EL CAJON : Husband Arrested in Wife’s Death

A 32-year-old El Cajon man has been arrested on suspicion of murder after a purported fight over a kitchen knife left his wife dead, police said.

Robert Ward Carlson dialed 911 shortly before 8 p.m. Tuesday and told police that Donna Shade, 32, had been stabbed with a kitchen knife while the couple struggled over it, Lt. Bob Lein said.

Although Carlson--who is unemployed--at first described Shade as his common-law wife, he later told police they were married four months ago. The couple had been together more than a year, Lein said. Shade had two daughters, ages 5 and 7, and a teen-age son, Lein said.

When police and San Miguel Fire Department paramedics arrived at the house on Alveda Avenue, they found Shade conscious, with a single stab wound in her chest, Lein said.

Paramedics took her to a Life Flight landing zone and were about to fly her to Sharp Memorial Hospital when she died, Lein said.

Carlson was taken in for questioning and was later arrested, police said.

“He indicated there was a struggle over the knife, and he indicated that it was an accident. That was the gist--that she ended up getting stabbed inadvertently,” Lein said. “We listened to the incoming (911) tapes. It appears to us it was beyond any kind of self-defense. Therefore, we charged him with murder.”

Lein said the case will be presented to the district attorney sometime before Friday.

Shade’s daughters were home when the stabbing occurred but they didn’t witness it, Lein said. They have been taken into custody by the county Child Protective Services, a spokeswoman there said.