John Cowell is accused in a deadly stabbing at an Oakland train station Sunday night. (BART)
A paroled felon who police say attacked two sisters with a knife at an Oakland train station Sunday night – killing one and injuring the other – was arrested Monday night
Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) said 27-year-old John Cowell was taken into custody at a station in Walnut Creek, not far from where police say he attacked 18-year-old Nia Wilson, who died, and her 26-year-old sister Lahtifa.
Earlier Monday, BART Police Chief Carlos Rojas said Cowell was cited for fare evasion on Wednesday and his photo was captured by an officer's body camera. Authorities released that image and another one from surveillance video that shows him at MacArthur station in north Oakland Sunday night dressed in a white and gray sweatshirt and carrying a backpack.
“Thank you BPD and thank [you] riders for keeping your eye out!!!” the transit service tweeted. Details of Cowell’s arrest were not immediately available.
Lahtifa Wilson told KGO-TV Monday night that she, Nia and a third sister, 21-year-old Tasiya, were returning from a family outing when they were "blindsided by a maniac."
"I looked back and he was wiping off his knife and stood at the stairs and just looked. From then on, I was caring for my sister," said Wilson, who spoke outside a family member's home with a bandage on her neck.
Wilson said a woman with a stroller gave her a baby blanket to apply pressure to her sister's neck, but Nia Wilson died calling out her sister's name for help.
Wilson said she told her sister she loved her.
"We're gonna get through this, I got you, you're my baby sister," she said.
Surveillance video on the train and at the station's platform showed Cowell had been riding the same car as the sisters, but they did not interact, Rojas said.
As the group got on the platform, Cowell quickly attacked them. Footage showed the suspect fleeing the station through a parking lot and stripping off his clothes there. Detectives recovered a knife they believed was used in the attack at a nearby construction site, Rojas said.
Ansar Muhammad, who identified himself as the girls' father, told KTVU that one of his daughters called him, crying hysterically, and told him to get to the MacArthur station.
Wilson said a woman with a stroller gave her a baby blanket to apply pressure to her sister's neck, but Nia Wilson died calling out her sister's name for help.
Wilson said she told her sister she loved her.
"We're gonna get through this, I got you, you're my baby sister," she said.
Surveillance video on the train and at the station's platform showed Cowell had been riding the same car as the sisters, but they did not interact, Rojas said.
As the group got on the platform, Cowell quickly attacked them. Footage showed the suspect fleeing the station through a parking lot and stripping off his clothes there. Detectives recovered a knife they believed was used in the attack at a nearby construction site, Rojas said.
"I get here and I see all the police and ambulance and I ran up the platform and I see my youngest daughter laying up on their tarp, dead," he told the station through tears. "I want justice for my daughter. I want justice for my daughter. Please, help me get justice for my daughter."
Ebony Monroe, a cousin of the victims, initially said Tashiya Wilson had been injured but authorities later said it was Lahtifa.
Monroe was among several relatives who went to the train station Sunday night after hearing about the attack. She said the Wilson sisters were returning home after celebrating Nia's late boyfriend's birthday. He drowned in a lake two years ago, Monroe said.
Monroe, 24, said her cousin attended Oakland High School and loved her family, dancing and makeup.
"She was a beautiful person inside and out, and she didn't deserve it," Monroe said.
A man who witnessed the attack told them the suspect came out of nowhere and slit Nia's throat while she was sitting down in the train and that he stabbed her sister as she tried to stop him, she said.
"She died for no reason," Monroe said. "We want to see justice."
Cowell recently completed a jail sentence for his conviction on a 2016 robbery in Contra Costa County. He also had prior arrests in Alameda County, as well as warrants out for his arrest, the East Bay Times reported.
Rojas said investigators were trying to determine what led to the attack. They have no information it was racially motivated, but they are not discarding that as a possible motive, he said. Cowell is white and the Wilson sisters are black.
The Associated Press contributed to this report
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