Lauded foster mother Pat McCollum, her disabled son and an 11-year-old girl have been identified as the victims killed in a College Hill stabbing on Thursday.
Cincinnati police reported they received multiple calls for a disturbance in the 1000 block of Springbrook Drive. When officers arrived, they found Anthony Mathis, 66, who retreated into a house.
Chief Theetge said SWAT officers attempted to negotiate with Mathis for several hours before entering the home.
Inside, they found Mathis with self-inflicted knife wounds, along with the 78-year-old McCollum, DJ McCollum, 32, and Cadence McCollum, 11, dead from apparent knife wounds.
DJ was adopted by McCollum when he was young. The relationship between Cadence and McCollum is unknown at this time.
Mathis was taken to the University of Cincinnati Medical Center for treatment where he succumbed to his injuries.
Mathis’ relationship to the victims is unclear at this time. Police did not immediately responded to The Enquirer’s request for comment.
McCollum says she ‘will never separate’ from son DJ
McCollum had fostered more than 70 children over the course of two decades and adopted at least four.
McCollum was also a longstanding member of New Jerusalem Baptist Church, according to her pastor, Rev. Damon Lynch Jr.
“She was a great mother and good to children,” Lynch said. He recalled she would often arrive on Sundays with a multitude of kids in tow.
McCollum never married, according an Enquirer report from 2012. She had her first child in high school, dropped out and completed her high school education at night and during summer school.
She earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees in social work from the University of Cincinnati. She taught at the college and trained foster parents. She became a foster parent in 1991 and specialized in caring for children with special needs.
DJ was McCollum’s fourth adoptive child. He came to her at the age of 7. He became severely disabled as a baby when 85% of his body was burned after an older child dropped a match in his crib.
She adopted him in 2002 and went on to see him walk on prosthetic legs and graduate from Woodward High School.
In 2012, she told The Enquirer she expected DJ to live with her the rest of her life.
“Either I die first, or he does,” she said. “I will never separate from him.”
The investigation into Thursday’s stabbing is still ongoing. Police ask anyone with information to call 513-352-3542.
This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: Police ID three victims killed in College Hill stabbing
