tuesday in a second south Charlotte apartment shortly after they found the other alleged victims.

Police said Kenneth Chapman shot himself in the head and died shortly after officers arrived late Monday night to check on the family’s status. A concerned relative had called police after he failed to contact Nateesha Chapman for about two weeks.

At a Tuesday press conference at Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police headquarters, Capt. Paul Zinkann choked back emotions as he described the 10-year-old’s ordeal.

"We all have children," Zinkann said. “What this man did was despicable and cowardly.”

Zinkann said homicide investigators late Tuesday were still trying to piece together exactly what happened. But based on the 10-year-old’s statements, he said, the killings may have happened about two weeks ago.

The girl told police that she overheard her parents arguing one night in mid-March. The next day, police said, the girl went to school. After she returned home, she told police, she never saw her mother again.

Investigators believe that Kenneth Chapman may have killed the two children a day or so later.

Police said the oldest child victim, 13-year-old Na’Jhae Parker, had a different birth father. She was a student at McClintock Middle School.

The other child victim, 1-year-old Nakyiah Jael Chapman, was Kenneth Chapman’s daughter.

Based on statements given by the 10-year-old, Kenneth Chapman allowed the two surviving children to live because one was his first-born daughter and the other was his first-born son.

At one point, however, police said, Kenneth Chapman may have pointed the gun at the 10-year-old and threatened to kill her.

Zinkann, the police captain, described the girl as “intuitive” and “bright.”

“She tried to play along and go along with what was going on,” he said.

Zinkann said both surviving children are staying with Charlotte relatives. He said the family moved to the city from West Virginia about nine months ago.

The case began to unravel late Monday when a man called 911 around 11:13 p.m. to say that he had not seen Nateesha Chapman, his niece, for about two weeks.

When officers arrived at the family’s south Charlotte apartment, just east of Providence road and south of Fairview Road, they found the front door open and saw a man standing on the stairs inside the unit. The two surviving children ran outside and police soon after heard two gunshots.

Officers entered the apartment and found Kenneth Chapman suffering from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. He died at the scene a short time later.

Police found the two murdered children in a room upstairs.

Using information gathered from family members, officers next went to a second apartment nearby, where they found the body of Nateesha Chapman. Police said the couple was in the process of moving from one apartment to the other.

Police said they had no record of domestic violence between the couple.

The county medical examiner late Tuesday said that Nateesha Chapman died of suffocation, Na’Jhae Parker died of stab wounds and Nakyiah Chapman died of suffocation.
 

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