SCRANTON -- Police are investigating the death of a teenager in Scranton.
According to police, Kayla VanWert, 18, of Scranton died at the hospital Sunday night from stab wounds.
Police have charged Cathleen Boyer, 16, of Scranton with aggravated assault, simple assault, reckless endangerment, and tampering with evidence.
According to a police report, Boyer stabbed VanWert in the neck and chest just before 10 p.m. Sunday.
The police report says VanWert and Boyer were in a heated argument on Facebook. VanWert then left her home to confront Boyer in the 800 block of McKenna Court. Boyer then allegedly stabbed VanWert in the neck and chest and the knife broke. Detectives later found pieces of a broken knife in the alley.
VanWert died at Regional Hospital, just two blocks away.
Investigators are not saying what the dispute was about.
Monday afternoon, the coroner ruled VanWert's death a homicide.
Lackawanna County District Attorney Shane Scanlon said he'll likely add more serious charges now that the ruled death has been ruled a homicide.
Police say Boyer confessed to the stabbing death on Facebook, posting: “I’m wrong I’ll admit it... Got to face the consequences... No remorse.”
VanWert was the mother of a 16-month-old boy. The child is now staying with his grandmother.
Members of Patel family from India own two homes near McKenna Court. They say they saw a young man carrying VanWert out of the alley, but they didn’t know she had been stabbed. Now family members say the violence makes them nervous about their neighborhood.
“We have lived here for seven years and nothing happened, this kind of thing, earlier. So this is the first time we saw it, face to face, and the family here is scared,” said Mulik Patel.
