A woman was stabbed to death in her home an hour after police had been alerted to reports of a man acting suspiciously in her street, it has emerged.
She has been named locally as Nicola Cross, 37, who was attacked at the family home in Hemel Hempstead on Monday while her two children were said to have been asleep in bed and her husband was at work.
Officers, who were initially called at 10.30pm to reports that a man was acting suspiciously in Dunlin Road, spoke with a man who they located.
Hertfordshire constabulary said that a further call was received by a second member of the public at 11.30pm reporting that their home had been broken into in the same street.
Officers who went to that address were said to have then become aware of a disturbance at a neighbouring property, where they found a 37-year-old woman who had been stabbed. She was pronounced dead at the scene.
A 25-year-old man from Hemel Hempstead was arrested on suspicion of murder. A short time later a 19-year-old man, from the same town, was arrested on suspicion of conspiracy to burgle.
The force said that it had made a referral to the Independent Police Complaints Commission. Neighbours said that the Cross family had returned from a two-week summer holiday in Majorca.
One said: “The police and ambulance were called out at about 11 o’clock. The woman next door said she heard screaming. There was a light on in the bedroom on the first floor.
“I think the front door was locked and then police had to get in through the next door neighbour’s house and the garden. Later on I saw a man in his 20s handcuffed in the street. I saw the children being taken away somewhere safe. Early in the morning her husband’s Mercedes was taken off on a low loader.”
Another neighbour said: “It is terrible news. Her husband is a lovely man. They are a nice family.”
The house remained cordoned off on Tuesday and a police forensic tent was at the front. The area at the back of the house was also taped off.
DCI Jerome Kent from the Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire and Hertfordshire major crime unit said: “This is an extremely shocking murder in which a young mother has lost her life.
“Our thoughts are with her children, husband and wider family at this tragic time. The family are being fully supported by specially trained officers.”
