An Indiana woman is facing a murder charge after deputies conducting a welfare check allegedly discovered her father stabbed to death inside their home with his heart cut from his chest.
Serena Dolnics, 32, was charged with murder on July 28 in connection with the death of her 69-year-old father, Gregory Dolnics, according to Porter County court records.
The horrifying discovery was made on July 26 at the Valparaiso home the father and daughter shared, about 55 miles southeast of Chicago.
Deputies with the Porter County Sheriff’s Office were sent to the residence shortly before 8 p.m. after a concerned relative called 911 and said they had been unable to reach Gregory by phone.
According to a probable cause affidavit reviewed by USA Today, Serena began making “odd statements” when the family member asked to speak with her father.
While the relative was still speaking with emergency dispatchers, they reportedly received alarming text messages from Serena’s boyfriend, who was at the home.
The boyfriend allegedly wrote that Serena was covered in blood, that he believed she had stabbed her father and that he feared she might kill herself.
When deputies arrived, they found the boyfriend standing outside. He told officers that Serena had just locked him out of the house.
An officer reportedly looked through a window and saw blood on the floor. After receiving no response from Gregory, police forced their way inside.
They found Gregory’s body lying on the floor with numerous stab wounds to his head, neck, hands and arms, according to the affidavit.
Police then described an even more disturbing discovery.
“Laying on his stomach was what appeared to be his heart,” investigators wrote in the court document.
Officers located Serena inside a bedroom shortly before 9:50 p.m. and took her into custody.
She was reportedly barefoot at the time, and police said her feet were covered in blood.
Serena was transported to a hospital, where officers observed injuries on both of her hands. Investigators said the wounds appeared consistent with a knife blade slipping through someone’s hand during a stabbing.
Authorities also recovered three blood-covered knives from inside the house.
Serena allegedly told police that she injured her hands while working in the garden with either a weed trimmer or a small saw.
Investigators said they found no garden, bloody gardening shears or saw anywhere on the property.
She also reportedly claimed she had not seen her father injured before officers arrived and remembered texting her boyfriend telling him not to come to the house.
An autopsy revealed that Gregory suffered multiple cuts to his face and hands, stab wounds to the back of his neck and additional stab wounds across his body.
The medical examination also confirmed that his heart had been cut from his chest, according to the affidavit.
Porter County Sheriff’s Office records showed Serena remained jailed without bond on July 29.
It was not immediately clear whether she had hired or been appointed an attorney to represent her.
Seems like a woman possessed doing satans work