Mother charged with murder after her 11-year-old son is found stabbed to death at Santa Ana hotel

SANTA ANA, Calif. (KABC) -- A mother was charged on Friday with murder in connection with the stabbing death of her 11-year-old son, who was found dead at a Santa Ana hotel, authorities said.

The video in the player above is from a previous report.

Saritha Ramaraju, 48, was also charged with one count of personally using a deadly weapon, a felony that potentially carries an additional prison term of one year, according to court records.

She is being held with no bail and is due in court April 17.

The gruesome murder happened after Ramaraju spent three days at Disneyland with her son during a custody visit, the Orange County District Attorney's office revealed in a press release.

According to the Santa Ana Police Department, Ramaraju called police to report that she had killed her son at about 9:45 a.m. Wednesday from the La Quinta Inn at 2721 Hotel Terrace.

Police body camera video showed the moment the mother was arrested outside the hotel room where the gruesome murder occurred.

The child was found with his throat slit on the hotel room bed among Disneyland souvenirs, the district attorney's office said, and it appeared the boy had been dead for several hours. Police recovered a large kitchen knife from the scene, which had been purchased the day before, authorities said.

The mother was transported to a hospital after she ingested an unknown substance, a police spokesperson said. She had apparently taken pills in an attempt to kill herself, the district attorney's office said. She was discharged and booked on charges of murder, child endangerment, torture and aggravated mayhem.

Ramaraju had moved out of state after divorcing the boy's father in 2018, the district attorney's office said. She had purchased three-day passes to Disneyland for herself and her son, and was supposed to return her son to his father on Wednesday.

"The life of a child should not hang in the balance between two parents whose anger for each other outweighs their love for their child," said Orange County District Attorney Todd Spitzer. "Anger can make you forget who you love and what you are responsible for doing. The safest place for a child should be in their parents' arms. Instead of wrapping her arms around her son in love, she slit his throat and in the cruelest twist of fate removed him from the very world she brought him into."

Detectives are working on locating any witnesses. Anyone with information was urged to contact SAPD Homicide Section Detectives at (714) 245-8390 or Orange County Crime Stoppers at (855) TIP-OCCS.

City News Service contributed to this report.